Leer County, Unity State
Demographics
2008 NBS Census population: 53,022
2021 NBS PES population estimate*: 92,228
2022 UN OCHA population estimate*: 77,811
2024 UN OCHA population estimate*: 92,227
2024 IPC population estimate: 80,145
2025 UN OCHA population estimate*: 86,784
Ethnic groups: Dok Nuer (Bapuor, Juong, Tikjak)
Displacement Figures as of September 2024: 38,307 IDPs (-2,453 Sept. 2023) and 30,456 returnees (+6948 Sept. 2023)
IPC Food Security: November 2024 – Crisis (Phase 3); IPC Projections: December to March 2025 – Crisis (Phase 3); April to July 2023 – Emergency (Phase 4)
Economy & Livelihoods
Leer County is located in Unity State. It borders Mayendit County to the west and north and Panyijiar County to the south. The county also borders Jonglei State (Ayod County) in the east. The county forms part of the Nile-Sobat livelihood zone which is characterized by black cotton soil and plentiful water resources. The Kiir and Wuot rivers cross through the county. The soil becomes water-logged during the rainy season and the county’s eastern edge, bordered by the Supiri River, is particularly prone to flooding.
In a 2013 IOM survey, residents responded that their main livelihood activities were farming (35%), livestock (34%) and fishing (29%). More recent FAO/WFP data indicates that 35% of households in Koch County are still engaged in farming, with a gross cereal yield of 0.6 tonnes per hectare in 2021 and 2022 (FAO/WFP 2022; FAO/WFP 2023). Ox-ploughs are not extensively used in Leer County due to the value placed on cattle, which means that crop yields do not reach their full potential.
Additionally, hunting, foraging for wild plants and producing milk are also secondary livelihoods in the county. Residents in this region rely chiefly on goat rearing and sorghum production for their livelihoods. Households also raise cattle and sheep and cultivate other crops such as maize, okra, pumpkin and cowpeas and sorghum as the staple cereal. Farming takes place on a subsistence level and less well-off households purchase nearly half of their staple cereals from the market. The sale of charcoal, firewood, grass and casual labour are also common means of income-generation.
A combination of flooding during the rainy season and violent conflict have limited water and land trade routes and prevented residents from accessing markets, which has driven inflation and deepened poverty (OCHA 2024). The frequent closures of the border with Sudan have also limited the flow of goods, while landmines have prevented some farmers from planting their crops, and residents fear accessing local markets when they must travel on roads that are unsafe.
Leer County has historically suffered from high levels of food insecurity and in February 2017 famine was declared in Leer and Mayendit counties in the south of Unity State. This was the first time since 2011 that famine had been declared anywhere in the world. Relative stability in the county since 2019, as well as humanitarian interventions in the area, have alleviated the pressure of food insecurity for the local population to a certain extent, though renewed conflict in 2022 has once more imperilled livelihoods and food security in the county. In November 2024, the IPC projected the county as being at crisis (IPC level 3) levels of food insecurity, with conditions projected to persist at the same level until April, 2025, when conditions were projected to deteriorate to emergency (IPC level 4) levels, where they would remain until at least July 2025. As of November 2022, at least 25% of households in Leer meet over 50% of their calorific assistance through humanitarian assistance, although the percentage of calorific assistance met through assistance is projected to decline to between 25% and 50% from December 2022 to July 2023.
In 2021 Leer County was identified as a flood-affected county by the Emergency Response Coordination Centre and by OCHA as a county with over 25,000 flood-affected people.
Infrastructure & Services
The county HQ is Leer town located in Juong payam. Road infrastructure is poor, with roads often impassable during the rainy season and physical access only possible via Adok Port in the east of the county.
Leer is home to one Early Childhood Development centre, seventy-one (71) primary schools, and five (5) secondary schools.
In December 2024, the WHO reported that Leer County had fourteen (14) health facilities, of which twelve (12) were functional. These functional facilities included ten (10) primary health care units (PHCUs), two (2) primary health care centres (PHCCs), and no hospitals. This means there were approximately 1.73 PHCUs per 15,000 people and 1.15 PHCCs per 50,000 people in the county at that time. The county’s only hospital was destroyed during the civil war.
According to OCHA’s 2025 Humanitarian Needs Overview, there are an estimated 73,766 people in need in Leer County, which represents approximately 85% of the county’s total population reported by OCHA for 2025. For comparison, in 2024, OCHA reported that there were an estimated 97,839 people in need in Leer County, of whom 35,174 were non-displaced people, with the remainder comprising IDPs and returnees. According to OCHA’s Humanitarian Needs Overview for 2023, about 70,028 people in Leer County had humanitarian needs (up markedly from 53,000 in 2021, due to the effects of renewed conflict and displacement in the county in February and April 2022). This represented nearly 90% of the estimated population of Leer County reported in the HNO, which has placed additional pressure on the already weak infrastructure and services.
Humanitarian conditions (and particularly food insecurity) in Leer County have been worsened by rounds of conflict, with the heightened needs reported in 2022 being only the latest in a series of conflict-induced humanitarian shocks. Following conflict in 2014, most of the county’s population left towns and villages, fleeing either to the bush or to other counties in Unity State. In the same year, the county also received approximately 40,000 IDPs from neighbouring areas, and recurring insecurity contributed to the temporary evacuation of humanitarian organizations from Leer in 2015. Conflict between government and opposition forces resumed in the county in 2017 and 2018. In 2022, insecurity and conflict linked to defections from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement – In Opposition (SPLM-IO) to the breakaway Kitgweng faction of the SPLM-IO – alongside escalating militia activity – resulted in further displacement in Leer, with at least 44,000 civilians displaced (UNMISS 2022, p.14).
Conflict Dynamics
Decades of civil war have regularly brought conflict to Leer County. Prior to the outbreak of civil war in December 2013, violence in Leer mostly took the form of localized conflict. These were often reflected as cattle raiding among youth from Leer, Mayendit and Panyijiar Counties and further afield. Community consultations held in 2012 suggested that these were mostly driven by food insecurity, competition over water and pastures, and poor management of the returns processes following independence (UNDP 2012). The oil fields in Leer and competition over control to tax the main road to Leer County were also seen to have contributed to border disputes and tensions between youth from Leer and Mayendit Counties. As in many other Nuer-populated areas, local spiritual leaders have popular support from communities and played an important role in localized peace-making and advising the aggrieved and authorities on dispute resolution and traditional reconciliation. In Leer the Dok Nuer prophet Gatluak Gatkuoth has played a particularly prominent role, although the authority of both customary chiefs and spiritual leaders over youth has been eroded as a result of the civil war (McCrone et al. 2021).
Like other parts of Unity State, a lack of cohesion amongst the Nuer sub-clans has been accelerated by the use of armed youth as proxies and the mobilization and militarization of community self-defence forces (referred to as ‘gojam’ in the Nuer communities of Leer County) in the context of national conflict. As home to the Dok Nuer – the community from which Riek Machar comes – Leer County was one of the most conflict-affected counties in the country until 2017, with brutal fighting between government and opposition forces leading to significant displacement and loss of life. Control of Leer County continued to shift between government and opposition forces until late 2015 and skirmishes continued throughout 2017-18 as opposition forces moved to and from the bush rather than directly engaging the government. In 2018 government forces and their allied militias launched a coordinated offensive on Leer and Mayendit counties that continued until the middle of the year. Landmines and explosive remnants of war are reportedly littered around Leer (as well as Mayom, Bentiu, Pariang and Abiemnhom), which UNMAS is in the process of identifying and clearing.
Both parties have been accused of committing serious human rights violations in Leer, with most of Leer town being destroyed. For example, according to the UN, between April and September 2015, an estimated 1,000 civilians were killed, 1,300 women and girls were raped, and 1,600 women and children were abducted in Leer, Mayendit and Koch counties alone (Protection Cluster 2015). Verification of incidents is difficult because Leer (and other southern Unity counties) was cut off to humanitarian agencies for months at a time, due to fighting, and there is no systematic process for counting fatalities and casualties in South Sudan.
The lull in large-scale hostilities in Unity state was broken in April 2018 when the SPLA, the SPLA-IO under Taban Deng Gai, and armed Nuer youth militias from Koch, Guit and Rubkona began moving south attacking villages in Leer. Many of the attacks documented by Amnesty International involved with the use of both light and heavy weapons, indicating the highly organised and asymmetric nature of this violence. Many villages were allegedly attacked multiple times in what appears to be an effort to ensure that civilians were permanently displaced from their homes (Amnesty International 2018). Following this, UNMISS deployed more peacekeepers to the area, and increased patrols; maintaining this presence and the TPA into 2021.
The situation remains largely unstable around Leer with significant numbers of opposition forces remaining in bases outside of town. Appointments made to Leer County as part of the R-TOGNU caused concern among the local population and international partners due to their alleged role in leading pro-government forces in the area during the civil war and the perceived legacies of human rights violations and discontent that have been left behind. Armed youth from Koch and Mayendit counties were implicated by the UN in attacks on Leer between February and April 2022, during which at least 72 civilians were killed, widespread SGBV was reported, and up to 40,000 were displaced (UNMISS 2022).
Administration & Logistics
Payams:  Adok, Bou, Guat, Juong Kang, Padeah, Pilieny, Yang, Thonyor
UN OCHA 2020 map of Leer County: https://reliefweb.int/map/south-sudan/south-sudan-leer-county-reference-map-march-2020
Roads:
- Leer has a single primary road running diagonally from Mayendit County in the north-west of Leer County to Adok port in the south-east. The road connects Leer town to the main Unity State trunk road at its west (connecting Lakes and Central Equatoria to Unity State) and Adok port on the Nile to its east. The road between Mir Mir and Adok was deemed impassable during the rainy season of 2024. During the dry season of 2025, it was deemed passable between Mir Mir and Leer and impassable between Leer and Adok. A secondary road runs west from northern Leer County into Mayendit County. The condition of the road is unknown, but generally only accessible during the dry season..
- The river route along the Nile from Bor to northern Unity State passes through the eastern side of Leer County, with the county being served by a port at Adok.
UNHAS-Recognized Heli-Landing-Sites and Airstrips: Leer
Additional MAF-Recognised Airstrips: Padeah, Din Din
The logistic cluster serves Adok Port and coordinates humanitarian barge and boat traffic. As of 2025, the logistics cluster is operating river transportation at 50%, owing to funding constraints.
References
FAO/WFP. (2023). Special Report: FAO/WFP Crop and Food Security Assessment Mission to South Sudan. Retrieved 31 July 2023. See equivalent versions of the CFSAM report online for data from previous years.
FEWSNET. (2018). ‘Livelihoods Zone Map and Descriptions for the Republic of South Sudan (Updated)’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Juba Echo. (2022). ‘Deaths, displacements sum up increasing violence in Unity State’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
OCHA. (2024). South Sudan Humanitarian Snapshot. Retrieved 17 March 2025.
OCHA. (2021). ‘Humanitarian Needs Overview: South Sudan 2021’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Protection Cluster. (2015). ‘Protection Cluster Situation Update: Southern and Central Unity (April-September 2015)’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
UNDP. (2012). ‘Community Consultation Report: Unity State, South Sudan. May 2012’. No longer available online on 7 August 2023.
UNMISS. (2022). ‘Press release: Rape, gang-rape and beheadings among human right violations documented in Leer, South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Reports on Leer
Amnesty International. (2016). ‘“Their Voices Stopped’: Mass Killings in a Shipping Container in Leer, South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Amnesty International. (2018). ‘“Anything that was breathing was killed”: War Crimes in Leer and Mayendit, South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Barasa, M. & Waswa, F. (2015). ‘Effects of Returnees Re-Integration on the Livelihoods of Host Communities in Leer County, South Sudan’. International Journal of African and Asian Studies 14. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Coalition for Humanity South Sudan. (2018). ‘Conflict Dynamics in Leer County, South Sudan: Issues, Barrier and Opportunities Towards Conflict Transformation’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Craze, J., Tubiana, J., & Gramizzi, C. (2016). ‘A state of disunity: Conflict dynamics in unity state, South Sudan, 2013-15’. Small Arms Survey. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Human Rights Watch. (2015). ‘“They Burned it All”: Destruction of Villages, Killings, and Sexual Violence in Unity State South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
International Crisis Group. (2017). ‘Instruments of Pain (II): Conflict and Famine in South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
IOM. (2013). ‘Village Assessment Survey: County Atlas’. No longer available online on 7 August 2023.
Kirk, T., Pendle, N., & Diing Akoi. (2024). Community self-protection, public authority and the safety of strangers in Bor and Ler, South Sudan. Global Policy 16(1), 86-97.
McCrone, F. et al. (2021). ‘The War (s) in South Sudan: Local dimensions of conflict, governance and the political marketplace’, LSE. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Mercy Corps. (2015). ‘Emergency Market Mapping and Analysis: Livestock Off-take and Sorghum Market Systems in Leer County, Unity, South Sudan’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Pendle, N. (2020). ‘Politics, prophets and armed mobilizations: competition and continuity over registers of authority in South Sudan’s conflicts’, Journal of Eastern African Studies 14 (1), 43–62. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
Pragst, F. et al. (2017). ‘High concentrations of lead and barium in hair of the rural population caused by water pollution in the Thar Jath oilfields in South Sudan’. Forensic science international, 274, 99-106. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
UNDP (2012). ‘Community Consultation Report: Unity State, South Sudan’. No longer available online on 7 August 2023.
UNICEF. (2016). Social Map – Leer. Retrieved 17 March 2025.
UNMISS/OHCHR. (2019). ‘Conflict-related sexual violence in northern Unity: September – December 2018’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
UNMISS /OHCHR. (2022). ‘Attacks against civilians in southern Unity State, South Sudan February – May 2022’. Retrieved 16 July 2023.
* Note: The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Population Estimation Survey (PES) was published in April 2023 based on data collected in May-June 2021. This uses a different method to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) Population Working Group (PWG) figures produced based on a combination of 2008 census data and population movement data up to 2022. The large discrepancies are primarily attributable to these different methods rather than changes in the actual population numbers over time and have been disputed by some civil society and analysts. Although the later PWG figures were produced more recently for the HNO 2023, at the request of the Government of South Sudan the data and method used by the PES is being used as the basis for the Common Operational Dataset (COD) for the UN system for the HNO 2024 and likely beyond. For further detail on this and other sources used in the county profiles, see the accompanying Methodological Note.
