Humanitarian Exchange articles tagged:Emergency interventions

Cash for work and cash transfers have been used increasingly since 2005 to try to reduce chronic vulnerability in Niger. They have been used as part of humanitarian relief as well as disaster risk reduction (DRR) programmes. This article examines how one organisation, Jeunesse En Mission Entraide et Développement (JEMED), has sought to integrate cash for work, sales of food and fodder at a reduced price and long-term development activities, including land regeneration, into a single programme in Abalak, northern Niger, and the impact of this integrated approach on the resilience of pastoralists. In addressing chronic vulnerability, traditional humanitarian relief…

Life is not easy in the Sahelian and Northern regions of Burkina Faso. These regions are characterised by arid soils, land and resource degradation and recurrent droughts, aggravated by persistent high temperatures, erratic rainfall, violent winds and deforestation. Other recurring shocks, such as epidemics and disease, further undermine development gains. Many villages are caught in a perpetual cycle of drought, floods, hunger and locust invasions. Efforts to build local communities’ resilience to these risks and crises are being put to the test by the complex and deepening food crisis across West Africa. Eighteen million people are affected, including a million…

Poor harvests in 2011, and then armed conflict and violence: people in northern Mali have been hit doubly hard. They are no longer able to meet their basic food needs. The majority of rural households owe their livelihood to farming and livestock activities. They have not had time to recover from the effects of drought, which has reduced their food security in recent years, and they are now suffering from the negative effects of conflict as well. Food is scarce and expensive and people have no income to buy what they need. Their resilience capacity has been severely depleted by…

In the wake of drought in West Africa’s Sahel region, a bleak narrative of an estimated 18.7 million people on the brink of potential catastrophic food crisis has captured media attention. There has been a constant drumbeat of calls from many agencies for more humanitarian funding. Agricultural production in the Sahel fell due to late and irregular rains and prolonged dry spells in 2011. Drought also caused a significant fodder deficit in the pastoral areas of the Sahel. The Food Crisis Prevention Network (RPCA) meeting of 12–13 April confirmed that Sahel cereal production in 2011 was 26% lower than in…

The special feature of this issue of Humanitarian Exchange focuses on the humanitarian crisis in the Sahel region of Africa, where aid agencies estimate that more than 18 million people are affected by food insecurity. It is available to download in English and French. In the lead article Peter Gubbels argues that the main cause of this crisis is not drought or a food shortage but a ‘resilience deficit’ which has left vulnerable people unprotected against shocks like rain failure and exceptionally high food prices. Northern Mali has been hit doubly hard by a poor harvest in 2011, followed by…

While welfare, such as free humanitarian aid, is arguably the sign of a civilised society, it is sometimes accused of ‘creating dependency’, undermining sustainable selfsufficiency and demeaning its recipients. The idea that dependency is a bad thing and that free assistance de facto creates dependency not only has long roots in the history of humanitarianism, but also is nourished by the strongly held feelings of those who believe that relief too should be in some way sustainable, linked maybe with a desire to move towards more developmental approaches. Humanitarian agencies tend to look at the situations of people affected by…

Diasporas play a vital role in supporting relatives and communities back home. Over the past 20 years Somalis from around the world have provided a significant amount of humanitarian and development assistance to communities in Somalia: a recent UN Development Programme (UNDP) survey estimated that between $130 million and $200m is given annually for these activities, while private remittances contribute an even greater share.[1] The Somali community in the UK is one of the largest and longest-established in Europe, with a number of charities providing direct assistance to Somalia.[2] However, as a result of clan and social tensions, limited organisational…

The challenges of responding to the catastrophic earthquake in Haiti in January 2010 were huge and varied, prompting agencies to think and act creatively. Christian Aid’s partners distributed cash to people affected by the disaster two weeks after the earthquake struck. Some Christian Aid partners chose to respond with cash, rather than with goods in-kind, as they recognised the diverse needs of those affected, the flexibility of cash to meet those needs, the importance of preserving people’s dignity by transferring choice to them and the need to support local markets. The cash response Initial assessments highlighted the enormous range of…

Rapid-onset emergencies are not contexts where one would expect to see innovation. The scale of devastation requires focused and fast action. Emergency professionals apply standard operating procedures and proven methodologies from previous humanitarian responses, and there is no time to develop and test innovative solutions effectively. Yet it could also be argued that crisis situations open up opportunities that make lasting change possible. Considering non-traditional solutions is easier because the disaster highlights that business as usual is no longer an option. The introduction of ‘mobile money’ following the devastating earthquake in Haiti in January 2010 is an important example of…

Information and communication technology is evolving at an extraordinary pace, changing the way we live and work. In recent years, advances in mobile phone penetration and other new technologies in low-income and disaster-affected countries mean that there is growing interest from donors, practitioners and governments as to how technology can serve humanitarian responses. This article summarises the findings of a study commissioned by the Cash Learning Partnership (CaLP) to review the current use of new technology in humanitarian cash and voucher programming, and the broader implications for humanitarian practice[1]. It explores three different areas of technology (electronic payments, mobile communications…