Displaying items by tag: Vulnerable groups

About the course The training covers essential methodologies of evaluation and applies them to conflict intervention, peace-building, and recovery initiatives. We cover challenges such as rudimentary plans, lack of information and complex implementation structures. 

From Iran to western China, Central Asia is suffering its worst drought in decades. One of the states hardest-hit has been Afghanistan; poor and conflict-ridden, it is also the least able to cope Afghanistan is in its third year of severe drought, compounding the effects of conflict and international isolation. Precarious security conditions and problems of access make needs difficult to assess, but it is clear that the food crisis in much of the country has become acute. Millions of Afghans have little or no access to food, and require international humanitarian food aid. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands more have been forced from their homes, congregating in camps in Afghanistan or across…

Jennifer F. Klot directed Graça Machel’s secretariat for the UN Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children. She has worked with international nongovernmental organisations, private foundations and multilateral agencies in the area of human rights, youth development, women’s rights, and development planning in both the United States and in Africa. “The report on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children is testimony to the millions of children who have been killed, injured and permanently disabled as a result of armed conflicts. It is testimony to countless others who have been forced to witness and take part in horrifying…

As the 18-month uprising in Syria rages on hundreds of thousands of refugees are crossing into neighboring countries of Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey. While the immediate responses have rightly focused on survival needs such as food, water, and health, education must also be addressed as early as possible. The importance of education in crisis situations is gaining momentum on international agendas, with USAID highlighting it as a goal in the 2011-2015 Education Strategy: “Increased equitable access to education in crisis and conflict environments for 15 million learners by 2015.” More recently, at the United Nations General Assembly meeting in…

There have been an unprecedented number of both natural and conflict-related disasters in recent years. Much has been learned about how to reduce the risk of disasters and prepare communities to respond and increased attention has been given to protecting vulnerable groups in crisis contexts. There are now numerous case studies and toolkits on gender and humanitarian relief and the body of knowledge is growing on age and disability. But there is one area about which we still know very little - the experience and needs of an estimated 21 million lesbian, gay and bisexual people believed to be affected…

Evidence of the particular vulnerabilities of LGBTI people (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex) has been documented in several emergency and disaster situations. For example, men who have sex with men (MSM) in Haiti were denied food aid after the 2008 earthquake because ration schemes were targeted only at women, and these men had no women registered in their residences; transgender people reported being denied entry to IDP camps after the floods in Pakistan because they did not possess proper government ID that matched their appearance; and aravanis (feminine, male-bodied, gender-variant people) routinely faced discrimination in access to housing, medical…

The IDP Vulnerability Assessment and Profiling (IVAP) project was launched in Pakistan in 2010 to enable agencies to provide humanitarian assistance in a more impartial and targeted manner. Responding to needs arising out of a protracted conflict, humanitarian agencies in Pakistan’s north-western Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) province were preparing to provide aid to hundreds of thousands of conflict IDPs for a third consecutive year. Effective targeting of beneficiaries – particularly in a period when financial resources were steadily decreasing – required humanitarian agencies to locate and identify those directly affected by the conflict, broadly understand their priority needs and then analyse…

The Household Economy Approach (HEA) is widely used as a framework for understanding food security, livelihoods and poverty. The framework also has the potential to inform social protection programming by improving understanding of the context in intervention areas, and enhancing targeting and coverage. In the Sahel, HEA has been used successfully for social protection programming in Niger and Mali in the form of safety nets based on regular cash transfers. Save the Children piloted safety nets in the Niger district of Tessaoua from 2008 to 2009 using HEA as a targeting and monitoring tool. The programme reached around 26,000 of…

Niger is a landlocked country in the Sahelian zone of West Africa. Ranked 186 out of 187 countries on the UN Development Programme (UNDP)’s Human Development Index, Niger faces extreme poverty and vulnerability caused by climatic factors and recurrent food crises. These crises have triggered large humanitarian responses involving food aid, nutrition interventions and cash transfers. These interventions, while important, have not addressed underlying issues of chronic vulnerability, which might be better tackled through social safety nets and social protection programming. This article examines the piloting of social safety nets in Niger, using cash transfers combined with the promotion of…

Nine years ago a bomb ripped through the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad killing 22 people including the UN's chief envoy to Iraq, Sergio Vieira de Mello. Later that same year a series of suicide bombings struck other targets in Baghdad including the International Committee of the Red Cross - the first attack of this kind in the ICRC's history. Since then August 19th has been designated World Humanitarian Day to remind us of those who put themselves at risk to provide humanitarian assistance to people in need. This year's anniversary will commemorate the highest annual incidence of major attacks…