Commission staff working paper

Cross-cutting issues

The Commission is committed to mainstreaming cross-cutting issues throughout its activities. They include, for example, gender equality or children's rights. These objectives are promoted and supported in all humanitarian aid operations through the contents of financing decisions and contracts. They are also vital to strengthen the impact of humanitarian aid in general and should be taken into account and integrated into all projects.

1. Gender

In 2009 the Commission received the results of the review it commissioned on gender issues in humanitarian aid, including strategies against gender-based violence in humanitarian settings. This review, a commitment in the Consensus Action Plan, was the first step in the Commission's drive to strengthen its gender approach in the delivery of humanitarian aid.

The review looked at the experiences of selected donor governments and partners, and presented good practice and recommendations. It proposed developing a policy of identifying specific target areas for gender-related activities and practical steps to be taken to integrate gender considerations more fully in humanitarian operations. It also recommended that the Commission's position on issues such as sexual and gender-based violence, gender analysis, gender data and information systems, gender in the cluster system and capacity building etc should be clarified.

The Commission took stock of the review's recommendations and has started to work on ensuring integration of the specific needs, vulnerabilities and capacities of different segments of the population in the design and implementation of its humanitarian interventions. In November 2009, the Commission held a consultation with partners to discuss the results of the review and to open the debate on two challenging issues: gender mainstreaming and gender-based violence. This meeting enabled gender experts and policy makers to meet and helped to identify key issues to be developed in the forthcoming policy document.

Finally, the Commission contributed to the development of the Gender Action Plan as well as to the implementation of the EU Comprehensive approach to UN Security Council resolutions 1325 and 1820 on women, peace and security.

2. Children

After the adoption of a document on children in emergencies⁸ in 2008, the Commission continued in 2009 its work mainly through calling for more attention to children's needs in EU-funded humanitarian interventions. Preventing separation during return programmes is a high priority. The Commission also continued to work on a better integration of children's rights and needs in EU policies.

7. Aid effectiveness

   1. Needs assessment

The Commission has been actively engaged in debates on setting-up better co-ordinated, more coherent common needs assessment.

This thinking is being developed in the context of the Inter-Agency Standing Committee Needs Assessment Task Force. The Needs Assessment Group (created in March 2009), which later became the IASC Needs Assessment Task Force (July 2009), has developed Terms of Reference and a work plan for September 2009-September 2010. The Commission organised a multi-donor consultation on humanitarian needs assessment in May to facilitate a concerted donor approach to needs assessment. The meeting triggered regular informal exchanges among donors. The Commission also proposed a multi-donor letter to Sir John Holmes in support of OCHA's role in needs assessment. The letter was signed in May 2009 by 25 humanitarian donors.

On 16 October 2009, the Commission organised a Donor Roundtable in Geneva on a Common Needs Assessment/Dashboard. The meeting expressed continued strong support for more reliable assessment, and support for the work of OCHA and the IASC Needs Assessment Task Force to this end.

2. Capacity building

The Commission is committed to the Capacity Building approach through the European Consensus on Humanitarian Aid. In the Consensus, the Commission, EU Member States and the European Parliament agreed that "…supporting the development of the collective global capacity to respond to humanitarian crises is one of the fundamental tenets of our [EU] approach"⁹. Correspondingly, the Consensus Action Plan asks the EU to "…explore how to enhance support to capacity building, including in the cluster approach and provisions for reinforcing local capacity… and to promote a multi-donor approach to capacity building"^10..

In addition, as a Good Humanitarian Donor, the Commission is committed to allocating "funding to strengthen capacities for response"¹¹.

Following up on this commitment, an extensive consultation process was launched in 2008 and continued into 2009. This involved consultations with partners, other donors and humanitarian actors. It concluded with a Round Table Conference in January 2009. As a result, Financing Guidelines for Capacity Building were adopted in September 2009. These identify the main gaps in the global humanitarian system and define how the EU's humanitarian funding can best be used to address these gaps.

For 2009 and 2010, €25 million is available for EU humanitarian Capacity Building Funding. This is primarily for:

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  needs assessment work by OCHA, the Food and Agriculture Organisation and the World Food Programme (WFP);
  
• 
  building global humanitarian health capacity, especially through the health cluster roll-out, through World Health Organisation;
  
• 
  building global humanitarian water/sanitation capacity, especially through the water/sanitation cluster roll-out, through the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF); building global humanitarian logistics capacity through WFP, especially through the logistics cluster;
  
• 
  building local, regional and international capacity to respond to disasters through the International Federation of the Red Cross and the Red Crescent Societies (IFRC).
  

Over €25 million of EU humanitarian Capacity Building funding since 2006 has been allocated to the cluster approach, so a workshop to review progress on this was held at the ECHO Partners' Conference in December 2009.

As part of the 2009 Capacity Building programme, the EU has supported OCHA's project on “strengthening the co-ordination of humanitarian response”. This included several components, including the Assessment and Classification of Emergencies. An important element is the development of a Humanitarian Dashboard, a tool to consolidate needs assessment and other core humanitarian information across sectors, presenting information in a one-page summary of key information and indicators, to strengthen evidence-based humanitarian decision-making. The tool was field-tested in Kenya in late 2009. This led to improvements that will be piloted in early 2010.

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