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Self Report 2017

The self-report on WHS Commitments below is organized according to the 24 transformations of the Agenda for Humanity. It is based on commitments pledged at the time of report submission. Click on the 'Expand' symbol to expand each section and read the reporting inputs by transformation.

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1B
Act early

Core Commitment

  • Commitment
  • Core Responsibility
  • Commit to act early upon potential conflict situations based on early warning findings and shared conflict analysis, in accordance with international law.
  • Political Leadership to Prevent and End Conflicts
  • Commit to make successful conflict prevention visible by capturing, consolidating and sharing good practices and lessons learnt.
  • Political Leadership to Prevent and End Conflicts

  • What led your organization to make the commitment?

    INTERSOS works mainly in conflict situations. This is why prevention and early warning findings are of the utmost importance for INTERSOS and its operations. Not only do we need to respond to the needs of the population affected by war, natural disasters and extreme poverty, but we also have to reduce these needs in the first place. We want to implement actions towards this aim in order to make such commitment a preventing tool.

  • Achievements at a glance

    To us, an achievement is to inform decision makers and relevant stakeholders regarding the actual and potential conflict situations we work in. This way, they are more prepared to take informed decisions on the root causes of such conflicts and/or on how to best prevent them. This we do through the organization of individual and public meetings with stakeholders or groups of stakeholders. Specifically, we organized meetings in Rome with the Humanitarian Coordinator in the UN Mission in South Sudan and other key Italian figures in the humanitarian and cooperation fields. We also organized individual meetings with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (DGCS) and the Agenzia Italiana per la Cooperazione allo Sviluppo (AICS) on specific contexts such as Yemen, Lake Chad, and the Mosul crisis. During these meetings, we increased political awareness on the above-mentioned crises, pointing out the actual circumstances on the ground as perceived by our operators.

  • How is your organization assessing progress

    We assess progress by monitoring the number of our initiatives as well as to what extent they involve the relevant stakeholders. We acknowledge the fact that progress in this field has to be assessed on the ground, though we reckon the complexity of measuring it in a crisis situation. We thus assess our progress by verifying whether our actions (i.e. meetings, advocacy, information sharing) make stakeholders willing to and able to act timely and effectively where needed.

  • Challenges faced in implementation

    The main challenge is represented by the difficulty of implementing these commitments. At the same time, this is also the reason why we committed to this ambitious aim. Among the many challenges we faced, lack of interests in certain contexts, conflicting political agendas, and our resource availability (both financial and staff) were the most pressing ones.

  • Next step to advance implementation in 2017

    We plan to continue in this direction, insisting on making the realities and root causes of conflicts visible to the relevant stakeholders. We also plan to share our good practices with the other NGOs we work with. Moreover, as much as this is in our resource capacity, we seek to have more dedicated staff and to increase our organizational culture on lobbying and advocacy.

  • If you had one message for the annual report on what is most needed to advance the transformation 'Act early', what would it be

    It is of the utmost importance that qualitative improvement of data and better information sharing are achieved, in order to influence decision-making processes in early warning and conflict prevention systems.

  • Cross cutting issues

    ☑People-centred approach

4A
Reinforce, do not replace, national and local systems

Individual Commitment

  • Commitment
  • Commitment Type
  • Core Responsibility
  • INTERSOS commits to establishing a common approach to providing information to affected people and collecting, aggregating and analysing feedback from communities to influence decision-making processes at strategic and operational levels.
  • Operational
  • Change People's Lives: From Delivering Aid to Ending Need

  • What led your organization to make the commitment?

    INTERSOS believes that provision of meaningful information and feedback is lifesaving for crisis-affected people, especially in conflict contexts, and that their voices can help redirect programmes and influence policy and decision making processes. Prior to this commitment, INTERSOS used to provide information to affected people and gather feedback from them in a non-systemic way, that is why we chose to standardize tools to gather feedback from beneficiaries and to make this process mandatory for our programmes.

  • Achievements at a glance

    INTERSOS chose Jordan as its pilot mission where an innovative database has been developed to adequately collect data and feedback about vulnerabilities directly from the affected population. Data is collected through tablets and a vulnerability scoring system is automatized so as to guarantee fairness and consistency of aid. Data is then analysed and feeds regular reports about specific challenges linked to the status of refugees in Jordan. The reports are shared with donors and other humanitarian partners to bring attention to less visible concerns and challenges of the affected population. Collection of feedback has been systematized in Jordan and Lebanon equally, where each beneficiary has the opportunity to share his/her views through several dedicated systems, i.e. static boxes, social media and with dedicated staff. Views and feedback support the development and evaluation of ongoing and past programmes.

  • How is your organization assessing progress

    As an initial indicator for the analysis of feedback and data, the Jordan mission aimed at listening to the voices of at least 600 affected people through individual and group consultations within the second half of 2016. As this has materialized, 2017 will see this number doubled in Jordan and the same initial number of 600 exported to other missions. Our progress indicator will be the number of INTERSOS missions where this operational policy will be implemented.

  • Challenges faced in implementation

    The necessity to build the capacity of translating the proximity with affected population into coherent data to be analysed and used for programmes and advocacy represents INTERSOS' major challenge. Other challenges revolve around the lack of staff able to concentrate on analysis and elaboration of data, instead of implementing programmes. Financial constraints and donors’ dependency are another challenge in implementing this commitment.

  • Next step to advance implementation in 2017

    In 2017, INTERSOS Middle East missions will implement organizational policies where feedback and views of affected population will be gathered and analysed on a regular basis. As part of a regional initiative within the context of the Mixed Migration Platform, this information will be used to produce at least two large research projects that will be disseminated among donors, humanitarian actors, academia etc. Provision of lifesaving information is also being undertaken at different levels and in different contexts, mainly for populations affected by displacements and conflicts. Standardized tools will be developed.

  • If you had one message for the annual report on what is most needed to advance the transformation 'Reinforce, do not replace, national and local systems', what would it be

    In order to deliver effective and timely emergency assistance, it is necessary to know crisis-affected people's needs and priorities. Therefore, improved systems of data collection and feedback gathering are required and should be standardized among the intervening actors to promote international and national coordination and mutual support.

  • Cross cutting issues

    ☑Accountability to affected people ☑ People-centred approach

  • Other related Agenda for Humanity transformations

    ☑1D - Develop solutions with and for people