DEC Cyclone Idai Response Meta-Synthesis Report
Recommendations
Recommendations CHS Commitment 1: Communities and people affected by crisis receive assistance appropriate to their needs. 1. Member agencies should increase collaboration and coordination in the area of needs assessments. In particular: ▪ Co-designing assessment frameworks would enable non-specialist organisations to benefit from the expertise of those with areas of specialism (GBV survivors, children, older people, people with disabilities, etc), ensuring that all vulnerable people are identified and included. ▪ Disaggregating and using data appropriately would provide a check on the inclusion and participation of specific vulnerable groups. The DEC could facilitate this by: ▪ Encouraging member agencies to produce joint needs assessments where practicable ▪ Insisting that beneficiary data be disaggregated by sex, age and disability, and that member agencies use the Washington Group questions to identify people with disabilities. This was identified as a weakness of the Indonesia Tsunami Response, as the metasynthesis stated: ‘Some members used important tools like the Washington Group Questions; however, the capacity to properly use these tools is still limited across most DEC members.’ It is not the DEC’s responsibility to build member agencies’ capacity in this, but donors have the opportunity to influence organisations to present data in specific ways, and this might be a way to encourage members to improve their practice.
It is important to note that lack of data is data: in other words, if beneficiary lists do not include at least 15% people with disabilities, and at least 10% older people, agencies can be confident that they are missing vulnerable people and need to review their targeting strategies. 2. Member agencies should improve the inclusion of people with disabilities and older people. This can be achieved through: ▪ Engaging with local organisations and groups representing older people and / or people with disabilities. Bringing groups with different specialisms together would improve understanding of the needs and capacities of people with multi-layered, intersectional vulnerabilities, as well as enabling responding agencies to identify these people. ▪ Learning from each other, and from external experts (for example, CBM UK provides training to INGOs on inclusion of people with disabilities, and publishes a wide range of applied research papers on inclusion in humanitarian settings). ▪ Differentiating assistance so that people with a range of abilities can participate (eg cash for work). ▪ Ensuring that all work meets the Humanitarian inclusion standards for older people and people with disabilities. The DEC could facilitate this by: ▪ Using the forthcoming Inclusion report to increase members’ capacity in this area. ▪ Asking members to report (even periodically) against the Inclusion Standards. 26
