UN calls for sustainable funding to disaster-affected community

The United Nations has reiterated the need for more funding for disaster preparedness, saying that existing financing mechanism largely caters for short term preparedness. They say there is need for joint action towards achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), particularly on conflict prevention and sustaining peace agenda. The call was made on Monday, March 9 during a panel discussion themed “The nexus between humanitarian action and development”, which was organised by the International Committee of the Red Cross and United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Arifur Rahman, the Manager for Livelihoods and Economic Inclusion at UNHCR Rwanda, said that there is need for collaboration, coordination and building capacity to be able to respond to disasters whenever they occur. He said that short-term and long-term preparedness would mean that people act and prepare and not just wait for the crisis to happen. “For instance, (in Rwanda) we are giving cash to refugees instead of food. Refugees have also been integrated in schools while others secured land from the surrounding community so that could help in case of food shortage. This is long-term support,” he said. He reiterated that the approach aims at building the capacity and resilience of vulnerable people. In Rwanda, Rahman said, there is a programme in line with National Strategy for Transformation (NST1) and the SDGs where humanitarian crisis response is embedded in each development plan. Yves Daccord, the Director-General of International Committee of the Red Cross said that there is need to look at joint elements between humanitarian actors and development actors. “As humanitarians, we normally intervene with clear focus on life-saving and emergency care. But we recognise that crisis lasts in some areas. We, as humanitarian, start to look at how we can borrow from competencies and tools from development. We want to work with governments such as on sanitation and water system,” he said. Theorists advocate for humanitarian aid that is developmentally applied to build up peace editor@newtimesrwanda.com

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UN calls for sustainable funding to disaster-affected community