ngos kenya job opportunities

president obama: hey! audience: hey! president obama: habari zenu! (applause) wakenya mpo? it is greatto be back in kenya. thank you so much for thisextraordinary welcome. i know it took a few years,but as president i try to keep my promises, and i said i wasgoing to come, and i'm here.

everybody, go aheadand have a seat. i'm going to betalking for a while. (laughter) relax. i want to thank my sister, auma,for a wonderful introduction. i'm so glad that she couldbe with us here today. and it was -- as she said,it was auma who first guided me through kenyaalmost 30 years ago. to president kenyatta, iwant to thank you once again

for the hospitality thatyou've shown to me -- -- and for our worktogether on this visit, and for being here today.it's a great honor. i am proud to be thefirst american president to come to kenya -- -- and, of course, i'mthe first kenyan-american to be president ofthe united states. (laughter and applause) that goes without saying.

audience member:i love you, obama! president obama:i love you back. i do. but, as auma wassaying, the first time i came to kenya, thingswere a little different. when i arrived atkenyatta airport, the airline lost my bags. that doesn't happenon air force one. they always have myluggage on air force one.

as she said, aumapicked me up in an old volkswagon beetle, andthink the entire stay i was here it broke downfour or five times. we'd be on the highway,we'd have to call the juakali -- he'dbring us tools. we'd be sittingthere, waiting. and i slept on a cotin her apartment. instead of eating atfancy banquets with the president, we were drinkingtea and eating ugali --

-- and sukumawiki. so there wasn't alot of luxury. sometimes thelights would go out. they still do -- isthat what someone said? but there was somethingmore important than luxury on that first trip,and that was a sense of being recognized, being seen. i was a young man and i was justa few years out of university. i had worked as a communityorganizer in low-income

neighborhoods in chicago. i was about to goto law school. and when i came here, inmany ways i was a westerner, i was an american, unfamiliarwith my father and his birthplace, really disconnectedfrom half of my heritage. and at that airport, as i wastrying to find my luggage, there was a woman there whoworked for the airlines, and she was helpingfill out the forms, and she saw my name and shelooked up and she asked

if i was related to myfather, who she had known. and that was the first timethat my name meant something. and thatwas recognized. and over the courseof several weeks, i'd meet my brothersand aunts and uncles. i traveled to alego, the villagewhere my family was from. i saw the graves of myfather and my grandfather. and i learned thingsabout their lives that i could have neverlearned through books.

and in many ways, their livesoffered snapshots of kenya's history, but they also told ussomething about the future. my grandfather, for example,he was a cook for the british. and as i went through someof his belongings when i went up-country, i foundthe passbook he had had to carry as adomestic servant. it listed his age andhis height, his tribe, listed the number ofteeth he had missing. and he was referredto as a boy,

even though he was a grownman, in that passbook. and he was in the king'safrican rifles during the second world war, andwas taken to the far reaches of the british empire --all the way to burma. and back home after the war,he was eventually detained for a time because he waslinked to a group that opposed british rule. and eventuallyhe was released. he forged a home forhimself and his family.

he earned the respectof his village, lived a life of dignity --although he had a well-earned reputation for being so strictthat everybody was scared of him and he became estrangedfrom part of his family. so that was his story. and then my father cameof age as kenyans were pursuing independence, andhe was proud to be a part of that liberationgeneration. and next to mygrandfather's papers,

i found letters that hehad written to 30 american universities asking for achance to pursue his dream and get a scholarship. and ultimately, one universitygave him that chance -- the university in hawaii. and he would go on to get aneducation and then return home. and here, at first he foundsuccess as an economist and worked with the government. but ultimately, he founddisappointment -- in part

because he couldn't reconcilethe ideas that he had for his young country withthe hard realities that had confronted him. and i think sometimes aboutwhat these stories tell us, what the history and the pasttell us about the future. they show the enormousbarriers to progress that so many kenyans faced justone or two generations ago. this is a young country. we were talking lastnight at dinner --

the president's father wasthe first president. we're only ageneration removed. and the daily limitations --and sometimes humiliations -- of colonialism --that's recent history. the corruption and cronyismand tribalism that sometimes confront young nations-- that's recent history. but what these storiesalso tell us is an arch of progress -- from foreignrule to independence; from isolation to education,and engagement with

a wider world. it speaks ofincredible progress. so we have to knowthe history of kenya, just as we americans have toknow our american history. all people have to understandwhere they come from. but we also have toremember why these lessons are important. we know a history so thatwe can learn from it. we learn our history becausewe understand the sacrifices

that were made before, so thatwhen we make sacrifices we understand we're doing it onbehalf of future generations. there's a proverb that says,"we have not inherited this land from our forebears,we have borrowed it from our children." in other words, we studythe past so it can guide us into the future, andinspire us to do better. and when it comes to the peopleof kenya -- particularly the youth -- i believe there is nolimit to what you can achieve.

a young, ambitious kenyan todayshould not have to do what my grandfather did, andserve a foreign master. you don't need to dowhat my father did, and leave your home in orderto get a good education and access to opportunity. because of kenya's progress,because of your potential, you can build your futureright here, right now. now, like anycountry, kenya is far from perfect, butit has come so far

in just my lifetime. after a bitter struggle,kenyans claimed their independence just a fewyears after i was born. and after decadesof one party-rule, kenya embraced a multi-partysystem in the 1990s, just as i was beginningmy own political career in the united states. tragically, justunder a decade ago, kenya was nearly torn apartby violence at the same time

that i was running for myfirst campaign for president. and i remember hearingthe reports of thousands of innocent people being killedor driven from their homes. and from a distance, it seemedlike the kenya that i knew -- a kenya that was ableto reach beyond ethnic and tribal lines -- thatit might split apart across those lines oftribe and ethnicity. but look what happened. the people of kenya chose notto be defined by the hatreds

of the past -- youchose a better history. the voices ofordinary people, and political leaders and civilsociety did not eliminate all these divisions, but youaddressed the divisions and differences peacefully. and a new constitutionwas put in place, declaring that "every personhas inherent dignity -- and the right to have that dignityrespected and protected." a competitive election wentforward -- not without problems,

but without the violencethat so many had feared. in other words, kenyanschose to stay together. you chose thepath of harambee. and in part because ofthis political stability, kenya's economy is also emerging-- and the entrepreneurial spirit that people rely onto survive in the streets of kibera can now be seen in newbusinesses across the country. from the city squareto the smallest villages, mpesa is changing theway people use money.

new investment is making kenyaa hub for regional trade. when i came here as a u.s. senator, i pointed out thatsouth korea's economy was the same as kenya's when iwas born, and then was 40 times largerthan kenya's. think about that. it started at the same place-- south korea had gone here, and kenya was here. but today, that gap hasbeen cut in half just

in the last decade. which meanskenya is making progress. and meanwhile, kenya continuesto carve out a distinct place in the community of nations:as a source of peacekeepers for places torn apart byconflict, a host for refugees driven from their homes. a leader for conservation,following the footprints of wangari maathai. kenya is one of theplaces on this continent

that truly observesfreedom of the press, and their fearlessjournalists and courageous civil society members. and in the united states, wesee the legacy of kip keino every time a kenyan winsone of our marathons. and maybe the firstlady of kenya is going to win one soon. i told the presidenthe has to start running with his wife.

we want him to stay fit. so there's muchto be proud of -- much progressto lift up. it's a good-news story. but we also know theprogress is not complete. there are still problems thatshadow ordinary kenyans every day -- challenges that candeny you your livelihood, and sometimes deny you lives. as in america -- and so manycountries around the globe --

economic growth has notalways been broadly shared. sometimes people atthe top do very well, but ordinary peoplestill struggle. today, a young child in nyanzaprovince is four times more likely to die than a childin central province -- even though they are equal indignity and the eyes of god. that's a gap thathas to be closed. a girl in riftvalley is far less likely to attend secondary schoolthan a girl in nairobi.

across the country,one study shows corruption costs kenyans 250,000 jobs everyyear -- because every shilling that's paid as a bribe couldbe put into the pocket of somebody who's actuallydoing an honest day's work. and despite the hard-earnedpolitical progress that i spoke of, thosepolitical gains still have to be protected. new laws and restrictionscould close off the space where civil society givesindividual citizens

a voice and holdsleaders accountable. old tribal divisions andethnic divisions can still be stirred up. i want to be very clear here --a politics that's based solely on tribe and ethnicity isa politics that's doomed to tear a country apart. it is a failure-- a failure of imagination. of course, here, in kenya,we also know the specter of terrorism has touchedfar too many lives.

and we remember the americansand kenyans who died side by side in the attack onour embassy in the '90s. we remember the innocentkenyans who were taken from us at westgate mall. we weep for the nearly 150people slaughtered at garissa -- including so many studentswho had such a bright future before them. we honor the memory of somany other innocent kenyans whose lives have beenlost in this struggle.

so kenya is at a crossroads-- a moment filled with peril, but also enormous promise. and with the rest ofmy time here today, i'd like to talk about howyou can seize the moment, how you can make sure we leavebehind a world that's better -- a world that we borrowedfrom our children. when i first came to sub-saharanafrica as president, i made clear my strong beliefthat the future of africa is up to africans.

for too long, i think thatmany looked to the outside for salvation and focusedon somebody else being at fault for the problemsof the continent. and as my sister said,ultimately we are each responsible forour own destiny. and i'm here as president ofa country that sees kenya as an important partner. i'm here as a friendwho wants kenya to succeed. and the pillars of that successare clear: strong democratic

governance; development thatprovides opportunity for all people and not just some; asense of national identity that rejects conflict for a futureof peace and reconciliation. and today, we can see thatfuture for kenya on the horizon. but tough choices aregoing to have to be made in order to arriveat that destination. in the united states, i alwayssay that what makes america exceptional is not thefact that we're perfect, it's the fact that westruggle to improve.

we're self-critical. we work to live up to ourhighest values and ideals, knowing that we're notalways going to achieve them perfectly, but we keep ontrying to perfect our union. and what's true for americais also true for kenya. you can't be complacent andaccept the world just as it is. you have to imagine what theworld might be and then push and work toward that future. progress requires that youhonestly confront the dark

corners of our own past; extendrights and opportunities to more of your citizens; see thedifferences and diversity of this country as a strength, justas we in america try to see the diversity of our country as astrength and not a weakness. so you can choosethe path to progress, but it requires makingsome important choices. first and foremost, it meanscontinuing down the path of a strong, moreinclusive, more accountable and transparent democracy.

democracy begins with apeacefully-elected government. it begins with elections. but it doesn't stopwith elections. so your constitution offersa road map to governance that's more responsive to thepeople -- through protections against unchecked power,more power in the hands of local communities. for this system tosucceed, there also has to be space for citizensto exercise their rights.

and we saw the strength ofkenya's civil society in the last election, whengroups collected reports of incitement so that violencecould be stopped before it spun out of control. and the ability of citizens toorganize and advocate for change -- that's the oxygenupon which democracy depends. democracy is sometimesmessy, and for leaders, sometimes it's frustrating. democracy means that somebodyis always complaining

about something. nobody is ever happyin a democracy about their government. if you make one person happy,somebody else is unhappy. then sometimes somebody whoyou made happy, later on, now they're not happy. they say, what have youdone for me lately? but that's thenature of democracy. that's why it works, isbecause it's constantly

challenging leaders to uptheir game and to do better. and such civic participationand freedom is also essential for rooting out thecancer of corruption. now, i want to be clear. corruption is notunique to kenya. i mean, i want everybodyto understand that there's no country that'scompletely free of corruption. certainly here in the africancontinent there are many countries that dealwith this problem.

and i want to assure you ispeak about it wherever i go, not just here in kenya. so i don't want everybodyto get too sensitive. but the fact is, toooften, here in kenya -- as is true in otherplaces -- corruption is tolerated because that's howthings have always been done. people just think thatthat is sort of the normal state of affairs. and there was a time inthe united states where

that was true, too. my hometown of chicago wasinfamous for al capone and the mob and organized crimecorrupting law enforcement. but what happened wasthat over time people got fed up, and leadersstood up and they said, we're not going toplay that game anymore. and you changed a cultureand you changed habits. here in kenya, it'stime to change habits, and decisivelybreak that cycle.

because corruptionholds back every aspect of economic and civil life. it's an anchor that weighsyou down and prevents you from achievingwhat you could. if you need to pay a bribe andhire somebody's brother -- who's not very good anddoesn't come to work -- in order to start abusiness, well, that's going to create lessjobs for everybody. if electricity is going to oneneighborhood because they're

well-connected, and notanother neighborhood, that's going to limitdevelopment of the country as a whole. if someone inpublic office is taking a cut that they don'tdeserve, that's taking away from those who arepaying their fair share. so this is not just aboutchanging one law -- although it's important to havelaws on the books that are actually being enforced.

it's important that not onlylow-level corruption is punished, but folks at thetop, if they are taking from the people, that hasto be addressed as well. but it's not somethingthat is just fixed by laws, or that anyone person can fix. it requires a commitmentby the entire nation -- leaders and citizens-- to change habits and to change culture. tough laws need tobe on the books.

and the good news is, yourgovernment is taking some important steps inthe right direction. people who break the lawand violate the public trust need to be prosecuted. ngos have to be allowed tooperate who shine a spotlight on what needs to change. and ordinary people haveto stand up and say, enough is enough. it's timefor a better future.

and as you take these steps,i promise that america will continue to be your partnerin supporting investments in strong, democraticinstitutions. now, we're also going towork with you to pursue the second pillar of progress,and that is development that extends economicopportunity and dignity for all of kenya's people. america partners with kenyain areas where you're making enormous progress, and we focuson what kenyans can do for

themselves and buildingcapacity; on entrepreneurship, where kenya is becomingan engine for innovation; on access to power, where kenyais developing clean energy that can reach more people; on theimportant issue of climate change, where kenya'srecent goal to reduce its emissions has put it in theposition of being a leader on the continent; on foodsecurity, where kenyan crops are producing more tomeet the demands of your people and a global market;and on health, where

kenya has struck huge blowsagainst hiv/aids and other diseases, while building upthe capacity to provide better care inyour communities. america is also partneringwith you on an issue that's fundamental to kenya's future:we are investing in youth. we are investingin the young people of kenya and the young peopleof this continent. robert f. kennedyonce said, "it is a revolutionaryworld that we live in,"

and "it is the youngpeople who must take the lead." it's the young peoplewho must take the lead. so through our young africanleaders initiative -- -- we are empowering andconnecting young people from across the continent who arefilled with energy and optimism and idealism, and are going totake africa to new heights. and theseyoung people, they're not weighteddown by the old ways. they're creating a new path.

and these are the elements forsuccess in this 21st century. to continue down thispath of progress, it will be vital for kenya torecognize that no country can achieve its full potentialunless it draws on the talents of all its people -- and thatmust include the half of kenyans -- maybe a little more thanhalf -- who are women and girls. now, i'm goingto spend a little time on this just for a second. every country and everyculture has traditions that

are unique and help makethat country what it is. but just because somethingis a part of your past doesn't make it right. it doesn't mean thatit defines your future. look at us in theunited states. recently, we've beenhaving a debate about the confederate flag. some of you may befamiliar with this. this was a symbol for thosestates who fought against the

union to preserve slavery. now, as a historicalartifact, it's important. but some have argued that it'sjust a symbol of heritage that should fly in public spaces. the fact is it was a flag thatflew over an army that fought to maintain a system of slaveryand racial subjugation. so we shouldunderstand our history, but we should also recognizethat it sends a bad message to those who were liberatedfrom slavery and oppression.

and in part because of anunspeakable tragedy that took place recently, where a youngman who was a fan of the confederate flag and racialsuperiority shot helpless people in a church, more andmore americans of all races are realizing now that thatflag should come down. just becausesomething is a tradition well, so around the world,there is a tradition of repressing women andtreating them differently, and not giving themthe same opportunities,

and husbandsbeating their wives, and children notbeing sent to school. those are traditions. treating women and girlsas second-class citizens, those are bad traditions. they need to change. they're holding you back. treating women as second-classcitizens is a bad tradition. it holds you back.

there's no excusefor sexual assault or domestic violence. there's no reason thatyoung girls should suffer genitalmutilation. there's no place incivilized society for the early or forcedmarriage of children. these traditions maydate back centuries; they have no placein the 21st century. these are issues ofright and wrong --

in any culture. but they're also issuesof success and failure. any nation that fails to educateits girls or employ its women and allowing them tomaximize their potential is doomed to fall behindin a global economy. you know, we're ina sports center. imagine if you have a teamand you don't let half of the team play. that's stupid.

that makes no sense. and the evidence shows thatcommunities that give their daughters the sameopportunities as their sons, they are more peaceful,they are more prosperous, they develop faster, theyare more likely to succeed. that's true in america. that's true here in kenya. it doesn't matter. and that's why one of themost successful development

policies you can pursue isgiving girls and education, and removing the obstaclesthat stand between them and their dreams. and by the way, if youeducate girls -- they grow up to be moms -- and they,because they're educated, are more likely to produceeducated children. so kenya will notsucceed if it treats women and girls assecond-class citizens. i want to be veryclear about that.

now, this leads me to thethird pillar of progress, and that's choosing a futureof peace and reconciliation. there are realthreats out there. president kenyatta and i spenta lot of time discussing the serious threat fromal-shabaab that kenya faces. the united states facessimilar threats of terrorism. we are grateful for thesacrifices made by kenyans on the front linesas part of amisom. we're proud of theefforts that we're making

to strengthen kenya'scapabilities through our new securitygovernance initiative. we're going to standshoulder-to-shoulder with you in this fight againstterrorism for as long as it takes. but, as i mentionedyesterday, it is important to remember thatviolent extremists want us to turnagainst one another. that's what terroriststypically try to exploit.

they know that theyare a small minority; they know that theycan't win conventionally. so what they try to do istarget societies where they can exploit divisions. that's whathappens in iraq. that's what happensaround the world. that's what happenedin northern ireland. terrorists who try to sow chaos,they must be met with force and they must also be met,though, with a forceful

commitment to uphold therule of law, and respect for human rights, and totreat everybody who's peaceful and law-abidingfairly and equally. extremists who prey ondistrust must be defeated by communities who standtogether and stand for something different. and the most importantexample here is, is that the united statesand kenya both have muslim minorities, butthose minorities make

enormous contributionsto our countries. these are our brothers,they are our sisters. and so in bothour countries, we have to reject calls thatallow us to be divided. this is true forany diverse society. and kenya is rich with diversity-- with many dozens of tribes and ethnicities, and languagesand religious groups. and time and again, justas we've seen the dangers of religious or ethnicviolence, we've seen that kenya

is stronger when kenyansstand united -- with a sense of national identity. that was the case ondecember 12, 1963, when cities and villages acrossthis country celebrated the birth of a nation. it was true in 2010, when kenyareplaced the anarchy of ethnic violence with the orderof a new constitution. so we can all appreciateour own identities, our bloodlines, ourbeliefs, our backgrounds --

that tapestry is whatmakes us who we are. but the history of africa-- which is both the cradle of human progress and a crucibleof conflict -- shows us that when define ourselves narrowly,in opposition to somebody just because they're of adifferent tribe, or race, or religion -- and we ignorewho is a good person or a bad person, are they working hardor not, are they honest or not, are they peaceful or violent-- when we start making distinctions solely based onstatus and not what people

do, then we're taking thewrong path and we inevitably suffer in the end. this is why martinluther king called on people to be judged not by the colorof their skin but the content of their character. and in the same way, peopleshould not be judged by their last name, ortheir religious faith, but by their content of theircharacter and how they behave. are they good citizens?

are they good people? in the united states, we embracethe motto: e pluribus unum. in latin, that means,out of many, one. in kenya, harambee --we are in this together. whatever the challenge, youwill be stronger if you face it not as christians ormuslims, masai, kikuyu, luo, any other tribe-- but as kenyans. and ultimately, that unity isthe source of strength that will empower you to seizethis moment of promise.

that's what will helpyou root out corruption. that's what will strengthendemocratic institutions. that's what will helpyou combat inequality. that's what will help you extendopportunity, and educate youth, and face down threats, andembrace reconciliation. so i want to sayparticularly to the young people here today,kenya is on the move. africa is on the move. you are poised to play abigger role in this world --

-- as the shadows of the pastare replaced by the light that you offer an increasinglyinterconnected world. and in the lightof this new day, we have to learn to seeourselves in one another. we have to see thatwe are connected, our fates arebound together. because, in the end, we'reall part of one tribe -- the human tribe. and no matter who we are,or where we come from,

or what we look like,or who we love, or what god we worship,we're connected. our fates are boundup with one another. kenya holds within itall that diversity. and with diversity,sometimes comes difficulty. but i look to kenya'sfuture filled with hope. and i'm hopeful because ofyou, the people of kenya, especially the young people. there are some amazing examplesof what's going on right now

with young people. i'm hopeful because of a youngman named richard ruto todosia. richard helped build yes youthcan -- i like the phrase, yes youth can -- it became one ofthe most prominent civil societyorganizations in kenya, with over onemillion members. and after the violenceof 2007, 2008, yes youth can stoodup to incitement,

helped bring opportunityto young people in places that werescarred by conflict. that's the kind of youngleadership that we need. i'm hopeful becauseof a young woman named josephine kulea. so josephine foundedsamburu girls foundation. and she's already helpedto rescue over 1,000 girls from abuseand forced marriage, and helped placethem in schools.

a member of thesamburu tribe herself, she's personally plannedrescue missions to help girls as young as 6 years old. and she explains that, "thelonger a girl is in school, everything for her -- forher income, for her family, for this country --everything changes." she gives me hope. i'm hopeful because of a youngwoman named jamila abass. so jamila founded mfarm, whichis a mobile platform that is

already used by over 14,000people across kenya. mfarm makes it easy for farmersto get information that lets them match their crops withwhat the market demands. and studies show that it canhelp farmers double their sales. so here's what jamilasaid: " love kenya because you feel you are homeanywhere you go." home anywhere you go --that's the kenya that welcomed me nearly 30years ago as a young man. you helped makeme feel at home.

and standing here today aspresident of the united states, when i think about thoseyoung people and all the young people in attendancehere, you still make me feel at home. and i'm confident thatyour future is going to be written across this country andacross this continent by young people like you -- young menand women who don't have to struggle under a colonialpower; who don't have to look overseas torealize your dreams.

yes, you can realize yourdreams right here, right now. "we have not inheritedthis land from our forebears, we have borrowedit from our children." so now is the time for us todo the hard work of living up to that inheritance;of building a kenya where the inherent dignity ofevery person is respected and protected, andthere's no limit to what a child can achieve. i am here to tell you thatthe united states of america

will be a partner for youevery step of the way. god bless you. thank you. asante sana.

ngo vacancy 2016

good afternoon and good evening to all ofyou joining us, depending on where in the world you are connecting today. very glad to have you with us, my name isangharad laing; i’m the executive director of phap. for those of you who may be new to phap’swebinar series, i’ll just quickly introduce. phap is short for the international associationof professionals in humanitarian assistance and protection, and among the many onlineactivities we’re engaged in, we’re very pleased this year to have started collaborationwith icva, the international counsel of voluntary agencies, focusing on this learning streamlooking at humanitarian financing.

this session today is the fourth session inour series co-organized by icva and phap and i am absolutely delighted to be once againco-hosting with melissa pitotti, head of policy at icva. thank you so much, angharad. i wanted to introduce myself and point outsome of the current relevance of this topic that we are working on. international humanitarian assistance frombilateral donors has doubled in the past decade, with bilateral donors contributing a recordamount for humanitarian aid in 2015 totaling 21.8 billion dollars, which represents anincrease of 11 percent since 2014.

donors remain strong supporters of ngos, providingover 3.2 billion to ngos in 2014 for humanitarian action and protection. excellent, thanks melissa, and great to co-hostingagain with you today. so now moving into the subject of today’ssession, as melissa said we’re looking today at bilateral funding: trends, challenges,and opportunities for ngos. in our last three webinars, we looked firstat the overall humanitarian financing landscape, we looked at un humanitarian funding throughpartnerships with ngos, and we also looked at access to pooled funds. and today, we’re moving our focus to thedirect access of ngos to financing from government

donors. more specifically, our examples today lookingat government donors, the united states and echo, the european commission’s directorate-generalfor humanitarian aid and civil protection. each of these two presentations will be followedby a presentation and few remarks from a ngo representative who will share their experiencesand lessons learned when accessing funding specifically from the us and echo. you might remember from our first webinarthat we talked a lot about the global humanitarian assistance report that provides some reallygood data. in the 2016 gha report, over 97 percent ofhumanitarian funding from bilateral donors

comes from just 20 donors overall. and the majority of funding originates fromcountries in north america and europe. however, in recent years support from governmentsin the middle east has risen significantly, with an increase of 500 percent since 2011,primarily supporting humanitarian action in the middle east. many governments are also signatories to thegrand bargain on humanitarian financing and efficiencies, which we had talked about inprevious webinars, which really commits to making humanitarian funding more efficientthrough a range of ways including through harmonizing and simplifying reporting requirements,strengthening transparency, promoting multi-year

funding, supporting national and local respondersas directly as possible, and other interventions. so thanks melissa, i’ll take a quick looknow at the learning objectives for our session today. we want to be accountable to you as listenersso we’ll lay these out in advance. first learning objective: to understand theconcept, generally, of bilateral funding. second, to increase knowledge of the overallsize, the funding flows and forms of bilateral funding, as well as the main donors and recipients. we’re also aiming to raise awareness ofthe main trends, challenges, and opportunities, specifically for ngos trying to access fundingfrom bilateral donors.

and finally, we’re seeking to increase knowledgeof the different sources of information available to you on bilateral funding. we’re very happy today with the panel thatwe have of speakers. i would like to introduce them to you. first, we introduce you to our two donor speakers. both of these donors give a very significantamount of funding to support humanitarian action. the first one is from the us government andthe second one is from echo. in 2015, the consolidated support from theus which provided 6.4 billion dollars worth

of aid and european institutions, includingecho, which provided two billion in aid, represented a major portion of all tracked humanitarianaid from governments in 2015. susan kyle is currently the attach㩠for humanitarianaffairs at the u.s. mission to the un and other international organization in geneva. prior to this she served at the state departmentas a special assistant to the under secretary for civilian security, democracy, and humanrights. she was also the south asia program officerin the department of state’s bureau of population, refugees, and migration, which some of youmight know as prm. and at prm she also worked as a domestic refugeeresettlement program officer.

i’d also like to introduce to you albertogarralon perez from the european commission. he is currently the deputy head of the newbudget, finance and control unit at dg echo in the european commission. he leads a team responsible for the assessmentof the financial capacity of potential grant beneficiaries, initiates and validates newgrant agreements, and assesses the final financial reports previous to final payments. before that he worked on internal audits andas an economics and statistical analyst for the european commission. we are also joined by some ngo representatives.

we have the international catholic migrationcommission, which some of you know as icmc, and we also have voice; they are going toshare their own experiences and some tips for what they have seen in the past on accessingbilateral funding. walter is the director of operations at thegeneva-based headquarters of icmc. he has 25 years of experience working in thehumanitarian sector on behalf of refugees and other vulnerable populations. at icmc, he directs and oversees all operationalprograms and projects, including a number of assistance operations as well as refugeeresettlement support centers in turkey and the middle east, and the unhcr icmc resettlementdeployment scheme.

prior to joining icmc in 2009, walter workedfor iom and unhcr, and we are very happy that walter has been an active participant in manyicva network events and processes. magali mourlon is a program coordinator atvoice. she’s responsible for several portfolios,including looking at the framework partnerships agreements, some of you might know it as fpain funding, drr, quality and accountability, sectoral policy related to humanitarian aidoperations like gender, food assistance, and also the eu aid volunteers. she’s been working for seven years in thefield, both in humanitarian and development context.

in particular, she worked for handicap internationalin pakistan, nicaragua, cambodia, and ethiopia, and icva network is very happy to have workedwith the voice network of ngos in several initiatives including recent grand bargaindiscussions. excellent. okay, then we will turn first to susan kyle. susan, you have the floor. thank you, and i want to first thank phapand icva for inviting me to participate in this webinar and also thank all the participantswho are online and interested in determining how best to access bilateral humanitarianassistance.

funding to ngos is critical to the deliveryof humanitarian assistance around the world and critical in filling gaps that the internationalorganizations are not able to fill, or the national governments. so i’m going to give a brief presentationon how ngos access department of state: bureau of population, refugees, and migration funding,otherwise known as prm. and in the u.s. government we also have humanitarianfunding from the u.s. agency for international development, usaid, office of foreign disasterassistance, ofda, but i’m not going to be able to speak to ofda’s funding today butcan answer any questions about prm. so, let’s go.

just to provide some basic information aboutthe bureau of population, refugees, and migration, this is our mission statement: we are in thedepartment of state and we lead on humanitarian assistance policy as well as funding. our funding looks to provide assistance, alsoto build partnerships, to promote best practices in humanitarian response, and to, as i said,ensure that the u.s. foreign and national security policy takes into consideration humanitarianprinciples. what does prm fund? we fund many different sectors, 10 sectorsin total, although not all are listed here. and sometimes an ngo-funded program can serveone sector or it can be multi-sectoral based

on the notice of funding opportunity, otherwiseknown as nofo, or based on the ngo’s capacity. and these areas, as you’ll see, cover protection,various elements of that, health, mental health and psychosocial support, water sanitation,hygiene, education, livelihoods, and shelter. it’s important for you to know how we fund. what are our priorities when we are lookingat funding? and when we put out a notice of funding opportunity,otherwise known as a nofo, we are usually seeking to ensure that funding for ngos orios address to needs of the most vulnerable. and so that can depend on the context whothat population includes, but always making sure that we are addressing the most vulnerablepopulation in the larger refugee of displaced

population. also, for ngo funding targeted beneficiarypopulations must be at least 50 percent refugees. there are instances occasionally where assistancefor idps may be included, but that would depend on the specific notice of funding opportunityannouncement, but generally speaking, the target beneficiaries must be at least 50 percentrefugees. as i said before, we are seeking to have ngofunding fill gaps in the international response and because there are multiple entities withinthe u.s. government that fund humanitarian assistance, state prm coordinates closelywith the usaid office of foreign disaster assistance, otherwise known as ofda, and theusaid regional offices.

i would also just note that we also coordinatebroadly with other bilateral donors, for example echo, or dfid, or others, as well as coordinatewith ios, so unhcr for example. there are general ngo guidelines that prmputs out each year. the new guidelines were just approved on fridayand will be on the prm website hopefully today, and you will have a link to them later inthis presentation, but make sure you check that out. just to give you a sense of what we fund andwhere, so this shows you the geographic breakdown of where prm provided funding in 2016. our fiscal years run october 1st to september30th, so this is based on the fiscal year

that we just passed. the vast majority is going to the middle eastand then africa, and then you’ll see the geographic locations further under there. in addition, to give you the breakdown ina slightly different way, this slide shows how the funding breaks down by organizationrather than geographic, and so unhcr receives the vast majority of prm funding, and thenif you lumped the ios together they receive the majority of prm funding. and ngos, international ngos and local ngos,receive around 10 percent of prm funding each year, give or take two percent in a givenyear, depending on needs and funding available.

in fiscal year 2016, as melissa had notedthe significant funding that u.s. government had provided, as a part of that prm made 2.8billion dollars available to our ios and ngos. so i’m going to talk about the steps thatyou will take if you are not currently receiving u.s. government funding. if you already receive the u.s. governmentfunding, you probably have done step one to four, but just for those who have not receivedu.s. funding, this just tells you even before you submit an application the steps you needto take to be able to submit an application to a notice of funding opportunity. the first step is to obtain an ncage code.

ncage you would receive from the nato supportagency registration system and that can take quite a bit of time, that can take weeks tomonths, and so as an organization you should be starting this process very far in advanceof actually submitting an application. so first you get an ncage code, then you wouldseek and obtain a duns number. you do this by applying online to dun & bradstreet,which is an agency that provides specific tax identification numbers or other numbersto ngos that are applying for u.s. government funding. if you do not have a u.s. government tax identificationnumber that is fine, you would just leave that entry blank when you submit the documentto dun & bradstreet for receiving a duns number.

the third step is to register with the systemfor award management. this is a u.s. government-wide system andthat takes about two weeks or longer if you are an ngo outside of the u.s. and then once you have those three registrationand number elements, then you would go on to the website grants.gov and each authorizedorganizational representative would register. an application to grants.gov must be submittedby the authorized organizational representative. if someone else in the ngo submitted the grants.govapplication that website would not accept it or it would be considered invalid if itwas accepted and so it’s very important that the ngo makes sure that an aor, or authorizedorganization representative, is registered

and that they are the ones that actually submitthe application on grants.gov. additionally, once you have the aor authorizationyou would track the status of those registrations. for example, sam, the system for award management,that registration needs to be updated each year to make sure that the point of contactand the correct email are always updated. and similarly, we’ve had some ngos wherethe information that the put in the ncage code was different from the duns number, specificallytheir address, and then when they went to submit the application it was rejected becauseof that discrepancy. so you want to make sure that all of thosesystems have the same information. so when you’re considering applying forprm funding, as stated in the last slide,

you want to make sure that you’re registeredwith all these processes before a notice of funding opportunity is announced because itwill take time for you to register and get everything you need. next, you can sign up for both grants.govand prm email listservs to make sure that you receive announcements on new funding opportunities. make sure you review the instructions of eachnotice of funding opportunity, they can be different, and so you want to make sure thatyou’re clear on that specific proposal. proposals must be submitted to grants.gov,not through other methods, unless the nofo says something specifically in it.

and also, prm deadlines are very firm; ifthe application is received after the deadline we will not review it. and here is some useful information for howto apply. is there a question? yes susan, sorry to interrupt you, but i thinkwe have something very relevant coming across our screen from javaid. they’re asking about the numbers, becauseyou talk about ncage and a duns number and they’re asking if this is required for ngosin asian countries. so it gets to the broader question of: whois eligible to apply for direct funding?

so maybe you could answer that now. thank you. certainly. happy to do so. so, an ngo in anywhere in the world, eitheran international ngo or a local ngo, is eligible for prm’s ngo funding and you are eligibleto receive a ncage code or a duns number and a sams registration, so just because it’sa local ngo you would still be able to attain that data. it’s just that you should start the processearly because it can take some time and what

i have found as a program officer before isthat it took longer for ngos that were overseas or local ngos than it took for u.s.-basedngos. so to continue with the presentation, thereare a couple of tips for you in regard to what to consider when you’re seeking tosubmit an application. proposals for prm are always due at 12pm eastcoast time. so wherever you are in the world that is yourdeadline, so 12pm on that day washington time. as i said, sometimes grants.gov can be challenging,especially right before a proposal deadline; it can timeout, there are file name conventionsthat you need to consider, and other elements. so it’s better to start the process earlier.

when you submit your application and you’redone with submitting it, you will get a confirmation screen from grants.gov. that is not the end. grants.gov will then validate that proposalsubmission and that can take up to two days. so prm does not actually receive your validatedproposal until that is done, it’s a two-step process. so you’ll get the confirmation screen andthen you will receive a submission validation email from grants.gov and that means yourproposal is complete. or if there was a problem with the proposalyou would receive a rejection email that specifies

the errors. immediately upon receiving that email of errorsyou should address it, one, and two, if you’re having any problems in this process you shouldbe in contact with grants.gov technical support and they will give you a ticket number andrespond to you. but please note, as i said prm’s deadlineis very firm, and so we only accept a completed, validated proposal by that deadline. if grants.gov accepts your application late,prm will not— it would not be seen by the grants panel review. also, some of the challenges that we haveexperienced for some ngos that have applied

before is, for example, the ncage code tooka really long time; the sams registration was not up-to-date. sometimes the sams contact, you will providea contact information for that called ebiz point of contact, or ebiz poc, sometimes thatcan be outdated if you’re chief financial officer left the organization and you thendidn’t put the new person in, then that would not work, you would not be able to submitthe application. similarly, not submitted by the right person,or not at the right website, or you’re missing key documents, and just to reiterate thatthis process to make sure everything is right can take time.

to get into actually how the organizationthat would be funded for prm, what is our life cycle of a grant? this shows you that. to note that once the program announcementis out, they’re usually open for 30 to 60 days depending on the reward. grants.gov will process the application andthen we will receive it at prm, and at that time prm has a panel review, so a small groupof people who score all of the ngo proposals for a given notice of funding opportunity. if prm intends to fund you, you will receivea letter of intent sent by prm after the application

was reviewed, and then you would go througha process with the prm program officer on negotiations before an award is made. if your application was not sufficient tomeet the requirements or the funding availability, you would receive a notice that you wouldnot be funded; so if you don’t receive a letter of intent to fund, then you are mostlikely are not funded. during the award phase prm will send you anotice of award, which is a specific u.s. government form. during the post-award period there is thestandard financial and program reporting quarterly. there also may be audits or other oversightmissions that occur.

there would be prm monitoring, either throughour regional refugee coordinators in the field or from someone from d.c. coming out, andyou would be receiving payment during that time. and for the closeout that happens with thefinancial and programmatic final reports. one of the things that is important for ngosto always look at is the prm ngo guidelines; these are general guidelines for all ngosseeking to receive our funding. and the 2017 ngo guidelines were just approvedthis past friday and they will be on prm’s website later today, but in this webinar wewill also put up the link to that, although at this point they still only show the 2016website, but by washington time today business

hours it should be up there. what we tried to do with new guidelines isto improve readability and we added sections related to accountability to affected populations,or aap, risk management, additional standardized indicators, and we’ve also added a prm awardsdata sheet, and a new project proposal template. and i’m going to walk through those now. why did we need to improve the readability? so our goal for the guidelines is that thesehelp give every ngo a better chance to meet the requirements and understand what our requirementsare. and these are to be seen in addition withthe notice of funding of opportunity.

we’ve been using the ngo guidelines fora number of years, and each year we added things and it’s become much more difficultto read and be organized, and so we trimmed it down and we also tried to be very clearabout what our requirements are for a project proposal, as well as what are prm’s policiesthat we are seeking to fulfill. also, we tried to make sure that there werelinks throughout the document so that it’s easier for the person to navigate. and we’ve added a checklist that shows whatis required for an application to help you out hopefully. on accountability to affected population,in 2016 the law actually added language in

to require additional assurance that fundingthat the u.s. government was giving included accountability to affected population, andi will actually read you an excerpt from this so you understand what it exactly says. so that funds appropriated, or given to statedepartment and usaid, shall be made available for the regular collection of feedback obtaineddirectly from beneficiaries on the quality and relevance of such assistance. also, state and usaid shall conduct regularoversight to ensure that such feedback is collected and used by implementing partnersto maximize the cost-effectiveness and utility of such assistance, and require such partnersthat receive funds to establish procedures

for collecting and responding to such feedback. and so this is really important for us thisyear, it is something new in our guidelines and a new requirement. we will require that before funding can beawarded an ngo submits an organizational framework document that outlines the organization’sexisting structure that ensures beneficiary feedback and how that is incorporated intoprogram planning in program response or changed the program over the time, and that that isstandardized across the organization. one other thing that is different is thatwe require ngos to report quarterly. as a part of that quarterly reporting, thengos that receive the award would have to

report on their accountability to affectedpopulations process twice per year, in the quarter two and quarter three or final report. additionally, as melissa had referenced, theu.s. government, through the grand bargain, and other organizations, committed to ensuringthat people affected by humanitarian crises and their communities are consulted on thedecisions so that humanitarian response is effective, efficient, and that design andimplementation of programming is responsive to these peoples’ opinions and priorities. another difference is risk management. this is a new requirement across the u.s.government as well where state and usaid are

having to provide information to our oversightbodies about how we improve identity and response to risk management in funding, and so thereforethat then comes down to the funding we give to ios and to ngos. and so ngos will be required to provide arisk analysis. there is a suggested template for that inour ngo guidelines, and you will have to summarize the risk analysis in your proposal narrative. so it’s both an attachment and in the narrative. and this is to look at potential risks thatyou may be facing in your program as well as administrative risks, and that the organizationhas a plan to mitigate these risks.

one thing that prm has done over the pasttwo years is to provide standard indicators that ngos should be including in their proposals. we currently have standard indicators forhealth, livelihood, protection, child protection, shelter, wash, nutrition, food security, andcore relief items. in the new ngo guidelines, we’ve added standardindicators for education, mental health and psychosocial support, and local governmentcapacity building. now, capacity building is not a sector onits own, but it is something that can be funded under specific sectors. it’s important to note that for each objectivethat an ngo has for a specific sector with

indicators they should be using some of thestandard indicators under that sector. also, when ngos are writing their objectivesunder each objective there should be at least one outcome or impact indicator, not justoutputs. so we’re not looking at how many peoplewere trained, but what is the effect of that training, for example. also new are the prm reward data sheet andthe prm proposal template, and we encourage you to use these. the prm reward data sheet is a requirement. although the template is not a requirementit is recommended.

we are testing it now with a notice of fundingopportunity that will come out in december and we hope to roll it out to all of our ngofunding by the spring. the word template is still available, butwe will be phasing it out. and the reason why we’re shifting to thisnew ngo proposal template in pdf form, is we’re trying to decrease the number of ngoapplications that are not reviewed because of technical grounds; for example, the margins,the font size, or texts being too long, and so these are technical elements that can leadto a proposal not being considered. it will also help prm track across regionsand across sectors what we’re funding and to be able to compare them.

one thing that is important for local ngosto also be aware of is that prm makes a significant amount of money available to u.s. embassieslocally, so that they can fund local ngos to support refugees and asylum seekers intheir countries. they’re quite small grants, it’s $25,000,that would go to an embassy in a year, but it is an opportunity for the embassy and thengo to work together, and for the local ngo to experience the reporting requirements ofthe u.s. government. and usually the funding goes directly to localngos through the u.s. embassy, but we do coordinate with unhcr to make sure that it is supportiveof the overall goals for refugees in that country, but you would be working directlywith the embassy on the application, and the

reporting, and things like that. the next slide provides some of the basiclinks which will be put up in the webinar so that you know where to go to for theseelements that are required for the application. and i want to thank you for your time. thank you so much for the presentation. really interesting to hear some of the detailsof the process, but also the link to why some of these changes are being made. it’s really interesting to hear those considerations. so thank you so much.

we are going to now give the floor to walterbrill, who melissa introduced earlier; he’s the director of operations with icmc, theinternational catholic migration commission, to hear just a bit about your perspective,walter, on the other end of this process. morning everyone out there, i hope you canhear me well. first, thank you to icva and phap for organizingthis event. my remarks will be mainly based on our ownexperience at icmc. we have currently a number of projects fundedby prm for instance in pakistan, in jordan, and malaysia, and also the project in syria. i think susan already covered a large territorythere in her presentation so i’ll try not

to repeat to much what has already been saidand focus maybe a bit more broadly on some of the questions i think some ngos might havewhen they look at the possibility of u.s. so if we look at both prm and ofda i thinkwe can say they are both sustainable funders with a large portfolio both geographicallyand different sectors. susan has already presented the geographicalsectors very well for prm. what do i mean by sustainable? sustainable—you know we have some donorswhere sometimes you would receive money for one year, perhaps also for a second year,and then they stop funding. and that is, for most of us, not very helpful.

our own experience with prm has been positivein the sense that once you obtain the funding from prm, it usually runs for a couple ofyears. you may have to make improvements, you mayhave to make modifications, but it’s not a one-off shot. and i think that’s one aspect we like inparticular about the prm funding. now another aspect susan mentioned brieflyis that there is some flexibility also with regard to include the local vulnerable populationin your project. prm is flexible there as susan said, for instance,prm requires 50 percent of the money has to go refugees, but then you can also look atthe local population and provide assistance

to them in many instances. so for instance we have a project in jordan,where i think about 30 percent of the beneficiaries are jordanian, so this usually makes yourprojects much more acceptable on the ground both to the local population and also withthe respective host governments. prm also provides, and ofda, the advantagethat they have on the ground presence and expertise. so for prm it’s usually what they call therefugee coordinators, so these are people out there in the field who really can provideyou with valued feedback on your project. so once you have a project, staying in touchwith the refugee coordinator on the ground

is really crucial; they would also usuallycome to visit your project, they would monitor, and if there is need to make changes, or ifthere are problems they are sort of your first port of call to go to. afterwards, of course, you may then also reportissues to the prm in washington. for ofda usaid, you have something that iscalled the dart, the disaster assistance response team, on the ground also. they also have the expertise and are yourlocal interlocutor. on the downside maybe for dart the personschange more frequently. a ref coord would usually be around for acouple of years, two or three years, the dart

team sometimes the people just stay a coupleof months, three months, six months maximum, so you have a higher rotation and so it isa bit more difficult to build up a good and trusted relationship. then, just a brief word on overhead. if you have funding from the u.s. governmentyou would either have what is called a nicra, a negotiated indirect cost rate, that meansyou would submit to an entity that is mandated by the u.s. government all your figures, yourheadquarters, what are the running costs, etc., in detail, and then they would agreewith you on an overhead rate that you would for every generally receive for every u.s.-fundedproject.

alternatively, and i think this is quite new,you can now claim, if you do not have a negotiated indirect cost rate, a minimum rate of 10 percentoverhead. i think what is particularly interesting fornational ngos here is that the u.s. has funded does not discriminate between ingos and nationalngos the rate the overhead would be available in both instances. then finally, i think prm in particular strikesa good balance between accountability on the one hand, that means they, like every otherdonor, they require reporting, they may require audits, so to ensure that the money is spentas foreseen, but overall, they do not tend to do too much micromanagement.

that means once you’ve agreed on the parametersof the project, prm usually lets you run your project and keeps, let’s say, the bureaucracyat reasonable levels. as many of you know we have the whole debateon less paper and more aid. we have some donors where we have more andmore paper. i think for the moment prm is still strikinga reasonable balance here at least based on our experience. now i want to provide some pointers like,what do you have to look at before you apply, before you decide to submit a project proposalto prm or ofda. a very critical question you need to ask yourselffirst is: what is the added value of your

ngo? it’s not just about filling in a form andsending it out, and hope, okay maybe we are lucky, we’ll get some funding. you need to critically look at where can yourngo or ingo make a difference. so you have to do some geographical mapping. maybe your ngo is present in an area whereothers are not. and you also have to do a bit of sectorialmapping; so you need to get an idea of who else is in that area where you want to submita project proposal. is there already many in that sector?

for instance, if you already have five otheringos or ngos in protection, it’s unlikely that prm may need another one in that area,but perhaps it’s in another sector that is less well covered. so you need to really look a little bit andassess critically where can we make a difference, where can we be of interest to prm in comparisonto others that may be already be on the ground. then you have to do, and i cannot stress thisenough, you have to do your homework. you really have to look at the multiple resourcesthat are available for both funders on the web. susan again mentioned a couple of them already.

you need to read all those documents; youneed to read the ngo guidelines; you need to thoroughly go through that and see whatthe requirements are. but then that is not enough. the next step you have to do is you have torealistically assess your organizational capabilities both in the field and, in particular for aningo, your headquarters. you have to be honest and look at: what isour strength? what is our weakness? do we have everything in place that thesefunders require? so for instance, can we comply with all ofthese guidelines that stipulate, for instance,

that you need a code of conduct, that youneed to have something in place to prevent sexual exploitation. you also need to assess whether you have thestaff expertise and capacity to in order to meet all these requirements. so that is really an indispensible step inparticular for smaller ingos, or smaller ngos. be honest there. a conclusion can be that we are not readyyet, but you can set yourself a timeline and say our goal is to be prm compliant, let’ssay, in two years and you try to work towards that.

so you need to work on filling the gaps firstbefore you jump into that experience. as already mentioned by susan, you have to,before actually applying, obtain a number of registrations. you have to obtain the duns number, so ifyou wonder what that stands for that’s for data universal numbering system, that basicallyserves as a unique identifier for your ngo so that once you have that number, once youhave obtained the duns, everybody knows to which organization this number belongs. you also have to do the website registrationfor sam and for grants.gov, as susan mentioned this can take some time.

so for instance, if you want to apply let’ssay in january to a proposal and you’re in december and you don’t have this, thatwon’t work. you need to build in a couple of months inthe realistic timeline to get ready for the actual application. the next point is: reading the guidelinescarefully and use checklists. you may say that of course applies to everydonor, that is true, but as the technical requirements from prm and ofda are quite detailed,i think this is here even more important. you really need to make yourself checklistsand really assess: have i prepared the documents correctly?

what is missing? what do we still need to do? and so then once you’ve done all that homeworkand you say, okay, we want to work now on a project proposal, again you need to reallywork on a realistic timeline. you have sometimes a process where you havefirst a concept note and then a full project proposal. in some instances you have right away theentire project proposal. in both instances you need to be sure thatyou have enough time to go through usually three, four, five versions or more of theproject proposal before a final version and

hopefully meeting the deadline. ensure compliance with submission guidelinesand rules is absolutely critical, susan stressed this too. there are multiple errors you can make inthis process, sometimes really stupid, let’s say you submit your concept note and you takethe wrong font size instead of—i don’t recall now exactly whether it’s a 12 font—let’ssay you take the wrong font, that can already ruin your application. i can mention an example of icmc. we had once a submission where we thoughtwe had done everything right and then a while

later we received an email back saying, sorry,your proposal could not be considered because it did not respond to the requirements. so what had happened there is that apparentlyour concept note or project proposal exceeded the authorized length by one paragraph. so you’re talking basically about one sentence. and as we found out it happened because we’veused the european din a4 version and then upon submission that sort of got reconvertedinto american size, and then things played out differently. now i have to stipulate here prm, we wereable to show that then our initial proposal

exactly corresponded to the page limit andthere is a procedure in place, and this is once again very well done, and so in the endwe were considered eligible for the proposal. but ever since now we only submit in pdf formatso to avoid these kinds of conversion errors. i think that so far from my part again i wouldsay at the end, don’t underestimate the work that this takes. it’s not simply about quickly filling inthe project template and shipping it off. if you want to go for this type of funding,you really need to get your organization ready and work on this over a longer period, inparticular if you are from a smaller ngo or ingo.

okay, thank you walter. we can see now that both timing and font size,not to mention paper size, are some of the main themes we are taking away [laughter]from the first half. thank you so much, seriously, for bringingyour perspective, it’s very valuable of course to have both sides of the relationshiphere represented and very much appreciate your time being with us all today. we’re now going to move on to give the floorto alberto garralon perez, deputy head for budget and control unit with dg echo. let’s just make sure that your audio connectionis working.

alberto, could you try— hello, good morning. yes, excellent. you’re coming through loud and clear. yes, very good, over to you, you have thefloor. okay, thank you. thank you very much for this opportunity tobe able to present what we do and how we do it. i think you mentioned at the beginning ofyour introduction of the funding areas that

for echo we don’t have, apart from our humanitarianassistance mandate we have a civil protection mandate as well. but anyway, for today i think the importantthing is to focus on our humanitarian assistance mandate which is to help the most in needpeople by natural and man-made disasters. our funding in 2016 is 1.9 million and ourmain activities are food, shelter, health, wash, nutrition, protection, and disasterpreparedness. one our main strengths is our network of officesabroad with more than 40 offices in different difficult countries and more than 450 peopleworking for echo in these 40 offices. then the main role they have are to ensurean adequate assessment of needs and proposals,

timely monitoring of activities implementing,assessment of the final reports. our humanitarian aid, you should know, isvery need-based. we have different instruments to assess theneeds. we use the integrated analysis framework whichis an annual excercise based on the use of national and subnational data, but we alsotake into account, of course, any risk management issues any new ways that we can anticipate. and we of course don’t forget the forgottencrises. objective for all of these analyses is toidentify the general context and the operational priorities for us, which delivery, coordinationand control modalities we are going to apply,

and, at the end of course, to have an indicativeallocation of resources. this difference is said in our worldwide visionwhich is going to identify the main specific objectives that we are going to cover in theyear, the total amount that we are going to devote to this objective, and a start date,which is usually the first of january, and the maximum duration of the actions, thatis usually around 24 months. in order to have some more operational documentthat we draft is the humanitarian implementation plans, the hips; these hips are a pictureof the situation in a given country in a given crisis. establish the main humanitarian needs andthe echo planned response.

they include a technical annex in which weprovide the information that we need to fund the operational data that we need for youto submit to receive the funding. these humanitarian implementation plans canbe modified on the basis of how the situation evolves in the field. who implements dg echo actions? we work under a framework partnership agreementthat we have signed with international ngos, with united nation bodies, and internationalorganizations such as the international committee of red cross, the international federationof red cross, and the international organization for migration.

they are our main partners. and of course we can accept new partners followinga procedure to apply for these partnerships based on a number of profil action criteriaand a number of suitability criteria. in terms of preselection criteria to obtainan fpa, a framework partnership agreement, the organization that applies would need tobe registered for at least three years in any member-states or in a country member ofthe eu economic area. we have a number of ngos from norway, forexample, switzerland. we expect that the organization is a nonprofitautonomous organization, we don’t accept commercial organizations.

we expect that the organization doesn’thave any record of bankruptcy, fraud, or corruption. and it should have minimum turnover relatedto humanitarian activities of 200,000 euros in each of the last three years. we can accept for those ngos that are focusedon a very particular activity—information, mapping, mines—to have reduced turnoverof 50,000 euros for what we call niche ngos. we also request for the financial audit accounts,the last two years of the financial audit accounts, we expect you have an audit reportthat is what we call an unqualified audit report. we are starting, in financial terms, to havefinancial statements that shows that the organization

has a positive and restricted net equity. in terms of general approach, of course, weexpect the organization adheres to the humanitarian principles, that they commit to grant accessto the inspection bodies of the european commission, such as the european court of auditors, ourauditors, or the audit office of the european commission. and finally, we expect that the organizationhas a commitment with the beneficiaries and the european citizens. in terms of suitability criteria, we are goingto look for a number of requirements in terms of administrative, logistical, and technicalcapacities.

we expect as well that the organization hasan adequate experience. in terms of administrative capacity, we aregoing to assess whether they’ve an adequate segregation of duties, a sector on documentmanagement policy. in terms of planning, for example, we needto know about the risk assessment of the organization, the strategic planning they have, the evaluationpolicy they follow. in terms of staff, apart from of course theoperational capacity the staff may have, it’s important for us to ensure that the workingconditions of the staff are safe and fair, that there is an adequate policy to preventthe conflict of interests, et cetera, et cetera. in terms of anti-fraud and corruption policies,we look very much at the tone at the top and

the strategy to prevent, to detect, and tocorrect any fraudulent practices. in terms of technical and logistical capacity,we expect that the organization complies with a set of international recognized standardsand principles, for example the project cycle management approach. and the organization should ensure adequateprocesses on need assessment, selection of projects, reports, and evaluations. and in terms of technical and logistical capacity,we stress very much the respect of the procurement principles in terms ethical values, the bestvalue for money, equal treatment, transparency, proportionality, no conflict of interests,and to support the local economy as much as

we can. in terms of experience and results, we expectthat our organizations are active in the humanitarian aid field for each of the three past yearsthe total operating incomes, as i mentioned before, should be about 200,000 euros. and then we are going to ask you for the kindof projects that were funded, in which countries and in which sector of intervention was theone in which the organization worked. how are we going to work? we have a financing decision and a hip. from this financing decision and a hip weare going to define a number of appraisal

criteria and we expect the ngo or internationalorganization to send their proposal through a standard single form in which the organizationhas defined the needs assessment log frame with results and indicators, and a detailedbudget that we are going to assess. the main rules that we have during the implementationof the action. there is a number of eligibility rules withinan implementation period. we fix an implementation period. we fix the modalities of payment with a pre-financingand a final payment at the end of the action when the final report has been accepted. we need the ngo ensure eu visibility duringimplementation of the action.

in terms of reporting, most of the cases nowwe just request for a final report, there are no interim reports, but of course, ourstaff in the field can visit the action to do a monitoring in agreement with the organizationimplementing the action. and then we have a number of audits at theend of the action. where to find the main information? in terms of the application procedure andcriteria for the new organizations interested to sign the framework partnership agreementwith echo, you have the partner help desk if you’re interested in the legal text andour reference documents. we have also a website in which you can findall this information.

and then in terms of details about the financingdecisions, and the hips, and the amounts of money to be done for the year, you also havethe opportunity to check in this website. and this is all, thank you very much. happy to reply your questions if any. okay, excellent. thanks so much, alberto. we’re going to move now for our final inputfrom our panel. we’re turning to magali mourlon, programcoordinator with voice, to hear once again from the ngo perspective.

and magali, let’s just test your connection. thanks so much. do you hear me?— okay great, that sounds terrific. you have the floor. yes, very good, over to you. thank you very much and thanks a lot to icvaand phap for inviting us to participate in this webinar and broadly to organize thisseries of webinars which i think is very useful and we heard from our members it’s extremelyrelevant.

so i will try to present very briefly a ngoperspective in relation to the existing partnership between dg echo and the ngos. but first of all, i would like to introduceyou to our network. so voice is a network, we are not an operationalpartner of echo; we represent 85 ngos and i would say 83 out of them are partners ofdg echo’s, and they’re all european ngos from 20 different member-states. so voice stands for voluntary organisationsin cooperation in emergencies and we are today the main ngo interlocutor on eu humanitarianaffairs and disaster risk reduction, promoting the added value of ngos.

of course, humanitarian funding is one ofour key issues in which voice network has decided to engage. so in order to introduce my perspective iwould just like to introduce a study which we conducted last year which is called ‘exploringeu humanitarian donors’ funding and conditions for working with ngos. this study was realized in order to take stockof the commitments to work within the consensus for humanitarian aid where we wanted to providean ngo perspective on where the eu stands in relation to this engagement to, and i quote,to continue efforts to streamline and simplify the procedure for humanitarian action in orderto reduce administrative burden on implementing

organizations. so what we did basically, we compared andanalyzed four different eu donors including dg echo, and i will say that out of this studyi just want to present one big outcome of this study that our members in the ngo communityall recommended very much dg echo partnership approach. and why is that is probably as you can seeon the graph, it’s probably because this partnership approach which is promoted byecho is in reality translated by a very good share of its funding going directly to ngos,as you can see, 43 percent of echo funding is directed to ngos which is very importantin relation to the other donors we looked

at, being germany, france, and denmark. so dg echo since its creation has put in placeits partnership approach and the so-called framework partnership agreement is today thefifth. the first one was put in place in 1993 andthey last, in general, for five years. so now, what are the challenges and recommendationsof the network we would put forward in relation to this fpa? i would say the first challenge is to signan fpa, as you heard from alberto, you need to eu-based ngos and have good experiencein humanitarian action and you need to provide a certain amount of documentation and it’squite a long process i would say; it takes

at least six months to one year. but signing an fpa is probably not the mostdifficult part. the most difficult part that we hear fromour members is to sign a first contract. once you have your fpa to become partnersof echo in a specific context in a specific country, you need to engage and submit yourproposal, and it’s not that easy to be selected. it’s a very competitive selection process. so what we recommend is really to engage asearly as possible with dg echo if you intend to submit a single form. and if you’re new in your country, i wouldreally advise you to ask the echo representative

in thefield, called a technical assistant, to come and visit your project and have dialogue withthat person before you submit your single form. then we will also advise ngos to engage inthe different field consultations happening incountry, but also in the dialogue meetings or consultations that are happening here inbrussels in relation to crises, but also in relation to policies, because echo is nota new donor, it’s a major policy maker. the second big challenge we have identifiedand that’s also why we did this study related to the complexity of the rules and procedures.

dg echo, today, is working through this fpa. just the fpa guidelines explaining the differentprocedures is a document of 155 pages, on top of which you need to add the single formulaplans, and this is to explain the general conditions of your fpa, your grant agreement,and so on and so forth. so the complexity of rules and proceduresis even more exacerbated because they have their own set of rules which are often differentfrom member-state rules or from other donors’ rules. so that represents a major risk for an ngo,if you are not fully aware of these rules you may take some financial risks while implementingthe project.

so to mitigate this risk i would say, as albertopresented, echo has developed a support unit they call partner help desk. it’s a very useful website where you canfind many answers to any specific question you may have on rules and procedures, butecho is also providing through this agreement that they have with ponto.sud some trainings,both in brussels and in the field, to train partners on the fpa. and then maybe just very quickly i would liketo introduce the fpa watch group, which is an ongoing consultation process between echoand its ngo partners. the watch group represents the views of allecho ngo partners, not only the monitoring,

reviewing of all the matters of the fpa, butalso in relation to a consultation in order to negotiate the upcoming fpa. so it is four years that we have this forumwhere ngos also speak with echo and try to negotiate together the upcoming fpa. the idea after that is that the fpa watchgroup works towards a common interpretation and consistent application of the fpa. and last, but not least, the watch group isalso a place of cooperation and exchange of information among the ngos and together withecho. so this formal dialogue is really, i think,one of the great tools for reflecting the

partnership spirit dg echo is trying to promoteand which we very much support. as voice, we are very much looking forwardto the upcoming discussion, and the ongoing discussion, on the grand bargain. i think there’s a lot of room for strengtheningthe partnership agreement and there’s a lot of room for simplifying rules and procedures,not only of echo, but more broadly of the donor community. i will stop here and give some minutes fordiscussion and sentiment. thank you so much magali for your remarks,your insights, and thanks for being here for the discussion.

looking at the time, we are going to lookto extend by 10 minutes, so we will go to 10 minutes past the hour. that will give us a few minutes now for q&a;we have some great questions that have come in. and for those that we’re not able to addresshere on the air live, we’ll seek to do that in writing and collaboration with our speakersfollowing the events. you can have those as a resource as part ofthe full package coming to you after the session so now to facilitate the q&a and discussion,i will hand it over to melissa. thank you, angharad.

so what we’re seen in both of the presentationsby the bilateral donor representatives is just how much detail is needed to be ableto access funding streams. and we’ve also heard from both ngo representativeson some of the opportunities but also challenges in complying with those requirements. we’ve seen in the grand bargain a real commitmentby both of the donors who have participated in today’s webinar an idea of more directlysupporting national and local responders. so ian in the uk was asking for a little bitmore of a perspective on how bilateral donors could support of the smaller ngos that mightnot have the number of staff or other administrative capacities that we’ve heard about when comparedto some of the bigger ngos.

so i would invite both susan and alberto,if you want to talk a little bit more about your organization’s thinking with regardto this whole notion of supporting more directly local and national responders. so why don’t we start with alberto. [[1:20:50 “mic turned on”]] thanks, melissa. for smaller ngos there are two main points. the first one i would say is that we needto ensure from our financial regulation that the operational capacity and the administrativecapacity of the ngo is enough to implement

an action granted by the european commission,that is the first point. so what we do in many cases and we are noticingthat our ngos and that our partners engage with local implementing partners which aresmaller and which, in most of the cases, can do an important part of the humanitarian work. that is basically the thing that is in placenow. in terms of in the future and with respectto the commitments that the commission made in istanbul on the grand bargain conference,this is something that is currently in discussion here internally and i don’t have anythingparticular to say more – i know our policy colleagues are working very much on that discussingwith other donors and with partners to look

for a solution on this issue. susan, do you have anything to add from aprm perspective? i would echo alberto’s comments, but alsostate that prm does seek to support and fund smaller ngos or local ngos. what, as walter mentioned, it may take timefor that ngo to ensure that they meet the requirements that we are seeking. one of the things that is available to localngos is engagement with other partners like voice, or icva members, or interaction membersthat are already recipients of u.s. government [clears throat] excuse me.

or assistance that those organizations havein advising ngos about bigger policy issues that we require. for example, codes of conduct that addressprevention of sexual exploitation and abuse, or risk management, aap, things like that. what i would say as a program officer previouslywho funded local ngos: i knew about the local ngos that we were interested in funding abouta year or two before they were able to receive and so that echoes my colleague from voice’scomment about, you know, engage with u.s. government officials on the ground where youare. for prm, it is our regional refugee coordinatorsand for usaid it’s the dart, but that is

important because they can help talk withthe organization about some of those requirements. and similarly to echo, the u.s. governmentat large is talking about how we implement our grand bargain commitments and world humanitariansummit commitments and so the full extent of that remains to be seen, but it is somethingthat we are committed to fulfilling. thank you, susan. the next question is with regard to lookingat the current landscape, the context in which we operate. yesterday, at the 2017 launch of the globalhumanitarian appeal, the emergency relief coordinator presented the global humanitarianneeds and several people were wondering: what

are the projections for the potential impactsof some of the changes we’re seeing on the scene? and we have here a similar question from roxanne:what are the main changes that ngos can expect, in terms of funding patterns, as a resultof the recent election in the united states? and also the brexit process, related to theeu referendum, i’m wondering if perhaps if we could turn back to susan and albertoto get their perspectives on this. we’ll start with susan. thank you melissa and that’s a very validand timely question. it’s not possible for me or the u.s. governmentright now to say specifically changes that

will occur under the new president and thenew administration january 20th and moving forward. however, what i would say is that humanitarianassistance for decades has bipartisan support within the u.s.; whether it’s democrat orrepublic, whether it’s parties on the further extremes of the green or libertarian. we’ve had strong support for humanitarianassistance overseas throughout all administrations and i think that that will continue. but it is true that is some uncertainty thatpeople feel before the new president is in office january 20th, and we will address thatas we go forward.

what i would say for prm at least, is thatwe have a good sense of what our budget will be in 2017 and it is similar to what we havein ’16. and the needs that are out there, as shownby ocha’s appeal launched yesterday, is the needs are massive and although governmentfunding has increased significantly over the years, we still are only funding about 50percent of the needs globally together. and so that is something that i think is achallenge that will remain. and hopefully the international organization,the ngos, and the governments fulfilling their grand bargain and other world humanitariansummit commitments will help address that. how about you, alberto?

[“microphone has been turned on”] thanks. well with brexit, it’s very difficult tosay up to now what will be the impact of the brexit in particular for the humanitarianaid of the commission. however, what i can say is that we keep verygood and very close relationship with dfid the british humanitarian aid body, andwe work together with and have a number of agreements to co-finance actions in the sahel,for example, for which we receive the money from dfid and we implement and we form someproposals that are presented to the commission. so basically that’s to foresee now, in particularfor the humanitarian aid, but working very close together with the british humanitarianaid office.

thanks. thank you, alberto. and we have time to squeeze in one more question. i would like to ask this to alberto. it’s about the humanitarian developmentnexus, because we received questions from roxanne in the netherlands, mohammed in egypt,and linda in palestine about this humanitarian development nexus. what are the challenges for ngos to accessfunding between humanitarian developments? and do we think or anticipate that developmentfunding will eventually replace humanitarian

funding in the future? i wonder, alberto, if you’re had any thinkingon that front? yes, well this is one very important issuefor us. we have received a recommendation from ourauditors to pay more attention to the link to relief, rehabilitation, and development,so that is something on which we’ll work. you should know that in the field we haveecho offices, but we have also the eu delegations working more on development issues. so yes, we work together with our developmentpolicy in the commission to ensure that when we can withdraw from an operation in one particularcountry that our colleagues can take over.

hey great, thank you. so thanks so much melissa for facilitatingthe discussion for the questions that we weren’t able to get to. as i mentioned, we will seek to follow upwith those in writing, so you will have them as part of the package of resources. so now we will move to asking each of ourspeakers once again for brief concluding remarks. we’ll move first to walter, then to magali,then alberto, and finally to susan. a few parting comments from all of you, please. first, over to you, walter.

i’ll look at some of the checked remarksand in particular the one that said, well, could you talk a bit more about the challenges. for me now, if you are looking for new bilateralfunding, and you are a smaller organization, i think you have to make a decision, you know,where do you seek the funding from, you cannot go for everything at the same time. so if you try to get echo funding, and prmfunding, and usaid funding, you’re likely to fail, because the requirements among thesedifferent funders are not necessarily compatible. and especially, as a smaller organizationyou will not have the resources to meet all these requirements.

so you need to look at which is the funderthat is the best fit for us. if we look for instance at prm, you know thatyou get a 10 percent overhead, and maybe that overhead can allow you then to hire more staffin the long run, once you have the project. so my advice would be: as you look for morebilateral funding, look first at which donor might be the best fit for you, make a selection,and don’t go for every one at the same time. alright. thank you and thanks so much for joining ustoday. we’ll move now to magali. magali, you have the floor.

thank you very much and thanks again for thisdiscussion. maybe if, as you highlighted melissa in thebeginning, bilateral funding, yes, is increasing, and there’s probably more opportunity forfundraising for ngos, be they local ngos or international ngos. but the trend is also the fact that the amountper contract is also increasing, i was just looking at echo reports; in 2010, the averageamount of that contract was around one million, five years later the average amount of thatcontract is around 1.6 million. meaning that, as an ngo, you have to havemore capacity to manage this funding. and this all goes together with the trendsof consortia.

it fits very well with the grand bargain inreducing management cost and making sure the funding is going more directly to the field. so consortia is one mechanism to engage inthis efficiency strive. so my advice for the ngos would be to keepon engaging among ngos, sharing information; i think that, of course, engaging the differentnetworks, but also engaging at international levels and networks being voice, but of course,icva, interaction, because there is a need for ngos to come together, to exchange information,to gather intelligence, and to learn from each other, and then to continue advocatingfor the value of ngos, which is i think very necessary today in relation to the grand bargainconversation.

so thanks a lot for that. okay, great. thank you, magali. and now moving to alberto. alberto, you have the floor. yes, thanks. well, dg echo is very committed to simplificationto speed up the analysis of new ngos to become partners, to speed up the selection of proposals,to provide accountability, to find beneficiaries, to implement the commitments of the grandbargain.

however, we are accountable as well with ourcounterparts in the european union and to our taxpayers. we try to find a good balance to give thebest service to the people in need. alright, thank you. and last, but not least, susan, the flooris yours. thank you very much. and i want to thank everyone for their presentationstoday as well as all of those online and those listening for your time and interest. i would just like to restate the importanceof engaging a the country and regional level

for ngos that our regional refugee coordinatorsand darts in the field have a lot of information early on before a notice of funding announcementcomes out, and so being in touch with them and also with the ngo consortia or coordinationmechanisms is really important. because those will be questions that peoplewill look at, is how well coordinated this is, and i think walter’s point of honestlylooking at the organization’s capacity and the priorities of the bilateral funder andmaking sure that those match as best as possible. and ensuring that your ngo has the capacity,not only to deliver assistance and protection to the beneficiaries, which of course is paramount,but also the capacity to meet the government funding requirements.

there was one question that i saw on the chatabout new ngos receiving funding. one thing i would say is that for state prm,it requires that an organization have been in existence and have records of audits, reporting,and things like that, for three years before they are eligible to apply for prm funding. now that doesn’t necessarily apply to thetaft funding at the local level that goes through our u.s. embassy, but if you are applyingto, for example, the horn of africa notice of funding opportunity for multi-sectors,that would be the case. prm’s funding announcements go out throughoutthe year, but mainly between december and may or june, most being in winter and spring.

i really want to encourage the ngos to askquestions to ref coords or to prm ngo coordinator, jeffrey tang, as well as to icva, interaction,and voice members. thanks once again to all of you for everythingyou have been able to share with us today. very much appreciated. for all of our participants i’d like tonote once again the recordings of today’s session as well as all of the mentioned resourceswill be available in the coming days on the event webpage. in addition, once the translation is completed,there will also be subtitles for the recording in both french and arabic.

icva will later put together a briefing paperon the topic discussed during today’s session. and, looking ahead to our next event comingup together, again the next event in the collaboration between phap and icva on this subject of thehumanitarian financing learning stream, we will be looking at the topic of private donors. that will be on the 27th of january, you canjoin this session to learn how private humanitarian funding is changing. it used to be primarily targeted at naturaldisaster response and we’ve seen over recent years this shifting with the context of theconflict in syria. you can also already register for this event.

although it is coming up at the end of january,you can already sign up by clicking the button on your screen. you will receive a reminder then, i shouldnote, so you won’t have to worry about forgetting between now and then, so please do sign upwe look forward to seeing you there. in addition to this in february of next year,we want to hold a humanitarian financing bonus topic webinar. over the last few months, we’ve receiveda lot of interest from ngos in wanting to learn more about the grand bargain on humanitarianfinancing. what’s the origin of the grand bargain?

what’s the process? how are humanitarian actors shaping it? how are we moving forward with the 10 grandbargain workstreams? and most importantly, what are the impactsof the grand bargain across the sector to improve efficiency? as some of you know, the grand bargain has10 workstreams, and to shape our planning for the webinar, we want to hear from youwhich workstreams you want to learn the most about and our survey about that will be displayedsoon. great.

and then just one quick reminder that we nowhave complete the whole package for the first topic that was ‘humanitarian financing landscape:realities and emerging trends for ngos’. you can now access in their totality the recording,the follow-up answers from the speakers from the q&a that we weren’t able to get to livethat’s all in writing, as well as the briefing paper that was prepared by icva. and then as for the second topic which wasentitled ‘un humanitarian financing: demystifying ngo access’, you can already watch the recordingwith english, french, and arabic subtitles, and in addition icva will soon be publishingtheir briefing paper and more information document on that topic.

for the third topic we covered which was onpooled funding, the recordings are available so you can access those now in case you missedthe session, and we will soon publish translated subtitles, as well as the compilation of thequestions that we were not able to get to live, but now have written answers. so then, once again i’ll draw this to aclose. thank you so much to our participants foryour proactive involvement and the interesting questions that were submitted. to our speakers, for your valuable input,for shedding light on bilateral funding opportunities, and how those work from both sides.

i’d like to thank my co-host melissa andthe whole team here from phap and from icva who have made this event possible. so with that we look forward to seeing younext time. have a very happy and new year, in the meantime,and i wish you a good morning, a good afternoon, or a good evening.