Pleading with a donation fatigued world
Dagim Belayneh
Despite the tremendous strides taken towards ensuring food security in Ethiopia, the recurrence of climate-driven humanitarian crises still leaves the country shorthanded. Successive failed rains caused by fluctuations in ocean temperatures known as the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) have created a series of severe back-to-back droughts in Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa region. The Ethiopian government and humanitarian groups have recently announced that the country will run out of emergency food aid for 7.8 million people hit by severe drought by the end of this month.
The Humanitarian and Disaster Resilience Plan (HDRP) document released just a couple of months ago states that 7.8 million Ethiopians need relief food or cash assistance in South and Southeastern Ethiopia and in pocket areas throughout the country. The document further indicates that conflict, drought, disease outbreaks such as Acute Watery Diarrhea, the Fall Army Worm infestation and floods have exacerbated the humanitarian crises in the country.
The Plan outlined five key humanitarian issues: 1. Continuing acute food insecurity, malnutrition and water shortages in lowland, mostly pastoral areas, likely to be exacerbated by the impact of La Nina on spring rains. 2. Conflict-driven displacement 3. Continued risk of life-threatening disease outbreaks 4. Acute food insecurity in highland areas 5. Protection concerns due to drought and conflict.
Every year we hear these kinds of reports. Last year, it was 8.5 million people. Sometimes the number of people expecting humanitarian assistance is lower while it got to twice this year’s figure some years back. The consistent reality, however, is that millions of Ethiopians are in need of humanitarian aid every year. According to the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator, Ahunna Eziakonwa-Onochie, these trends have highly predictable patterns. The sudden surge in the number of people in need of humanitarian aid and acuteness of the problem leaves the government and humanitarian groups in need of more financial and material resources. Humanitarian appeals follow to address the gap in resources.
The National Disaster Risk Management Commission Commissioner, Mitiku Kassa, stated in the foreword of the HDRP document that he has personally overseen the preparation of 18 consecutive annual humanitarian appeals for Ethiopia. The recurrent nature of the problem and the routine humanitarian appeal for help is all evident from his remarks. On top of that, however, the statement reflects the potential for donor fatigue.
The increasingly chaotic international system is also not helping as various humanitarian crises, artificial and natural, are spread all over the world. The U.N. announced recently that famine in northeast Nigeria, together with South Sudan, Yemen and Somalia constitute the worst humanitarian crisis the world has faced since 1945. The U.N. Secretary-General’s humanitarian envoy Ahmed Al Meraikhi said: “There is donor fatigue because there are a lot of crises.”
It is amid such international conditions that Ethiopia has once again set out to plead for millions of dollars from the aid fatigued international community. Although the level of severity and the time left for the emergency food aid to run out might prompt some into jumping on board the call for aid, the entire amount of aid needed to save the 7.8 million people might not be raised within such a short period of time. That means the lives of a large number of people might be at risk.
Therefore, we can conclude that the strategy put in place to address this recurrent crisis either sought to mitigate each crisis when it arose or it failed to sustainably alleviate the problem. In both cases, there is a need for a new approach to deal with the recurring climate-driven humanitarian crisis.
Accordingly, the Ethiopian government and its partners have agreed that a significant shift in approach is required. The HDRP document states:
This Humanitarian and Disaster Resilience Plan (HDRP) represents a first step towards the development of a multiyear planning framework that will seek to: increase the quality and predictable delivery of required multi sectoral humanitarian response; mitigate future needs in areas that experience recurrent climate induced shock; support the strengthening of national service provision to address chronic and acute needs; and, the recovery of communities affected by drought and conflict.
In addition to primarily focusing on immediate response requirements for 2018, the document lays out the basis for a three-pillared model that will allow for further planning and development investments, in line with a disaster risk management approach. Pillar 1 has to do with prevention and mitigation while pillar 2 is about preparedness and response; the third pillar is about national systems strengthening and recovery. The document states that the first pillar of prevention and mitigation involves Activities to be undertaken immediately that will reduce humanitarian needs and requirements in 2018 and beyond – i.e. new emergency borehole drilling (with clear area-based targeting), development of fodder banks in pastoral areas, etc. The preparedness and response in Pillar 2 is largely about relief commodities and partners presence in hot-spot areas. The third pillar of National systems strengthening and recovery involves Activities to increase the capacity of national response systems and some limited, sector-specific early recovery activities, notably for conflict IDPs.
International funding and financing to tackle chronic and acute needs (and to address underlying causes) is generally programmed through one of three channels:
Channel 1. Resources programmed via Treasury / Ministry of Finance as direct budget support
Channel 2. Resources programmed via Sectoral Line Ministries, with technical support from international partners
Channel 3. Resources programmed via humanitarian and development partners, working in support of Government at point of delivery.
The Ethiopian government has a stated ambition of being supported to gradually shift response to predictable humanitarian needs through Channels 1 and 2 (along with work on mitigation and recovery), leaving Channel 3 for response to unanticipated shocks.
Carving out a strategy that sustainably addresses recurrent climate-driven humanitarian crises is so essential considering the frequency with which these crises are happening. It will rescue the lives of numerous Ethiopians and avert a looming catastrophe.