In conflict situations, such as those in Afghanistan and Somalia, simple communication technologies can help researchers and humanitarian organisations collect more accurate data on the effects of humanitarian aid. Electronic surveys taken with smartphones, for example, can automatically assess collected data and prevent implausible responses from being entered. This toolkit weighs the benefits – and the risks – of technology used in aid and development.

Global Overview OCTOBER 2016

October saw Venezuela’s tense political standoff at new heights amid economic stress and popular unrest, and Haiti’s weak political and security equilibrium struck by a major natural disaster and humanitarian crisis. In Africa, violence worsened in the Central African Republic (CAR), north-eastern Kenya, Mozambique and western Niger, while in Ethiopia the government hardened its response to continued protests. In Myanmar, unprecedented attacks on police in the north triggered deadly clashes and displacement threatening to exacerbate intercommunal tensions across the country, while Russia’s North Caucasus saw an increase in conflict-related casualties, detentions and counter-terrorism operations. In the Middle East, the election of Michel Aoun as president of Lebanon signals a long-awaited breakthrough ending two years of political deadlock.

2 novembre 2016 – Le Fonds central pour les interventions d'urgence (CERF) de l'ONU a annoncé qu'il lui manquait 25 millions de dollars sur les 450 millions nécessaires pour financer ses réponses rapides aux crises humanitaires d'urgences et négligées pour l'année 2016.

Dans un communiqué de presse diffusé mardi, le CERF a souligné que ce déficit de financement pourrait avoir un effet dévastateur en empêchant le CERF de fournir une aide humanitaire en temps opportun et de pouvoir sauver la vie de millions de personnes touchées par des crises.

Selon le Fonds, ce déficit est principalement dû aux fluctuations des taux de change qui sont estimés à 16 millions de dollars en 2016. Jusqu'à présent en 2016, le CERF a versé 390 millions de dollars dans 45 pays pour des activités vitales en réponse à la forte demande des partenaires humanitaires.

En moyenne, chaque année, les subventions du CERF aident les partenaires humanitaires à fournir des soins essentiels à plus de 20 millions de personnes; une aide alimentaire à 10 millions de personnes; de l'eau et de l'assainissement à 8 millions de personnes; des moyens de subsistance à 5 millions de personnes; de la protection à 4 millions de personnes et des abris à 1 million de personnes, ainsi que des services pour les réfugiés et les migrants, des programmes de nutrition, d'action contre les mines, d'éducation d'urgence et de gestion des camps.

En 2013 et 2014, les contributions au CERF ont dépassé l'objectif annuel de 450 millions de dollars, avec environ 480 millions de dollars versés au fonds chacune de ces années. Mais en dépit des récentes augmentations des besoins humanitaires, le financement du CERF pour soutenir l'action humanitaire d'urgence a diminué en 2015 (402 millions de dollars reçus) et en 2016 (425 millions de dollars) alors que le Secrétaire général avait lancé un appel pour un financement de 1 milliard de dollars d'ici 2018 et que la majorité des donateurs du CERF avait soutenu cet appel.

A titre d'exemples, le CERF a alloué en 2015 un total de 15 millions de dollars pour soutenir une assistance vitale à plus de 2 millions de personnes touchées par le tremblement de terre de magnitude 7,8 qui a frappé le Népal en avril 2015. En 2016, le CERF a alloué 21 millions de dollars pour soutenir une aide humanitaire immédiate à plus de 250.000 personnes touchées par le conflit au Soudan du Sud.

Ce type d'aide comprend un soutien à une assistance de base en matière de logement et autres produits non-alimentaires, d'eau et d'assainissement et de promotion de l'hygiène, de santé, de nutrition, de sécurité alimentaire et de protection des personnes déplacées.

KEY FINDINGS

As early as July 2015 concerns over access to water began to be heard from earthquake affected communities. The first issue of Open Mic Nepal highlighted comments from Gorkha and Dhading that water sources had dried up. Over time the Common Feedback Project registered more and more feedback over water supply from all of the 14 priority affected districts.

These concerns were not only captured by qualitative data, but also to some extent by the Community Perception Survey, particularly in the thematic area of protection, where it was found that 10 percent of respondents felt there was tension in their community as a result of competition over scarce water resources. Also in the reconstruction themed survey, a number of respondents stated that their reconstruction efforts were delayed due to a lack of water for mixing mud or concrete. Some communities reported that they were more worried about water than they were about rebuilding, and also that additional hours needed to travel long distances to retrieve water was impacting their productive capacity.

In light of the growing body of qualitative feedback being collected on water concerns, the Common Feedback Project decided to dedicate some questions on its regular Community Perception Survey explicitly to water, in an attempt to quantify the scope of the problem across the earthquake affected area.

In June 2016 the Community Perception Survey included two questions specifically on water. The survey found that only 24 percent of respondents claimed there was an issue with access to water in their community. However, there were pockets of greater water insecurity in certain districts, such as Sindhupalchok (47 percent), Dhading (46 percent) and Gorkha (34 percent). Interestingly, 31 percent of respondents stated that they or their family were facing problems as a result of water scarcity. These reported problems were greatest in the same three water insecure districts.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• Ensure planned WASH or water supply programmes are accurately targeting the identified pockets of heightened water insecurity.

• Continued monitoring of the issues and further qualitative and quantitative research should be conducted to assess the long term impacts of the changes in the water table or water flows.

• Planned and existing water and sanitation projects could consider the promotion of rainwater harvesting techniques in the earthquake affected areas, especially if the impacts on the water table are assessed to be long term.

New Report ‘Transitioning from the MDGs to the SDGs’ Calls for Collaboration to ‘Deliver as One’*

New York, November 10 — UNDP and the World Bank Group released its new report “Transitioning from the MDGs to the SDGs” today, coinciding with the UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination's (CEB) Second Regular Session of 2016. The session brings together United Nations System Principals to enhance UN system-wide coherence and coordination on a broad range of issues of global concern. The launch of the report is timely as the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development has set the vision for the next 14 years of global action.

“The 2030 Agenda is recognized as a transformative, universal and integrated agenda. Implementation should not create 17 new silos around the Sustainable Development Goals,” recommends the new report.

The report pulls together the main lessons from the Millennium Development Goals Reviews by the UN System and World Bank Group for their engagement at the country level. These reviews took place at meetings of the UN CEB from 2013 to 2015.

According to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the CEB Reviews were “unprecedented – a truly integrated system-wide endeavour, championed jointly by World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and United Nations Development Programme Administrator Helen Clark”.

The report concludes, “it is time to more systematically consider the ‘how’ of the integration at the country level and draw on the comparative advantages of the UN system’s diverse areas of expertise, how to work collaboratively and deliver together, and how to work on the continuum from the normative to the operational as a comprehensive and coherent UN effort.”

UNDP Administrator Helen Clark stated, “To leave no one behind, strong engagement with local communities and civil society is required. This should include investments in the empowerment of women and girls, sustainable energy for all, and the sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity.” She further added, “Achieving sustainable development is helped by having humanitarian and development actors working closely together.”

“The World Bank Group and the United Nations have a shared vision of a world free of extreme poverty by 2030,” said World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim. “To meet our ambitious goals, World Bank Group and UN staff must collaborate effectively with our country partners, use our comparative advantages, and remove bottlenecks that impede delivery. This report has shown that, together, we can achieve better results for people and the planet.”

“The MDG acceleration exercise not only delivered results on the MDG targets, it also provided lessons that are directly applicable to our work on the Sustainable Development Goals and the World Bank Group’s own twin goals to end poverty and boost shared prosperity. We know that to achieve those ambitious and interrelated targets at scale, World Bank Group and UN staff have to be flexible, share knowledge, and focus on measurable results,” stated Mahmoud Mohieldin, World Bank Group Senior Vice President for the 2030 Development Agenda, United Nations Relations, and Partnerships.

“The CEB reviews were the highest level of analysis the United Nation’s leadership devoted to advocating the need to work across silos, and work across the Millennium Development Goals to tackle off-track MDG targets, with an implicit aim to learn lessons for what was to come: a more integrated sustainable development horizon called the SDGs. There is a shared understanding that investing in solutions within a sector was often not sufficient to meet a particular MDG target,” said Magdy Martínez-Solimán, UN Assistant Secretary General and Director of UNDP’s Bureau for Policy and Programme Support.

Simona Petrova, Acting Secretary of the CEB and Director of the CEB Secretariat, United Nations recalled, “the MDG Reviews showed that significant development gains were possible when the UN system really came together in support of countries. A hallmark of the Reviews was the high level of coordination and cooperation between the UN Country Teams and the World Bank Group offices. To help meet the ambition of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, achieving this degree of collaboration ought to be the goal in all countries from the very beginning of the SDG implementation period.”

The new report draws attention to the three main conclusions that need to be applied to the transition to the 2030 Agenda, such as: a) Support cross-institutional collaboration between the UN and the World Bank Group; b) Advance better understanding of cross-sectoral work, and the interrelatedness of goals and targets; and c) Promote global and high-level advocacy.

The report discusses 16 countries and the Pacific Island sub-region— an exercise that brought together the UN and the World Bank Group, which systemically identified the country situation, the bottlenecks to attainment of the MDGs, and potential solutions to be implemented. Since many MDGs have been absorbed into the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), many of the observations and solutions provided are expected to prove useful to implementation of the SDGs.

MEDIA CONTACTS

In New York, UNDP
Sangita Khadka
Tel : +1 212-906-5043
sangita.khadka@undp.org

In Washington, WBG
Mike Kelleher
Tel : +1 202-473-4440
mkelleher1@worldbank.org

Nepal - Restoring and maintaining open spaces has long been recognized as a key way to increase resilience in disaster-prone areas. Nepal’s open space concept was initiated in 2009 as a flood-related response. The spaces, identified to meet the communities’ projected needs, were used to great effect in the aftermath of the country’s 2015 earthquake.

Sanogaucharan football ground in the Nepalese capital is one of 83 designated open spaces in the Kathmandu valley. Last Saturday it was the venue for a friendly match between IOM Nepal and YUWA, a local youth HIV advocacy organization to raise awareness on preserving and protecting open spaces.

Before the match, volunteers cleaned to pitch and held a rally to encourage the community to participate in the campaign.

“This match forms part of a series of campaigns that place emphasis on the roles of communities and local volunteers in supporting the government’s efforts to maintain these spaces,” said IOM Nepal’s Jitendra Bohara.

The involvement of Nepalese citizens in assisting the government-led campaign serves as a model example for other disaster-prone areas hoping to raise awareness of the need to protect open spaces. Local communities have developed coalitions of women’s groups, youth clubs, local authorities, and businesses to participate in the campaign.

Communities can turn these spaces into sports and recreation areas, as well as incorporating green infrastructure into the urban planning. In doing so, they will gain a better sense of how these open spaces can be used in times of disaster.

The campaign is part of IOM Nepal’s project, “Identification and Management of Open Spaces for Disaster Preparedness”, in partnership with the Government of Nepal, with support from the United States Agency for International Development's Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance (USAID/OFDA).

The project aims to enhance the government’s preparedness efforts and establish coherent approaches in managing the needs of displaced populations after a large-scale earthquake in remote areas and cities.

For further information, please contact IOM Nepal. Jitendra Bohara, Tel: +977 9801004571, Email: jbohara@iom.int or Ariani Hasanah Soejoeti, Tel: +977 9810175020, Email: ahsoejoeti@iom.int.

This study maps out the major weaknesses of each fragile situation on the latest country performance assessment exercises and identifies overall common issues that need special attention.

While investments in transport, energy, education, health, private sector development, and other areas remain necessary, much more must be done to ensure that these investments are sustainable. Rethinking ADB’s engagement in fragile countries is critically important. This must be backed by a comprehensive understanding of the governance, institutional, political, and social issues that are behind each country’s exposure to conflict or fragility.

Findings show that the weakest areas in fragile and conflict-affected countries are policies for social inclusion/equity, followed by structural policies, and public sector management and institutions. Economic management has generally the highest ranking or is the strongest area in many such countries.

In Nepal Cordaid is supporting some 500 displaced families in 4 camps. They lost their houses and income after the April and May 2015 earthquakes. We provide drinking water, business skills trainings and help mountain farmers adapt to lowland agriculture.

Cramped settings, minimal facilities

These families are living in very cramped settings with minimal facilities on the slopes of the mountain. Unfortunately there is no adequate land in the valleys available to provide shelter for them and they can’t go back to their destroyed homes because the area is inaccessible or no longer exists.

New homes, but not for the majority of IDPs

Cordaid’s shelter program is in full swing. The first of 380 earth quake proof houses have been built and families have moved in their new homes.

But thousands of IDPs don’t have such luck. They don’t have a home to return to and the government is doing very little for them. We have been advocating for their rights. “But this is a long process”, explains Cordaid humanitarian worker Margriet Verhoeven. “And as the funding for our IDP support program in Nepal stops in April next year, we want to make sure the displaced families know how to effectively raise their voices, to advocate for their rights and to gain access to the relevant government officials who are responsible for resettlement programs and IDP support.

Our team in Nepal has been very successful in the IDP camps in Laharepauwa. As the pictures show, dozens of families attended our awareness raising meetings. They are now actively advocating for their rights.

Political Parties Fail to Deliver on Promises

(New York, November 19, 2016)– Ten years after signing a peace accord, successive Nepali governments have failed to deliver on its central human rights promises, Human Rights Watch said today. The international community, and particularly the United Nations, should press the government to fulfill its pledges as victims wait in vain for information about missing family members and accountability for crimes committed during the war.

The Comprehensive Peace Accord (CPA) of November 21, 2006, brought an end to Nepal’s civil war, which was started in 1996 by the Communist Party of Nepal – Maoist. The war claimed more than 13,000 lives. Both the Maoists and government forces committed serious human rights abuses, including enforced disappearances, torture, extrajudicial killings, and sexual violence.

“The ceasefire agreement ended armed conflict, a landmark for a country torn apart by violence and war,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “But the promises of accountability for abuses and the resolution of thousands of disappearances have been broken by Nepal’s main political parties, all of which have taken turns at leading the government in the last decade.”

The long civil war left a political gap that led King Gyanendra to reassert monarchical autocracy and suspend the constitution on February 1, 2005, with the support of the military. The authoritarian approach and serious human rights violations led to a people’s movement to oppose the monarchy. Nepal’s political parties formed an alliance, and together with the Maoists, made a commitment to democracy and human rights under the 2006 peace deal.

One of the key undertakings under the peace accord was to investigate and bring to justice those responsible for human rights violations committed during the war. Yet, all the political parties appear to have forgotten those promises, and the victims’ families are still waiting.

Devi Sunuwar is still demanding justice for the killing of her daughter Maina, then 15. Soldiers detained Maina in February 2004, though the army vehemently denied it at the time. Under sustained pressure from the international community, including from the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the army finally proceeded with an internal inquiry and military prosecutors brought three soldiers allegedly responsible before a court martial.

According to army records, the accused were only charged with minor offenses of using improper interrogation techniques and not following procedures during the disposal of Maina’s body. They were sentenced to six months in prison, effective from March 2005. Since they had already spent that time confined to barracks during the period of investigation, the officers were set free. “The government is protecting murderers,” Sunuwar told Human Rights Watch. “But I will keep fighting till I get justice.”

Arjun Lama was abducted in May 2005, in broad daylight and in front of many witnesses by men known to be Maoists. Although the exact circumstances of his death are not yet known, his body was partially exhumed at a spot identified by witnesses who said they saw his murder. Agni Sapkota, a Maoist leader accused in the case, was denied a visa to visit the United States in June 2010, but the government has yet to take any action on the case. The National Human Rights Commission has secured the exhumation site but fears that because it is not guarded, his remains are not safe.

After much faltering, a truth-seeking commission and a disappearances commission were established in 2015, but were slow to get under way. The legislation undergirding the commissions is deeply flawed as it allows for amnesty for certain crimes, creating space for those responsible to escape justice. The law has been criticized by international experts, including OHCHR, and has been struck down twice by Nepal’s Supreme Court. But the authorities have not amended the legislation to bring it into line with either the Supreme Court’s orders or international law.

By September 2016, the two commissions had received nearly 59,000 complaints relating to wartime abuses, according to sources close to the commissions.

In a cynical move designed to provide further shelter for the abusers, the then-prime minister, Khagendra Prasad Oli, signed an agreement in May 2016, with the other main political parties agreeing to withdraw all wartime cases before the courts and to provide amnesty to alleged perpetrators. This agreement was a clear statement that regardless of the Supreme Court directives, all political parties are actively working against accountability and justice.

An unrealistically short statute of limitations on reporting sexual violence has served as a serious bar to women and girls reporting rape, Human Rights Watch said. Social stigma and lack of medical and legal support have suppressed their testimony. Survivors say that they continue to feel a deep sense of injustice at being left out of reparation and reconciliation mechanisms.

In addition to accountability for wartime cases, Human Rights Watch noted that many other obligations under the peace agreement remain unfulfilled. The pledge to end discrimination based on gender, caste, class, ethnicity, and membership in other marginalized groups remains deeply contested, and power continues to rest among traditional elites. Demands to restructure the state to invest more power in marginalized communities, a central pledge of the agreement, led to months of economic blockade and many deaths in the country’s southern districts between September 2015 and February 2016. Talks designed to remedy these grievances remain stalled.

“The war was brutal, and Nepal’s political leadership should not forget that injustices need redress,” Adams said. “Nepali political leaders should stop sweeping war crimes and justice issues under the rug, and instead live up to the incredibly brave promises made under the CPA.”

A significant success of the peace accord was the demobilization and rehabilitation of child soldiers from Maoist forces. By early 2010, an estimated 3,000 Maoist soldiers who had joined as minors were reintegrated into civilian life through a government program assisted by the UN.

The UN and Nepal’s donors have an important continuing role to play, Human Rights Watch said. The UN had a large and significant presence in Nepal through a dedicated Office of the High Commission for Human Rights and the UN Mission in Nepal to enforce and monitor the agreement. Although the Nepali government applied considerable pressure to restrict full operation of the two offices, both provided important independent reports on the implementation of the peace agreement. However, the Nepali authorities, in December 2011, forced OHCHR to shut down its operations.

“The United Nations played an important role in bringing about the peace and in ensuring that both sides abided by the main planks of the peace agreement, including on human rights,” Adams said. “The UN and Nepal’s donors have a continuing obligation toward the victims of Nepal’s conflict to ensure that government delivers on its commitment to justice.”

For more Human Rights Watch reporting on Nepal, please visit: https://www.hrw.org/asia/nepal

The quest of the last 15 years to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) taught us that Global Goals can motivate and help sustain leaps in human progress. It also taught us that the specifics matter. In some places, the MDGs became a widely-recognized, consistent and important driver of local progress; in others, the role and impact of the MDGs was more ambiguous. A lot depended on way the MDGs were implemented: if local change agents made them meaningful locally; if local leaders drew on their legitimacy and visibility; if they were employed to solve real-life problems etc.

The MDGs had greater impact where they captured the popular imagination, generating good-will and raising expectations. This happened when the Goals were brought into the popular discourse through national movements, local campaigns and political platforms; and where local leaders and change agents considered the MDGs, less as a rigid framework than as an opportunity to:

• Build consensus around national development priorities;
  
• Win international support and generate local buy-in;
  
• Align fragmented initiatives;
  
• Make the needs and contributions of communities and localities visible; and/or
• Hold leaders to account for their commitments.
  

Change agents in communities and countries around the world, supported by UNDP and others, learned to leverage the MDGs to realize these outcomes. Improvements in data, partnerships, systems and institutions gradually made MDG practice more effective, responsive and coherent. This accelerated maternal and child survival, enrolment and gender parity in primary schools, lowered HIV prevalence, among other outcomes. The world cannot afford to start over with the SDGs – but must build on the improvements made under the MDGs. Many countries recognize this and are adapting existing strategies and repurposing the institutions that enabled MDG progress. Their challenge is to understand, prioritize and sustain what works and adjust initiatives that have stalled, while strengthening underlying capacities, mobilizing all possible resources and putting in motion the farsighted polices the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) require. This report seeks to help them by providing key lessons from the MDG era, distilled by governments and stakeholders themselves, through National MDG Progress Reports. Between 2013 and 2015, 55 countries produced National MDG Progress Reports assessing the totality of their countries’ MDG experience. Many detail lessons they now apply to implement the SDGs. Most echo lessons UNDP learned from its experience supporting over 140 countries to achieve the MDGs.

FOREWORD

At the sixty-eighth session of the World Health Assembly in May 2015, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan committed the Organization to creating a single, all-hazards emergency programme; to establishing a global health emergency workforce; and to raising a US$ 100 million contingency fund to enable rapid emergency response.

As I write this in October 2016, the programme, the workforce and the fund have become a reality, although they are still being built. While the new programme represents a major restructuring and a new approach to how WHO addresses emergencies — be that in prevention, preparedness, response or recovery — it was built on the foundations already in place. This includes the work of WHO’s Department of Emergency Risk Management and Humanitarian Response (ERM).

The department, now folded into the new programme, was responsible for managing all phases of WHO’s humanitarian work in relation to conflicts and disasters.

This report details the work of the ERM department in 2015, a year when the Organization provided assistance to more than 40 countries dealing with health emergencies, including seven simultaneous Grade 3 emergencies — the most in any single year on record.

These emergencies – in Central African Republic, Iraq, Nepal, South Sudan, Syria, and Yemen — placed unprecedented strains on the Organization at all levels.

The Ebola outbreak in West Africa represented the seventh of these Grade 3 emergencies, but was outside of ERM’s purview, and thus is not covered in this report.

The year also saw a third consecutive global increase in the number of people displaced by violence and persecution. The total came to over 65 million, most of whom remain in the Middle East and in Africa. WHO continued to coordinate health-sector responses to protracted crises, including in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Myanmar, the Sahel sub-region of Africa, Somalia and Ukraine.

A disturbing increase in attacks on health workers has made helping at-risk populations an even greater challenge. A WHO report, Attacks on Health, found that from January 2014 to December 2015 there were 594 reported attacks on health care resulting in 959 deaths and 1561 injuries in 19 countries with emergencies.

WHO condemns these attacks in the strongest terms and will continue to advocate on behalf of health workers wherever and whenever they are under threat.

In addition to disease outbreaks and conflicts, natural hazards — earthquakes, typhoons, and floods — affected approximately 90 million people in 2015. The Nepal earthquake of April 2015 alone affected almost 6 million people. WHO and partners responded to the vast majority of these crises.

The new emergencies programme will build on successes such as the deployment in 2015 of a novel surveillance system for detecting infectious disease and monitoring trends, and partnerships that have been at the heart of WHO’s emergencies work for years, be they networks of experts or medical teams ready to deploy.

WHO also invests considerable efforts in helping countries to prepare for and mitigate the effects of emergencies: retrofitting hospitals so that they don’t collapse during earthquakes; training rapid response teams so that they can react quickly when an emergency occurs; establishing stockpiles of drugs, supplies and emergency kits; strengthening WHO’s readiness to respond to emergencies, in support of local health staff; and assisting with recovery efforts based on the principle of ‘building back better.’ The question is whether the resources and can be found and the global momentum can be built to do a great deal more of this advanced work. If so, future tolls to people and communities will be less severe when diseases spread, when disasters strike, and when conflicts break out. This is why WHO has changed how it operates.

It is clear that to meet the immediate health needs of crisis-affected populations, whilst at the same time tackling the root causes of their vulnerability, WHO must be part of a broader change in the way the international community prevents, prepares for, and responds to crises.

From the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, to the Sustainable Development Goals and the World Humanitarian Summit, there is now a groundswell of support for a profound reform of the way the world approaches crises, and it is in this context that WHO’s new Health Emergencies Programme has taken shape.

To perform effectively in all areas of work on emergencies, WHO needs predictable, long-term, sustainable funding. Our funding appeals for emergencies were largely underfinanced in 2015.

This must change.

Dr Richard J. Brennan

Director of Department of Emergency Operations, WHO Health Emergencies Programme

former Director of WHO’s Department of Emergency Risk Management and Humanitarian Response

New Delhi, 25 November 2016 – In a move to guarantee access to high-quality medical products that can protect, diagnose and treat illness and disease in the WHO South-East Asia Region Member countries today launched a path-breaking initiative that will enhance information sharing, collaboration and convergence of regulatory practices across the Region.

“Access to high-quality medical products is a matter of life and death for everyone. The coming together of the Region’s regulatory agencies marks a watershed moment that will ensure medical products produced and sold in the Region do exactly what they are supposed to. This will benefit the vulnerable in particular, who are often pushed into poverty when paying for low-quality or unsafe products. It will also enhance our ability to effectively tackle health security threats such as antimicrobial resistance and tuberculosis, which are exacerbated by ineffective drugs that breed resistance,” Dr Poonam Khetrapal Singh, Regional Director for WHO South-East Asia said.

The presence of poor quality medical products on the market is the result of limited regulatory capacity to enforce best practices needed to develop, produce and distribute them. While many regulatory authorities in the Region lack sufficient technical capacity, staff and resources to perform effectively, even well-resourced authorities are hard-pressed to thoroughly evaluate all new products and enforce existing regulations. The new South-East Asia Regulatory Network (SEARN) aims to change that.

“The network, which connects every one of the Region’s national regulatory authorities, will help harmonize existing regulations and streamline work-sharing arrangements in order to get the most out of our collective strengths,” Dr Boonchai Somboonsok, Secretary General of Thailand’s Food and Drug Administration said. “By collaborating and working together we can learn from one another while effectively regulating the vast number of products available in our countries.”

For the Region’s smaller countries – such as Bhutan and Maldives – SEARN will significantly expand the ability for national regulators to ensure medical products are safe and of adequate quality.

“Greater information sharing, collaboration and alignment of regulatory standards in the Region will be of great use to Bhutan. As a smaller country it is important for us to work with national regulators in other countries and have rapid access to regulatory information about products we import to Bhutan to ensure their quality and safety. We’re immensely pleased to be a part of this initiative and look forward to its implementation,” Sonam Dorji, the former head of Bhutan’s Drug Regulatory Authority said.

At the same time as protecting consumers, SEARN will have a substantial impact on how the medical product market’s supply side functions.

“As a major producer of medical products India is very much looking forward to SEARN’s full implementation of planned activities. By working together to increase regulatory capacity SEARN will ensure that only products that are of a high standard can get to the markets we are supplying. SEARN will also help to improve convergence towards good regulatory practices in the Region,” Dr G N Singh, the Drugs Controller General of India, Central Drugs Standard Control Organization, said.

Dr Khetrapal Singh further emphasized how the new initiative would accelerate progress towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals via the attainment of universal health coverage. “By ensuring medical products are of a high quality we will expand health coverage and ensure every member of society can get the care they need,” Dr Khetrapal Singh said. “SEARN will strengthen health systems across South-East Asia and help fulfill each person’s right to the highest attainable standard of health.”

SEARN was established as an outcome of regional meetings in 2015 and 2016. It exists on a voluntary basis and will meet annually in addition to carrying out ongoing joint activities.

The WHO South-East Asia Region is comprised of 11 countries, all of whom are now SEARN members. These countries are Bangladesh, Bhutan, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, India, Indonesia, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Timor-Leste.

###

Media Contact

Ms Shamila Sharma
Communication Officer
WHO Regional Office for South-East Asia
E-mail: sharmasha@who.int
Mobile: +91 98182 87256
Tel: +91 11 23370804, Extn: 26575

Highlights

• The School Sector Development Plan (SSDP), a comprehensive education plan, was formally adopted by the Ministry of Education. As a member of the Local Education Development Partner Group (LEDPG), WFP has been actively involved in the consultations and contributed to the development of the SSDP.

• The first year activities under the Rural Women’s Economic Empowerment (RWEE) programme were successfully completed in Sarlahi, Sindhuli, and Rautahat.

WFP Assistance

DEV 200319: The Country Programme (CP) supports the Government of Nepal in enhancing the food and nutrition security of vulnerable communities and increasing resilience to disasters.

The CP covers four areas:

Livelihoods creation provides seasonal employment and livelihood training, rehabilitation of rural roads and trails, irrigation channels and other community assets.
Under the livelihood creation programme, WFP implements the Rural Women’s Economic Empowerment (RWEE) project, a joint five-year initiative that promotes the empowerment of rural women through livelihood activities.

Education support is provided to the Ministry of Education to achieve holistic approaches to student well-being by improving nutritional intake through school meals. In addition, support is provided to continue increasing knowledge related to nutrition.

WFP Assistance Nutrition support is provided to the Ministry of Health to prevent chronic malnutrition among pregnant women, nursing mothers and children aged 6 to 23 months.

Capacity development includes Vulnerability Analysis and Mapping (VAM), the Government’s Food Security Monitoring System (NeKSAP) and Emergency Preparedness Response.
PRRO 200875: The PRRO transitions from the Emergency Operation (EMOP) 200668 and will support vulnerable earthquake-affected populations in Gorkha, Nuwakot, and Dhading.

PRRO 200787: This operation continues to support refugees from Bhutan through food assistance. WFP further supports the refugees with a Reclamation Gardening Programme, wherein the population are supported with vegetable seeds, saplings, manure, gardening equipment and trainings.
SO 200848: The SO comprised the Logistics Cluster, Emergency Telecommunications Cluster, and the Remote Access Operation (RAO) during the initial response to the earthquake emergency. At present,

WFP is continuing the RAO, with trail work in earthquake affected districts.

Constant political feuding and weak governance has delayed post-quake rebuilding despite an outpouring of aid

By Nita Bhalla and Gopal Sharma

HOKSHE, Nepal, Nov 25 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Farmer Ganesh Prasad Gautam beamed as the young woman behind the desk littered with files called his name out at the rundown government office in the mountains of central Nepal.

After 18 months of living in a shack made of corrugated iron, tarpaulin and bamboo amid the ruins of his earthquake-hit house, he is finally receiving long-promised government funds to start rebuilding his home.

The 54-year-old farmer was one of eight million people affected in April last year when a 7.8-magnitude quake struck the Himalayan nation - leaving 9,000 dead and destroying one million homes as well as schools, businesses roads, and bridges.

"The money is late and it's not enough to build what I had before, but at least the government has given it," Gautam said to nods from fellow villagers gathered at the office in Hokshe village, 64 km (40 miles) east of Kathmandu.

"We've already endured one winter and two monsoons like this - out in the open with no protection from the rain and cold."

But Gautam is one of the lucky ones.

Constant feuding between a myriad of political parties has fuelled political turmoil and weak governance in Nepal, delaying efforts to rebuild the country of 28 million people despite an outpouring of aid, analysts said.

Ongoing political instability in a country which has seen 24 governments in 26 years has stymied reconstruction efforts.

"You are looking at a country that has had three governments since the earthquake - all coalitions and none with a solid majority," said Renaud Meyer, Country Director for the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Nepal.

"There is no doubt the political landscape is the biggest barrier for the recovery and reconstruction of Nepal to take place. It requires consistency, it requires determination and the less open it is to spoilers, the better."

POLITICS PREVAILS

Wedged between India and China, Nepal - famed as the birthplace of Buddha and home to Mount Everest - is one of the world's poorest countries.

A decade-long civil war between Maoist rebels and government forces ended in 2006, raising hopes of development in a country where one in four people live on less than $1.90 a day - the World Bank's measure of extreme poverty.

The three main parties - the Nepali Congress (NC), Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist-Centre) and the Unified Marxist Leninist (UML) - have over the years made unlikely bedfellows in fragile coalitions and politicians are seen as selfish and power hungry.

Critics say rather than focus on reconstruction, former Prime Minister Sushil Koirala's NC-led government exploited a wave of national solidarity in the quake's aftermath to finalise Nepal's long overdue constitution.

Even though a new charter was adopted in September 2015, and a new coalition government led by Khadga Prasad Oli's UML party took power, the historic moment was marred by bloodshed in street clashes in the southern Terai region bordering India.

More than 50 people died in the crisis, which forced Oli to resign nine months after taking power as his main coalition partner, the Maoist Centre party, withdrew its support.

The constitutional crisis and political changes resulted a six-month delay in setting up the National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) - the key agency overseeing Nepal's recovery.

As a result, families are only now receiving the first installment of a promised 200,000 rupee ($1,880) housing grant.

But for some Nepalis, the funds are too little, too late.

FOOD SECURITY SNAPSHOT

• Above-average cereal harvest forecast in 2016

• Cereal import requirements in 2016/17 marketing year forecast at average levels

• Food insecurity conditions persist in most rural areas

Above-average cereal harvest forecast in 2016

Harvesting of the 2016 monsoon season cereal crops (rice, maize and millet) is ongoing and will continue until December. FAO’s latest forecast for the 2016 aggregate cereal production stands at about 187 000 tonnes, 2 percent above last year’s good level. Most of this increase reflects a larger rice output, which is expected to reach 80 000 tonnes, 3 percent up from the 2015 harvest. The 2016 maize production is forecast to increase slightly to 82 000 tonnes.

Cereal import requirements in 2016/17 marketing year forecast close to average levels

Total cereal import requirements in the 2016/17 marketing year (July/June) are forecast to return close to average levels reaching 78 000 tonnes. Imports consist mainly of rice and wheat, which are forecast at 70 000 and 6 000 tonnes, respectively.

Food insecurity conditions persist in most rural areas

Food insecurity persists mostly in rural areas, with higher concentrations in the eastern and southern parts of the country. UNHCR indicates that, as of June 2016, around 15 500 refugees from Bhutan are still living in refugee camps in eastern Nepal. These populations rely mostly on humanitarian assistance, including food aid, healthcare and other necessities.

A steep, 90-minute climb along a rough-hewn path is the only route up to Pragatishil village. The village sits high in the mountains, about 50 kilometers from Nepal’s western city of Pokhara. The area adjoins Gorkha district - the epicenter of last April’s 7.8-magnitude quake which claimed nearly 9,000 lives and left hundreds of thousands homeless.

Building a school here for the community’s 100 children is no easy task. Porters have to carry about 13 tons of hollow concrete blocks up the path on their backs, not to mention the cement, steel roof struts and other building materials.

“This is a very remote area, with no roads and no electricity,” says Headmaster Prem Bahadur Gurung, pointing even further up the slope to where many of the children’s homes are.

His school is one of 31 in the area, being either rebuilt or structurally reinforced by the Nepal Red Cross Society, whose aim is to provide safe buildings for the children to study in. Outside one of the existing classrooms, which is still in use, a group of children are sitting on the grass for a lesson.

“The children wanted to come outside because it’s cold in the classroom,” says their teacher. “After the earthquake, they often rushed out of the building because they were scared by the numerous aftershocks.”

Manika Ale, a 14-year-old student at the Mahendri Mabi Secondary School, which sits in a valley of rice fields, agrees. “We feel safer now, but in the first few months, we often ran outside,” she says.

She is one of a group of students having an afternoon maths lesson in one of the classrooms, which has been reinforced, or retrofitted.

Retrofitting is being carried out at 21 of the Red Cross-supported schools. The process, which is not yet widespread in Nepal, involves strengthening a building’s foundations and roof, jacketing the walls with wire mesh and putting buttresses in place so that in the event of an earthquake, the building may shake but is unlikely to collapse.

“This is a practice which we would like to promote and persuade other actors to replicate,” says Xavier Chanraud, an engineer with the French Red Cross which together with the Danish Red Cross is supporting the project.

Mariana Liptuga, the Danish Red Cross country representative, points out that retrofitting schools is not only at least 25 per cent cheaper than building new ones, but also offers many other advantages.

“In terms of logistics it is more efficient, especially in remote areas. The time it takes and ecological impact is reduced because smaller quantities of materials such as wood are needed,” she says.

Whether retrofitting or re-building structures, for the Red Cross safety is the key concern. Many schools currently under reconstruction across areas damaged by the earthquake are being reconstructed use single-thickness brick or dry stone walls in violation of Nepal’s strict building code.

Seismologists say there is a significant likelihood of another major earthquake in the Himalayan country, where tectonic plates intersect. But no-one can predict when it might strike.

“The children are often frightened by rumors or false information in the media” about an imminent disaster”, says Krishna Chandra Pokherel, headmaster of Mahendri Mabi school.

The work to rebuild and reinforce schools in just one strand of a disaster risk reduction project managed by the Nepal Red Cross Society that aims to help local communities protect themselves better against a range of hazards, from earthquakes and flooding to communicable diseases.

“We often talk about building resilience in face of future disasters. What could be more crucial to resilience than investing in the safety of our country’s children,” says Dev Dhakhwa, Secretary General of the Nepal Red Cross Society.