“The best way to deal with humanitarian conflict is to not have them in the first place.” - Kristalina Georgieva
“Politics sometimes fail to deliver solutions; it is thus a necessity for developmental actors to assemble earlier, develop synergies, and to not contradict one another’s efforts.” - Thomas Zahnneisen
“From the Afghani lens, building institutions, establishing governance and security, and justice reform should be prioritized; from the humanitarian context, actors must invest in education, human capital, and infrastructure.” - Suraya Dalil
“Emergency in humanitarian work does not make sense alone, that’s philanthropy.” - Antonio Hautle
“Needs are not shrinking, needs are producing; strategies are neither blunt nor evidence based enough.” - Jae Egeland
Taking stock of the recommendations at the UN High Level Panel’s report on humanitarian financing, the discussants articulated their perspectives, ambitions, developments, and achievements of the Grand Bargain thus far. Relevant progress has been observed since the inception of the Grand Bargain. Most notably, the humanitarian-development divide has been bridged and now concurrently coexist; improvement in the predictability of funding has been illustrated, and funding has doubled from $7 billion to $14 billion, to name a few.
“Donors should follow the people in need not the income of the country refugees flee to.”
In this regard, the World Bank has raised more than $1 billion of donations from bilateral sources to reduce the cost of middle income countries whom host refugees, allowing them to take care of their communities and refugees in concessional terms.
“Our guiding force must be what it is that we can deliver for the people.”
As far as ways forward, to address the communities through humanitarian diplomacy, the response must be multi-dimensional, collaborative, and complementary. Increasing the diversity of engagement through more inter-agency collaboration on the field and institutional actors operating on comparative strength will allow those involved to fulfill their collective responsibility to serve humanity. A comprehensive mapping exercise has been prioritized as the next step of the process which allows for institutions to be more informed, cognizant of recommendations, and to provide key examples of initiatives relative to recommendations addressed.
