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The UK’s review of humanitarian aid: an agenda of radical change?

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Published:
1 April 2011
Region:
Europe
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The UK’s review of humanitarian aid: an agenda of radical change?

This two page document by the ODI (Overseas Development Institute, 2011) summarises the Humanitarian Emergency Response Review (HERR) commissioned by the UK government to look into how the UK should respond to rapid-onset humanitarian emergencies. It claims the HERR gives a very frank diagnosis of the general health of humanitarian action today, taking on board some of the most radical thinking around. The report has seven threads, one of which is early action, stressing that risk analysis should go beyond geographical predictions and take into account the role of the political economy in emergencies. The HERR also looks at resilience and innovation and the ODI document explains the radical idea of linking the MDGs with humanitarian assistance. Impact and Accountability is a further trend, ODI explains how the HERR report advocates for bringing impact assessment into the accountability thread.

The ODI summary assesses the HERR report as having the potential to provoke real and far-reaching change and that although some of what it reccomends is not new, the fact that it is an official document may mean DFID has to consider it and take it into account.

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