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Statement on GISF’s response to current resource challenges for members, associates and the wider NGO community

GISF Executive Director, Jon Novakovic, provides a statement on the organisation's status and response with respect to the USAID funding freeze.

Last week the United States government announced a 90-day pause in disbursements of foreign aid. As a consequence, many organisations funded by USAID have received suspension orders, impacting their operations. This includes many of GISF’s members and associates. 

As you may be aware, GISF is also supported by funding from USAID. At the time of writing, GISF has not received a suspension order relating to our USAID funding and is continuing operations as normal. Should GISF be impacted, we have contingency plans in place.  

In the face of the current resourcing challenge, I wanted to highlight the fact that security risks do not stop. Organisations still have a duty of care to their staff regardless of financial stress. So, GISF remains on hand to support our members and associates during this challenging moment. 

Below are a few of the initiatives we are focused on to ensure we can continue to support our members and associates as best as possible during this challenging moment. 

Global Security Risk and Policy Conference 

Our inaugural Global Security Risk and Policy Conference will continue to go ahead as planned in Dublin, from 26-27 February.  

I want to highlight the fact that the Conference is entirely focused on funding and resourcing for NGO security risk management. The importance of this theme has only increased in the past week. Together, with your participation and collaboration, we can generate strategies that will increase your organisation’s ability to deliver on its duty of care in an increasingly difficult funding environment. 

One change to the Conference, is that we will now look to livestream some sessions where possible, so that more staff from our members and associates can benefit. We would encourage all registered attendees to try to attend in Dublin if possible. This will enable you to take advantage of the full programme, as well as the networking and information-sharing opportunities that are only possible in person. An email will be sent to attendees early next week to confirm numbers. This will give people the opportunity to switch from in-person attendance to virtual if needed. 

All details are on the dedicated webpage and will be updated if and when any changes occur. 

Roundtable on impact of USAID funding on security 

GISF will convene a roundtable on Monday at 2pm (GMT). We will provide a virtual space for GISF members and associates to discuss the impact (organisationally and operationally) of US funding decisions, and share useful lessons and mitigations. You can register to attend the roundtable here. We will also issue a short survey to help understand the impact of funding constraints on NGO security risk management. 

Advocacy 

GISF will contribute to the formulation of advocacy strategies among the major INGO networks. We will use the results of the above survey to indicate whether legal duty of care is being risked by funding decisions. There is also a broader question around whether efforts to justify foreign aid through the lens of ‘soft power’ will have an impact on NGO security risk management by damaging acceptance strategies. 

Employment 

My team will temporarily expand the types of vacancies we aggregate and share, to support NGO security staff who may need to search for new employment opportunities due to resourcing challenges.

If you have more ideas of how GISF can further support your needs at this time, please get in touch with me at jon@gisf.ngo.