An internally displaced person (IDP) is someone who is forced to leave their home but who remains within their country's borders. They are often referred to as refugees, although they do not fall within the legal definitions of a refugee.
Humanitarian aid is material and logistic assistance to people who need help. It is usually short-term help until the long-term help by the government and other institutions replaces it. Among the people in need are the homeless, refugees, and victims of natural disasters, wars, and famines. Humanitarian relief efforts are provided for humanitarian purposes and include natural disasters and man-made disasters. The primary objective of humanitarian aid is to save lives, alleviate suffering, and maintain human dignity. It may, therefore, be distinguished from development aid, which seeks to address the underlying socioeconomic factors which may have led to a crisis or emergency. There is a debate on linking humanitarian aid and development efforts, which was reinforced by the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016. However, the conflation is viewed critically by practitioners.
A humanitarian crisis is defined as a singular event or a series of events that are threatening in terms of health, safety or well-being of a community or large group of people. It may be an internal or external conflict and usually occurs throughout a large land area. Local, national and international responses are necessary in such events.
Disaster response is the second phase of the disaster management cycle. It consists of a number of elements, for example; warning/evacuation, search and rescue, providing immediate assistance, assessing damage, continuing assistance and the immediate restoration or construction of infrastructure .The aim of emergency response is to provide immediate assistance to maintain life, improve health and support the morale of the affected population. Such assistance may range from providing specific but limited aid, such as assisting refugees with transport, temporary shelter, and food, to establishing semi-permanent settlement in camps and other locations. It also may involve initial repairs to damaged or diversion to infrastructure.
The United Nations Humanitarian Response Depot (UNHRD) is an international network of six humanitarian support hubs located strategically around the world, that provide supply chain solutions to the international humanitarian community. The hubs are located in Brindisi (Italy), Dubai (UAE), Accra (Ghana), Panama City (Panama), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) and Las Palmas (Spain).
Medair is an international non-governmental organisation (INGO) whose purpose is to relieve human suffering in some of the world's most remote and devastated places. Medair aims to assist people affected by natural disasters and conflict to recover with dignity through the delivery of quality humanitarian aid.
The Steering Committee for Humanitarian Response (SCHR) is an alliance made up of chief executive officers representing nine humanitarian networks or agencies.
There are a number of meanings for the term humanitarian. Here humanitarian pertains to the practice of saving lives and alleviating suffering. It is usually related to emergency response whether in the case of a natural disaster or a man-made disaster such as war or other armed conflict. Humanitarian principles govern the way humanitarian response is carried out.
ReliefWeb is a humanitarian information portal founded in 1996. The portal now hosts more than 720,000 humanitarian situation reports, press releases, evaluations, guidelines, assessments, maps and infographics. The portal is an independent vehicle of information, designed specifically to assist the international humanitarian community in effective delivery of emergency assistance or relief. It provides information as humanitarian crises unfold, while emphasizing the coverage of "forgotten emergencies" at the same time.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is a worldwide humanitarian aid organization that reaches 160 million people each year through its 192-member National Societies. It acts before, during and after disasters and health emergencies to meet the needs and improve the lives of vulnerable people. It does so with impartiality as to nationality, race, gender, religious beliefs, class and political opinions.
Sphere is a global movement started in 1997 aiming to improve the quality of humanitarian assistance. The Sphere standards are the most commonly used and most widely known set of humanitarian standards. Sphere's flagship publication is the Sphere Handbook.
Shelter Centre is non-operational Swiss humanitarian NGO which works to support all humanitarian stakeholders involved in the shelter of populations affected by conflict and natural disaster.
Sexual exploitation and abuse in humanitarian response first came to public attention with the release of a report in February 2002 of a joint assessment mission examining the issue. The joint mission reported that "refugee children in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone have been subjected to sexual abuse and exploitation, reportedly by employees of national and international NGOs, UNHCR and other UN bodies..." Humanitarian agencies responded almost immediately with measures designed to prevent further abuse, setting up an inter-agency task force with the objective of "strengthening and enhancing the protection and care of women and children in situations of humanitarian crisis and conflict..." In 2008 there were signs that sexual exploitation and abuse of beneficiaries not only continued, but was under-reported. In January 2010, the ECHA/ECPS task force developed a website devoted to protection from sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA) by personnel of the United Nations (UN), non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and other international organizations.
The Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) is an inter-agency forum of UN and non-UN humanitarian partners founded in 1992, to strengthen humanitarian assistance. The overall objective of the IASC is to improve the delivery of humanitarian assistance to affected populations. The Committee was established following UN General Assembly Resolution 46/182 and resolution 48/57 confirmed that it should be the primary method for inter-agency coordination. The committee is chaired by the Emergency Relief Coordinator Mark Andrew Lowcock
Syrian refugee camp and shelters are temporary settlements built to receive internally displaced people and refugees of the Syrian Civil War. Of the estimated 7 million persons displaced within Syria, only a small minority live in camps or collective shelters. Similarly, of the 8 million refugees, only about 10 percent live in refugee camps, with the vast majority living in both urban and rural areas of neighboring countries. Beside Syrians, they include Iraqis, Palestinians, Kurds, Yazidis, individuals from Somalia, and a minority of those who fled the Yemeni and Sudanese civil wars.
The Logistics Cluster is a coordination mechanism established by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC), activated to ensure an efficient and effective emergency response.
Emergency sanitation is the management and technical processes required to provide sanitation in emergency situations. Emergency sanitation is required during humanitarian relief operations for refugees, people affected by natural disasters and internally displaced persons. There are three phases of emergency response: Immediate, short term and long term. In the immediate phase, the focus is on managing open defecation, and toilet technologies might include very basic latrines, pit latrines, bucket toilets, container-based toilets, chemical toilets. The short term phase might also involve technologies such as urine-diverting dry toilets, septic tanks, decentralized wastewater systems. Providing handwashing facilities and management of fecal sludge are also part of emergency sanitation.
Common Operational Datasets or CODs, are authoritative reference datasets needed to support operations and decision-making for all actors in a humanitarian response. CODs are 'best available' datasets that ensure consistency and simplify the discovery and exchange of key data. The data is typically geo-spatially linked using a coordinate system and have unique geographic identification codes (P-codes).
ACAPS is a non-profit, non-governmental project that provides international, independent humanitarian analysis. Founded in 2009, ACAPS provides daily monitoring and analysis of the situations in 150 countries, to support humanitarian aid workers. This analysis is freely provided to the NGOs, UN agencies and donors. ACAPS is also known for having developed a severity ranking of humanitarian crises. It employs around 30 professionals based in Geneva.
