Director’s Update

As the number of emergencies increase, the number of children affected also increases. Now more than ever before we are tasked to meet our goal and deliver immediate and lasting improvements to children’s lives worldwide.

Globally, natural disasters affect 225 million people annually, a large percentage of these are children. 37 million children live in areas affected by war. In the last decade, 2 million children have been killed in situations of armed conflict, while six million children have been permanently disabled or injured.  
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ACE represents one of the most important challenges of the Alliance for the next few years. I hope that all Alliance members will join the common effort to succeed.

VALERIO NERI  CEO ITALY

Photo: Guy Calaf / Save the Children

Our achievments in 2008

During 2008 the Advocacy Working Group (AWG) has developed and coordinated Alliance advocacy efforts on DRC, Sri Lanka, Georgia, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe and Gaza.

Publications

As part of our efforts to influence policy makers and establish guidelines in order to bring about positive change for children, we have published a number of reports including "In the Face of Disaster," a report highlighting the effects of climate change and its impact on children. This publication gave 12 memebrs the opportunity to discuss the issue with their respective governments. More »

One of the core components of the Advocacy work has been on lobbying for the inclusion of “child protection and education in every emergency response.”  As part of this work a “Child Protection in Emergencies” policy guide was published and distributed amongst member countries and key actors. More »

Save the Children has also been active in the development of SPHERE’s standards of child protection. 

Standard Operating Procedures

Across the Alliance much work has been done reviewing and revising the Standard Operating Procedures for Emergency Advocacy. The procedures should be finalised and published by mid 2009.

Photo: Christian Holst/Reportage by Getty Images for Save the Children

Westport meeting

The Communications Working Group met for the first time in September and focused its scope of work around improving both capacity and systems for the rapid dissemination of high quality communication materials in and around emergencies. 

The group will work with country programmes and head offices on skills development to ensure there is the capacity to meet the communications needs of the wider Alliance.

Both these approaches will be realised through the development of systems/ protocols, common skill standards, improved technology, enhanced coordination and investment in the human resources to ensure a capacity to communicate about this life saving work.

Developing and delivering resources

Communications teams across the Alliance have been very effective in developing and delivering resources and messages from our emergency programme work to a wider audience. Understanding what is happening on the ground is essential in engaging Members as an Alliance. 

Our skilled staff 

We have witnessed a growth in the number of Save the Children stories, blogs and photo essays appearing in international media from Jon Bugge blog for Sky News from Kenya after the post-election violence to Andrew Kirkwood blog for the BBC from Myanmar. La Republica ran Karin Beate Nøstreud’s photographs from Ethiopia and CNN partnered Save the Children India throughout the height of India Floods. 

Photo credit: Frederic Coubert / Save the Children

US$ 100 million raised

A total of US$100 million has been raised for ten ELT declared emergencies, nearly tripling the revenue of 2007.  The emergency response to Cyclone Nargis demonstrated improved fundraising capacity of members as the success of Members efforts against in country competitors was recognised.

Positioning

Save the Children Netherlands positioned itself as first and Save the Children Denmark second in their respective markets. Moving into 2009, there will be an increased focus on continued Member capacity building to establish and implement emergency fundraising strategies.

Fundraising Working Group

In 2008, the ACE Fundraising Working Group developed a Revised Emergency Fundraising Tool Kit; Alliance Fundraising and Reporting Infrastructure; Peer Organisation Benchmarking.

Save the Children India - Bihar Floods

The newest member of the Alliance: Save the Children India raised over US$ 2.6 million for its Bihar floods appeal. This was 30% more than their target. Contributions from 11 different Members totalled a quarter of the sum raised, highlighting the critical importance played by the ELT declaration. The overall response massively enhanced Save the Children India’s profile which in turn increased their ability to save more children.  

Photo: Chris Stowers / PANOS

Achieving more for children 

Save the Children has responded as an Alliance to more emergencies in 2008 than ever before. We have responded to meet the needs of children and their families in ten emergencies: Kenya post-election violence, Mozambique floods, Myanmar cyclone Nargis, China earthquake, India floods, Haiti hurricanes, Ethiopia food shortages, Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo conflict, Zimbabwe crisis and crisis in Gaza. More »

Our operations

• In response to the India Floods Save the Children provided health and hygiene kits to 4815 families.
• In Myanmar Save the Children has 157 functioning Child Friendly Spaces (CFS) and CFS activities have reached 33,065 children.
• To minimise the spread of Cholera in Zimbabwe Save the Children have been providing  water treatment tablets, soap, water containers, posters and fliers, mealie-meal, cooking oil, kapenta fish. To date 23, 495 have benefitted from our cholera response.
• After the China Earthquake in May, we distributed school supplies to 62,910 students and 811 teachers in 26 primary and middle schools and 42 kindergartens in Mianzhu, An, Qingchuan, and Shifang counties.
• Furthering their commitment to learning evaluation there were three externally led operational reviews to the Peru earthquake, Bangladesh cyclone and Myanmar cyclone.

New ACE Framework

To enhance the Alliance’s ability to rapidly mount life saving responses the team have developed and launched a new framework (rules and principles) for cooperation in ELT-declared emergencies; and an Emergency Preparedness Framework, inclusive of minimum standards and guidelines.
 
ACE and ELT have taken various steps over the last year to improve systems, protocols and capacity. A new architecture for Alliance emergency response has been developed and approved by the Board; a new system for planning preparedness activities has been designed as well as a framework for coordinating alliance responses. Work has moved ahead with developing a centralised roster of Alliance Emergency Response professionals.

In emergency situations, when our help is needed more urgently than ever, a joint approach of all Save the Children Members is effective and powerful.

KATRIN WIELAND  CEO GERMANY

Photo credit: Karin Beate Nøstreud / Save the Children

Save the Children New Zealand send NZ$ 60 000 to support Zimbabwe

At the beginning of December Save the Children New Zealand announced that it was supoprting the Alliance Appeal in Zimbabwe by providing NZ$ 60 000 to Alliance programmes in Zimbabwe. Read the Press Release here »

Save the Children CEOs visit programmes in Myanmar

Charlie MacCormack, (CEO Save the Children US), Gro Braekken, (CEO Save the Children Norway) and Katherin Wieland , (CEO Save the Children Germany) visited Myanmar to see the success of our response to Cyclone Nagris.  Photographs from their visit are available here»

Nokia partners Save the Children Finland in Ethiopia

Save the Children Finland and Nokia have collaborated  to help alleviate the existing water problem made worse by the current drought in Alaba Special Woreda through collaboration with the Woreda administration and its relevant offices. More »

Member response to Gaza crisis

A total of 21 Members are actively communicating and fundraising around our activities in Gaza.

This is an unprecedented response and is testament to the hard work of the teams in Gaza and Ramallah, and those individuals, at Member level, who are focusing attention on this crisis.

Photo: Colin Crowley / Save the Children

An introduction 

Be Ready is as series of events to foster and develop staff engagement in and around emergencies. The emphasis is about being ready at a head office level, a country programme level and a personal level.

What can we do to help ensure that when a disaster strikes we are positioned to respond immediately with life saving assistance?

In order to achieve this goal, the Alliance Cooperation in Emergencies team will be developing and sharing core tools, materials and resources to assist Alliance members in advocating, communications and fundraising in and around emergencies. 

Increasing our ability as an Alliance to respond and prepare for emergencies will mean that more lives will be saved, children’s rights will be reinforced and the resilience of their communities strengthened.

Historically, emergencies have been the engine to the growth of our brand, profile and impact. Alliance Cooperation in Emergencies and the Be Ready initiative builds on this, championing innovation, creativity and flexibility. This initiative will be the mechanism to enable stronger members and a stronger Alliance

Since we endorsed emergencies cooperation as a key challenge, we have seen increased cooperation of members in responding to emergencies, engaging in preparedness training, fundraising and communicating our work.

JASMINE WHITBREAD  CEO UK

Photo: Save the Children

Guidelines and Handbooks

» Rules and Principles for Alliance Emergency Response (360Kb PDF)
» Normas y Principios para la respuesta de Emergencia de la Alianza  (398 Kb PDF)
» Child Friendly Spaces Handbook (566 Kb PDF)
» Child Led Disaster Risk Reduction Part 1 (2.85 Mb PDF)
» Child Led Disaster Risk Reduction Part 2 (2.43 Mb PDF)
» Child Protection in Emergencies Positioning Papers (365 Kb PDF)

Publications

» In the Face of Disasters (438 Kb PDF)

» Non Discrimination in Emergencies Manual (3 Mb PDF)
» Delivering Education in Emergencies (657 Kb PDF)

Video

» When Disasters Strike (Quicktime)