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The presently called United Nations
Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs - Ethiopia (UN OCHA-Ethiopia) began life in November 1984 when the United Nations
established the Office for Emergency Operations in Ethiopia (OEOE)
to help coordinate the delivery of international famine relief to
the drought affected highlands of the country. In October 1986,
with the effects of the famine largely mitigated, the Secretary
General decided to dismantle the OEOE and incorporate its key
functions into the mandate of UNDP, thereby placing support for
national disaster preparedness and prevention on a firmer footing.
This led to the formation of the UN Emergency Prevention and
Preparedness Group (UN-EPPG) in January 1987 as a project
implemented by UNDP and reporting directly to the UN Secretary
Generals’ Special Representative.
In the months following the change of Government in mid-1991 the
EPPG played a crucial role in formulating a programme to assist
the post-war recovery process and accelerate the reintegration of
more than 350,000 ex-soldiers and fighters. It also helped prepare
consolidated UN appeals for Ethiopia in addition to working with
the then called UN Department of Humanitarian Affairs (DHA; now
OCHA) in compiling a regular situation report on humanitarian
needs in Ethiopia and the Horn of Africa on behalf of the donor
community.
To bring its title into line with those of similar UN offices in
other disaster prone countries, on 1 January 1994 the EPPG was
renamed the UNDP Emergencies Unit for Ethiopia (UNDP-EUE).
Although the project’s formal terms of reference were unchanged,
its modus
operandi had altered considerably since the change of
government with a greater emphasis on supporting the humanitarian
and inter-agency coordination responsibilities of the UN
Humanitarian Coordinator and less on management support for relief
operations in the field. The change of name signified this change
of emphasis and also heralded the beginning of a new, more
constructive, relationship with the Government’s relief and
rehabilitation commission (RRC; now DPPC = Disaster Prevention and
Preparedness Commission).
Once again in 1999 the institutional role of the Emergencies Unit
faced a change in orientation towards a UN Country Team Support
Unit. Although the suggested name-change of the unit to 'Country
Team Emergency Support Unit' has not taken place, the unit is
seen as 'UN' entity, rather than a UNDP organism because its
over-riding 'mandate' is to provide substantial institutional
support to the UN Country Team in Ethiopia.
The UN Country Team approach in Ethiopia permits joint
humanitarian action that is coordinated and managed through the UN
Strategic Disaster Management Team (UN-SDMT), a committee comprising the
heads of operational agencies and chaired by
the UN Humanitarian Coordinator. UN OCHA-Ethiopia functions as the
secretariat for the UN-SDMT, undertaking specific operational tasks
which do not fall under the clear mandate of the specialised
agencies, ensuring an adequate follow-up to any decisions or
recommendations resulting from discussions and providing a linkage
between the UN-SDMT and government, donor and NGO
counterparts.
With the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA)
since the beginning of 2001 now jointly sharing the financial
support of the unit with UNDP, the Unit’s name was once again
changed into UN OCHA-Ethiopia. OCHA now, as of 2003, provides the
majority of financial support to the office.
There is always much demand for reliable background information,
contextual reporting and data on the humanitarian situation in
Ethiopia. Efficient information sharing and authoritative analysis
are fundamental to its support to the UN Resident Co-ordinator.
UN OCHA-Ethiopia produces a range of documents to meet these needs
through a combination of regular situation reports, special
studies, maps and other graphical materials, resource tracking
reports and operational databases made available to the relief
community primarily through a combination of hard copy and
electronic mailing lists.
UN OCHA-Ethiopia is responsible for monitoring relief needs and
providing humanitarian support services to the UN Country Team (UNCT)
reporting directly to the Humanitarian Coordinator and through the
Resident Coordinator to the Heads of UN-Agencies. It has existed
under various names and guises for more than fifteen years, funded
through contributions from a combination of UN and bilateral
donors among which Switzerland through Swiss Development
Cooperation (SDC) and Swiss Humanitarian Aid (SHA) has remained a
major contributor for many years.
UN OCHA-Ethiopia works in support of the UN Humanitarian
Coordinator to facilitate a coordinated, well-resourced and
effective international relief response and the bridging of the
transition from relief to recovery. Functionally, the work
of the UN OCHA-Ethiopia breaks into four
main areas: (1) coordination and operational support; (2) field
monitoring and analysis; (3) information management and
humanitarian reporting; and (4) research and evaluation. |
