Partners' briefing_II.

mp4
Slide 1
Speaker 1: Welcome to the second module of the Global Wash Cluster coordination briefing
package. This briefing package was developed by the Global Wash Cluster and is being
delivered in partnership with UNICEF.
Slide 2
Speaker 1: This briefing package is composed by two modules. The first one that we have
already seen is the "Introduction to humanitarian WASH coordination" and this second
module is called the "WASH Sector Response Plan".
Slide 3
Speaker 1: The objectives of this briefing are threefold. The first is for you to understand the
Humanitarian Program Cycle or HPC. The second is to know how WASH coordination
platforms (either cluster or sector) can support the response, especially the multi-sector
response. And the third objective is to understand how WASH partners can contribute
and should contribute to the coordination system
Slide 4
Speaker 1: Firstly, let's start with the Humanitarian Program Cycle or HPC. The HPC is a
tool that was created by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, OCHA.
It is composed of several phases: needs assessment monitoring etc. as well as enabling
environments which are the "coordination platform" and "information management system".
The HPC is a central aspect of cluster coordination because it allows all partners to work
to same timeline and with the same objectives.
Slide 5
HPC phases and enabling environments remain the same whatever the context; however,
the HPC timeline varies a lot depending upon whether it’s a protracted or sudden onset
emergency. Protracted emergencies are characterized by their long duration. Somalia,
Afghanistan and Sudan have been in some kind of a state of emergency since the 1980s and
can be considered to be protracted crises. More recently, Syria has been a protracted crisis
since 2012. In a protracted emergency, the HPC timeline is an annual one. It starts with
the development of the Humanitarian Needs Overview (the HNO) which gathers all the
assessment data for all the sectors. The HNO is then followed by the development of a
Humanitarian Response Plan (HRP) in November which gathers the response plan of all
the sectors for the following year. Finally, during the following year several Periodic
Monitoring Reports are released, gathering the results of the response implementation
monitoring for all sectors or clusters. These reports inform any revisions to the HRP.
Slide 6
In contrast, with a rapid onset emergency, such as an earthquake, a tsunami or a rapid
escalation of violence followed by massive population displacement the timeline is obviously
much shorter, usually measured in number of days. In these circumstances a Flash
Appeal can be organised very quickly within 3-5 days following the start of the emergency.
For smaller scale emergencies, other documents and processes similar to the flash appeal are
used. Flash appeals are a rapid summary of a Needs Assessment, and a response plan with
budget for the following months. It is only based on Secondary Data obtained from different
sources with the first needs assessment report being released two weeks after the beginning of
the emergency. Then, 2 weeks later, a coordinated needs assessment process can start which
will include primary data collection. In the meantime, emergency response activities have
already started, based on initial Flash Appeal strategy. 30 days after the beginning of the
emergency, if the emergency response is estimated to last, an HRP is developed to replace or
complement the Flash Appeal. Three months after the beginning of the emergency, periodic
intersectoral monitoring reports are released with an operational Peer Review in the case of an
L3 emergency.
Slide 7 Here are three examples of HPC coordination products for the protracted
emergency of the Syrian conflict. First of all, you have the Humanitarian Needs Overview
(or HNO) which gathers the assessment data for 2018 for all the sectors, including WASH.
Then you have the Humanitarian Response Plan released 2 months after gathering the
response plan of each sector for 2019 and following that the Humanitarian Monitoring
Reports are released the following year.
Slide 8
Speaker 1: Now let's start with the second part of our briefing which looks at the partners’
emergency WASH response. We are going to go through each of the HPC phases and
explore for each phase: what is the objective for partners? how the coordination platform can
support them and with which tools and finally, how partners should contribute in order for the
coordination platform to function well and achieve delivery of its strategic objectives. We are
going to first talk about Needs Assessment, then Response planning followed by Resource
mobilization, Response implementation and Monitoring of the response. Please note that
the emergency preparedness process is not going to be considered in this online briefing,
although preparedness will be covered during the face to face partner briefing you will
receive in -country.
Slide 9
Speaker 1: So, let's start with needs assessment. What do we want to achieve during this
phase? We want to evaluate the needs and understand the local context in order to
design a quality response.
What information and tools do partners need to achieve this objective? They need maps and
population databases, they need a list of priority areas that need to be assessed; they need
an assessment methodology relevant to the local context and they need to know the
response modalities relevant to local context to assess their feasibility. Response modalities
can include for example: Cash Transfer, Market support, Direct service delivery and local
capacity building. Finally, they need questions and indicators relevant to the local context
for both the assessment and monitoring phases of the response.
Slide 10
So, how can coordination support partners with getting this all this information and how can
the coordination platform support the needs assessment phase? Most organizations have
enough capacity to carry out agency level assessments. However, the coordination platform
can facilitate this work and increase its quality. For example, the WASH cluster is usually
able to provide secondary data to guide partners needs assessments and a Secondary Data
Review report is usually released by the coordination platform at the beginning of an
emergency, and available to all. The coordination platform is also responsible to set up
protocols to harmonize partners' assessments and make their consolidation possible at the
response level. In some cases, the coordination platform can even directly lead a national
(or subnational) assessment on behalf of WASH partners. This is often done through a
third-party specialist organisation such as REACH. Finally, the cluster will also facilitate
interagency and intersectoral collaboration to set up a joint assessment mechanism, such as
the Rapid Response Mechanisms seen in the Democratic Republic of Congo or the Central
African Republic.
So, what are tools available to make this all happen?
Examples include the assessment databases and reports available on the national WASH
sector website,
harmonized WASH assessment protocols
and finally the WASH section of the Humanitarian Needs Overview.
Slide 11
Speaker 1: Let's look in a bit more detail at one of these tools which is the Harmonized
Assessment Protocol. Let's start by asking a question: What should WASH partners’
assessments enable the coordination platform to do? Well, the assessments of the partners, if
they are done well, harmonised and reported on time to the coordination platform, should
allow the cluster to reliably analyse the situation not only for individual WASH partners but
also for the whole response. They should then allow the coordination platform to choose the
most relevant modality for the response strategy, such as market support, direct service
delivery or cash and voucher assistance. This will allow the coordination platform to
compare the needs over time and in different geographical areas and to be better able to
prioritize these needs. They should enable the coordination platform to define more precisely
the specific needs for priority groups in priority zones. They should also inform strategic
core indicators that will be part of the monitoring plan of the WASH Operational Response
Plan for the HRP. WASH partner assessment data should also contribute to a multisector
sector needs analysis because the needs assessment data of each sector is consolidated into a
multi sector needs analysis that will be done by OCHA over the whole response, during the
development of the Humanitarian Needs Overview (HNO), which is quite a complex
process due to the number of sectors and partners involved.
So, to meet all these objectives, which criteria should partners’ assessments must meet?
Firstly, they should have comparable indicators and geographical level reporting.
Secondly, they should consider market analysis in the assessment to see if cash transfer
programming is feasible, or if the local market can be used or needs support. Thirdly,
partners’ assessments should have robust and comparable sampling methodologies, so they
can be consolidated over time or over the response area. Additionally, areas and beneficiary
groups should be targeted for assessment according to a prioritization process done by the
coordination platform. They should use core indicators so that data consolidation and
comparison is possible. It’s very important that assessment should be harmonized in time
and space with other agencies and sectors. Lastly, assessment reports of WASH partners
should be properly reported, referenced, disseminated and made accessible to all. In order
to meet all these criteria, partners need to follow a harmonised assessment protocol when
developing their assessment strategy.
Slide 12
Speaker 1: So, how should partners contribute to make coordinated needs assessments
possible? Well, firstly, they can contribute to the design of the harmonised assessment
protocol through the assessment technical working group and then implement the
assessment protocol, especially in regard to the timely reporting and format of their
assessment data. Lastly, they should contribute to any interagency or intersectoral
assessment mechanisms, such as the Displacement Tracking Matrix (the DTM),
coordinated by IOM. These intersectoral assessments must include WASH indicators and
the analysis needs to be validated by the WASH coordination platform, with full input from
the WASH partners.
Slide 13
Speaker 1: Here is an example of outputs from consolidated WASH need assessments from
the 2019 Humanitarian Needs Overview for Syria. Here are 3maps with water source
coverage per geographical area: the first map shows coverage for water trucking, the second
map shows coverage by urban water networks and the bottom map shows coverage for
water wells. With the help of these maps, it is possible to quickly analyse where priority
needs are.
Slide 14
Speaker 1: Here is another example of consolidated outputs - the geographic distribution of
people in need of WASH services by both population size and severity of need. Once again,
with this kind of map it is quickly possible to analyse where the gaps are in terms of WASH
service delivery needs.
Slide 15
Speaker 1: We have seen how assessments should be coordinated between partners by the
WASH cluster. We are now going to see another HPC phase, which is the response planning
or strategic planning phase. What is it we want to achieve during this phase? As a cluster we
want to design the response based on the assessed needs and prepare concept notes for
funding and implementation. To realize this, WASH partners need to define the relevant
activities to be implemented in agreed locations and they also need to have implementation
strategies that are coherent with other agencies, sectors and the SOF. Evidence of this
coherency would for example be partners using the same latrine design, the same
implementation modalities and with a coordinated approach to local markets like other
sectors. Finally, they need to have a list of response areas and groups to be targeted as a
priority and to know where the current response gaps are.
Slide 16
Speaker 1: So how can the coordination platform support partners in planning the response?
Firstly, it can provide key information needed to fully scope the response. This information
can be found in the Humanitarian Response Plan or, the Flash Appeal in the case of a rapid
onset emergency. In the HRP, WASH information is summarized as the WASH Operational
Response Plan as well as the cluster’s Strategic Operational Framework or SOF. While
the HRP and WASH Operational Response Plan are made on an annual basis, the SOF is a
summary of all implementation strategies for the WASH sector and covers the learning and
operational policy of several years of WASH response.. In addition to these information
products, the cluster also provides regular WASH response updates in the form of a WASH
response update or dashboard which is often shared on a monthly basis.
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Slide 17
Speaker 1: Let's look a bit more in detail at one of the main tools for humanitarian response
planning which is called the HRP (or Humanitarian Response Plan). As a reminder, the
HRP is produced once a year in protracted emergencies and on an ad hoc basis in other
type of emergencies. HRPs are usually composed of a Country Strategy, in which
multisector level information is provided such as overall response strategic objectives, partner
capacity across the different sectors, level of access to beneficiaries, targets for the
whole humanitarian response, the overall funding requirements for the response and a
multisector monitoring plan. Following the HRP country strategy, there follows each
cluster’s Operational Response Plan with their own Strategic Objectives that contribute to
the overall country strategic objectives.
Each sector’s ORP also includes what we call the sector caseload i.e. the number of people
targeted by each sector, the priority geographic response area for each sector and the
priority sectoral activities. For WASH priority might be given to water trucking, improving
sanitation in cholera treatment centres or rebuilding a city’s water network. Lastly, there will
be an indication of what the funding requirements for each sector, together with a
monitoring plan for each sector.
Slide 18
Speaker 1: Let’s take a look at the Syria HRP as an example. Here the country strategy of
the HRP for 2019 had 3 multisector strategic objectives: save life, enhance protection and
increase resilience and access to services. These strategic objectives were driven and informed
by the particular humanitarian context and the Humanitarian Needs Overview (HNO).
Slide 19
Speaker 1: Within the HRP for Syria there is the WASH Operational Response Plan with 2
strategic objectives specific to WASH. The first one is to support water and sanitation and
sewage systems to ensure continuous services for affected people in Syria, and the second
one is to deliver wash supplies and services to the most vulnerable people.
Slide 20
Speaker 1: The WASH Strategic Objectives section is followed by the response prioritization
by geographical area. In this example, the districts in Syria have been ranked from 1 to 5, with
category 5 districts being the priority, where implementation should start as soon as possible.
Slide 21
Inside the HRP is a lot of population data related to the different categories of people living
in the areas affected by the emergency. Let's look in a bit more in detail at one of them, the
humanitarian caseload. In any country, the population can be divided up into a number of
categories. Firstly, is the population living in the affected area which is the whole
population. Within the whole population, some people will have been affected by the
disaster while some will not have been affected. For example, a flood might affect 80 % of a
population in a city with 20% not affected. Within the affected population, there will be
people who are resilient enough to not need humanitarian assistance because they have
sufficient resources and household assets to not be vulnerable while other people will
definitely need humanitarian assistance - this is the Population In Need, usually referred to
as the "PIN" figure. However, only a fraction of this population can realistically be targeted
by the response and this targeted population is also called the caseload. However, not all the
population in need can actually be targeted by the response for a number of reasons. Firstly,
there can be a lack of access to certain geographical areas due to security considerations or
logistic constraints. Also, the lack of capacity of partners can limit the proportion of people in
need who can actually be reached or there can be a lack of financial resources allocated to the
response. In any case, strong advocacy should be done by the coordination platform for the
caseload figure to be as close as possible to the Population In Need figure. Within the
population targeted can be found the population "reached" by humanitarian aid. As an
example for WASH, the population reached can be the number of people reached by one of
the planned WASH activities such as water trucking or the distribution of hygiene kits.
However, it should be noted that this population reached has not necessarily been entirely
covered according to the standards described in the SOF/established cluster standards. Only
when all the standards for WASH have been met can they be considered as actually covered
for WASH service delivery.
Slide 22
Speaker 1: So how can partners contribute to the strategic planning process for the response?
Well, one of the best ways is to become a member of the SAG (the WASH cluster
Strategic Advisory Group). Usually the strategic planning documents are developed by the
WASH Cluster coordinator with support and advice from SAG members who must validate
the key documents produced during a series of cluster meetings or workshops with partners. It
may seem a minor point , but during a response you will always find some partners preferring
to follow their own strategic guidelines rather than the SOF which their WASH cluster
has endorsed! It’s vital that partners both respect and use the SOF and the HRP. Donors are
well aware of this and many donors request partners’ proposals to follow the cluster
guidelines before they will consider and later accept WASH response proposals. Nonetheless,
WASH actors who are working mostly (or completely) through private funds will often have
limited accountability to the cluster and may choose to work outside of the SOF.
Slide 23
Speaker 1: So we have talked about response planning: the next phase of the HPC is resource
mobilization. So what do partners want to achieve in this phase? They want to prepare and
submit proposal for funding. So what information do partners need? They need to know
how to access both pooled and non-pooled funds (we will see later the difference between
the two) and they need to know about the donors’ priorities and they need to understand the
pooled fund allocation criteria and process.
Slide 24
Speaker 1: So, let's take a look now on how the WASH response plan, represented by the
various partners' proposals, is funded. There are 2 sides to the funding stream. We have the
demand side which is made up of all the documents through which agencies and clusters
request money. We then have the supply side, which is represented by all the funding
sources and mechanisms that support the WASH response. The demand side is composed of
agency-specific appeals i.e. most agencies will make their own specific appeals and have
communication campaigns to raise funds. NGOs can also raise funds by being part of a
consortium. Most NGOs will also submit project proposals to bilateral or multilateral donors
such as ECHO, OFDA or DFID. However, the development of these appeal processes is
often done without any coordination, with each agency or group of agencies deciding
independently their funding requirement and programme targets. Fortunately, there are other
funding processes called consolidated appeals. These include the Flash Appeal (for rapid
onset emergencies) and the HRP (for protracted crises) which include financial targets based
on a coordinated needs assessment process. Now let’s take a look at the Supply side and see
how funding demands are covered. There are several sources of funding. In some cases the
response, or part of the response, is funded by the national government and private individuals
can make personal donations to NGO funds. Thanks to these donations NGOs often have
private funds which they can use to respond quickly or to complement institutional funding.
There are then bilateral donors from one specific country e.g. DFID for UK, OFDA for USA
or multilateral donors e.g. the European Union or the Gates foundation with several countries
or entities putting their money into a common pot. The private sector is now an important
funding source through their Corporate Social Responsibility mechanism. Lastly, but very
importantly, you have pooled funds mostly represented by the CERF and Country Based
Pooled funds. Pooled funds are specific funds that are provided by several different donors
and administered in one country by one large organization which is often UNDP or
OCHA. These pooled funds represent a unique tool to implement cluster strategies because
the cluster coordinators are members of the project review committees who review
submitted project proposals against selection criteria linked to the cluster strategy. In this way,
pooled funds are a great way of getting funding to implement the cluster strategy that has
been agreed with cluster members. The most common tools involving clusters in terms of
funding demand are the Flash appeal (for rapid onset emergencies) and the HRP (for
protracted or slow onset emergencies). Pooled funds are the CERF and the Country Based
Pooled Funds.
Slide 25
Speaker 1: So how can coordination support partners with mobilizing resources for their
responses? As we mentioned earlier, they can support the development of pooled fund
proposals and the WASH cluster coordinator can have one-to-one meetings with partners to
ensure that their proposals match the allocation criteria. The coordinator will also be part of
the WASH pooled funds proposal review committee which will include key WASH partner
staff. The tools used here are the country based pooled fund guidelines and allocation
criteria.
Slide 26
Speaker 1: So let's look more in detail at the role of the coordination platform in funding the
response. The cluster coordination platform is not a donor and has no funds to allocate to the
response, but it does have a key role in the funding process and specific responsibilities in
relation to pooled funding. Firstly, the cluster coordinator is responsible for estimating the
WASH response budget. This is usually a rough estimation, because it would be almost
impossible to precisely estimate the budget needed, but nonetheless this needs to be done as
accurately as possible. With this information the coordination platform will support pre-
allocation funding to the WASH sector. Donors allocate funds to specific emergencies and
often earmark these funds for specific sectors, meaning that each sector will receive a
specific amount of money, based on the donor’s available budget, agenda, strategy and
perceived priorities all of which can be significantly influenced by the cluster coordinator,
who will be in regular and high level contact with main potential WASH donors in regards to
the current WASH response priorities and gaps. The cluster coordinator will also
communicate directly with the Humanitarian Coordinator, the OCHA person in country who
is responsible for the whole response. The HC will have a great power in terms of allocating
how much of the pooled funds will be allocated to each sector. Additionally, the cluster
coordinator will be in regular contact with other non-pooled donors to influence the
funds that they will earmark for WASH.
Once this pre-allocation exercise is complete, the cluster coordinator will support and
coordinate the funds allocation. This allocation process is usually straightforward for the
pooled funds because pooled funds are designed to support cluster strategy implementation
which the cluster coordinator will have already lead on. For non-pooled funds, e.g. ECHO and
DFID, the cluster coordinator is not involved in the allocation process and therefore has a
much more limited role. Nonetheless, he or she can still work with both donors and
partners, to ensure that funded projects are coordinated and follow cluster strategy as
much as possible. Most institutional donors value the cluster’s role and will prioritise a
coordinated approach. The cluster coordinator will then monitor the financial resources
allocated to WASH by keeping track of all accepted proposals and all the funds that been
allocated by donors to the WASH response. By keeping such a record as accurately as
possible, the coordination platform will be able to identify potential funding gaps by
comparing the current level of funding with the estimated budget. Once these gaps are known
the cluster will be able to advocate for more funds from donors.
Slide 27
Speaker 1: So, how should partners contribute to the funding process? First of all, they
should coordinate the content and submission of their proposals with the coordination
platform and ensure they use guidelines that are produced by the cluster and validated by the
SAG, including the cluster technical standards and standard methodologies. They should also
provide an estimation of their funding and plans using the online HPC Projects Module
so the cluster coordinator can have a more precise estimation of the level of funding required
as well as the cluster’s capacity to use the funds and operate effectively. Additionally, they
should share their funding data in a transparent way. Finally, partners can apply to
become members of the pooled fund review committee.
Slide 28
Speaker 1: In terms of Humanitarian Program Cycle phases we have assessed the needs,
developed a strategy based on those needs and mobilized resources to implement the
strategy. Now, the implementation phase can begin. But what do we want to achieve
during this implementation phase? Well that’s simple: we want to implement the planned
activities with the highest possible quality and respecting the cluster standards and the
methodologies that where agreed with the coordination platform. So what do partners need
to do this? They need standards and methodologies that are coherent with the local context
and that are harmonised as much as possible with other partners. Partners also need efficient
ways to work with
other sectors: nutrition, health and shelter have strong links with WASH but without prior
agreement on who is doing what and with who, a lot of duplication and gaps can occur.
Typical examples of duplication between sectors are WASH in health centres, WASH
minimum standards in nutrition centres and with shelter there can be issues of duplication in
terms of construction of bathrooms or toilets attached to shelters. Partners will also need
guidance to mainstream cross-cutting issues in their response. By "cross-cutting issues" we
mean issues that are not directly related to the implementation of a sector’s work. Examples
include environmentally sensitive planning and full inclusion of people with disabilities. Last
if all, we need ways to objectively monitor response quality. Quality is the central aspect of
the response but it's quite a broad definition and for each response we need to agree first on
what the quality targets are and how they will be monitored and by who? Partners? Donors?
Government? By the beneficiaries themselves? Or by the coordination platform through a
private company? There are a number of potential options here.
Slide 29
Speaker 1: So, how can the coordination platform support partners in implementing their
response? Well it has to provide harmonized implementation guidelines to partners in order
that partners responses are coherent with the cluster strategy.
The main tool to do this is the
Strategic Operating Framework (the SOF) which we mentioned earlier. The SOF is usually
a large document which complements the WASH Operational Response Plan section of the
HRP. The SOF contains all the technical standards, methodologies and other details that
partners should use to implement their WASH response. The SOF will also cover cross
cutting issues. For example, in terms of environment, which type of building materials should
be used by the partners? The SOF also provides guidance on ways to monitor the quality of
their program with quality targets for different phases of the response.
Another key tool is the 5 Wash Minimum Commitments for Safety and Dignity which we
looked at in the previous briefing. These 5 commitments should ensure that the response will
properly address the specific needs of vulnerable categories of beneficiaries such as children,
girls, people with disabilities and the elderly.
Slide 30
Speaker 1: So, how should partners contribute to the standards and guidelines which will
guide the implementation? To start with, they can be part of a Technical Working Group or
TWiG. A TWIG can be set up for example to develop specific standards for water,
sanitation or hygiene. This could include standardizing WASH infrastructure design e.g.
hand dug well protection and latrine design. TWIGs can involve partners from other sectors
e.g. nutrition in the design of effective WASH-nutrition joint interventions. For
protection mainstreaming, protection staff might be involved in a user-centred latrine
design that gives women and girls toilet facilities they are not afraid to use. Although there is
no legal obligation for partners to follow cluster implementation guidelines, if the government
is part of the cluster and has validated the implementation guidelines then the partners will
indeed have a legal obligation to follow the government's guidelines. This is one example of
where having the government leading the sector or co-leading the cluster coordination
platform can have many benefits.
Slide 31
Speaker 1: So, in terms of HPC phases we have now assessed the needs, planned the
strategy, mobilized the resources, started implementing the strategy and we can now
monitor the response. So what do we want to achieve through response monitoring? We
want to monitor progress and quality of the response and then report on it. And we also
want to identify and fill gaps when and where they arise. Gaps can be related to delays in the
response, issues with the quality of the response or a lack of linkage between the response
and the planned strategy. There can also be a lack of prioritization with partners not
respecting the planned prioritization by the by the cluster. So what do the partners need to
monitor their response? Partners can usually monitor themselves and their activities, so why
do they need a coordination platform to also do this for them? Well, they need monitoring
indicators that are consistent with the local context, especially in a new emergency with a
high turnover of staff who are not necessarily familiar with the context and who might use
indicators inconsistent with indicators being used by the cluster or sector or the government.
Partners also need to be part of some mechanism that avoids duplication - it is already
challenging enough for partners to monitor their programmes in a complex environment but
what about the programs of other partners who are implementing in the same area? The risk
of duplication will be high, especially in any context where there are many partners. Partners
need to know the current programmatic and geographical response gaps, as well as the
whole picture at country level, in order to focus their operations on the ground. They also
need an understanding of monitoring tools to monitor quality and again they could set up
their own quality monitoring tools, but these would not be harmonized with other
organizations and sectors who are working in the same area. So, once again, there is a real
danger of efforts being duplicated. Finally, some kind of feedback and complaints
mechanism is needed by partners to monitor their individual responses. Sometimes a
feedback and complaints mechanism is set up by a single organisation on behalf of the whole
cluster for example UNOPS in Iraq. These feedback and complaint mechanisms enable
beneficiaries to address any problem or gap that they perceive in the way they have received
humanitarian assistance and to give the cluster and partners the information they need to make
changes on the ground and, where needed, information to support advocacy by the cluster
coordinator.
Slide 32
Speaker 1: So how can the coordination platform support partners in monitoring the response?
Firstly, they can provide core indicators for response monitoring that will be used by all
partners. By using core indicators, it will be much easier for the coordination platform to
consolidate monitoring reports for the whole response and identify and share response
gaps with partners. The response gap could be for example be too many partners working in
one area but not enough in another area. What tools are available to do this? The key ones
are the WASH core indicators and the Response Monitoring Report template. The most
common template is the activity reporting matrix or the W-matrix (the 3/4/5W) from which
the regular WASH Cluster dashboard is generated. The dashboard is a 1-page short visual
report from which partners, donors and beneficiaries can get a rapid overview of the response
progress and context, including gaps.
Slide 33
Speaker 1: We are now going take a look at what aspects of the response should be
monitored by the coordination platform. Both response inputs and response outputs need
to be monitored. Response inputs are represented by the capacity of the WASH sector
while response outputs look at WASH response quality. On the input side there are funding
levels, partners’ capacity, government capacity and the capacity of beneficiaries together with
the quality of the humanitarian coordination. On the WASH response outputs side, you
have: the progress against the strategic indicators set out in the HRP Monitoring Plan; the
coverage of the response i.e. to what extent all the subdomains of WASH (water, sanitation
and hygiene) have been delivered and beneficiary needs addressed to agreed cluster standards.
We also consider accountability and protection by monitoring the five WASH Minimum
Commitments on Safety and Dignity of WASH services. Finally, what is the relevancy of the
response modality? Several response modalities can be used in the strategy for example
capacity building, cash distribution, direct service provision and in-kind distribution.
Monitoring these different approaches enables changes in programming modality to be made
if needed. Overall, a Quality Assurance and Accountability system can be represented by the
processes of monitoring of the outputs to improve the inputs.
Slide 34
Speaker 1: Let’s take a quick look now at the activity monitoring report which is often
represented by the W-matrix. Each W represents a level of information; WHO is doing the
activity; WHERE the activity is being implemented; WHEN that is if the activity is planned,
ongoing or has been completed; WHAT type of activity is implemented and FOR WHOM
(the number of people targeted and disaggregated by age and gender). During the first phase
of the response the information available is not enough to complete the complete 5W so we
use a 3W matrix (WHO, WHERE and WHAT) to start with and then add additional
information later when the situation is more stabilized. A 3W matrix alone allows an
operational presence map to be generated and shared with partners.
Slide 35
Speaker 1: How should partners contribute to response monitoring? To start with, they
should dedicate resources and time to fill in the W-matrix activity reporting tool. The
time needed for this is significant if you don't want to make mistakes and avoid late
submission of partner reporting data to the coordination team. This information, often
submitted on a monthly basis, is invaluable for coordinating the WASH response. Secondly,
partners should participate in the Quality Monitoring System and follow programming
standards and modalities described in the SOF. Finally, response gaps should be discussed
with other partners and ways found to address them collectively. This could be for a
geographic area, a specific technical shortcoming for example how to distribute hygiene
kits or developing sufficient technical capacity in borehole drilling through training.
Alternatively, it could be a multi-sector challenge e.g. ensuring enough boats to access
flooded areas for needs assessments.
Slide 36
Speaker 1: We finish this briefing with 3 key priority messages for you, the partner the
cluster is working with and supporting. Firstly, at each stage of the WASH response,
partners can expect support from the coordination platform throughout the
Humanitarian Programme Cycle, whether it is during the assessment, implementation or
monitoring phases and this also includes building a Strategic Operational Framework (the
SOF) which will guide and scope the overall response. Secondly, partners must bring their
contributions and support to the coordination platform because if you don't then the
coordination platform will be unable to deliver relevant outputs and information products.
And finally, we highlight the fact that the cluster is not only the coordination staff, but
partners are the cluster. And there is a collective accountability for the result of the
WASH response
Slide 37
Thank you for your time today. You’ll find more coordination resources from the Global
WASH Cluster on our website and on the Agora training site.