Hi everyone,
I, on behalf of Humentum, have been appointed to a new DFID Steering Group which will coordinate dialogue between DFID and the NGO Sector. It has about 10 NGO representatives who are coordinated by Bond, and includes CIVICUS, Action on Global Health as well as several CEOs.
The purpose of this group is to facilitate ongoing strategic and technical discussion between DFID and civil society to help inform both DFID and the sector's response to COVID-19. The key objectives are:
- to ensure effective information sharing between DFID and civil society to inform international efforts to tackle COVID-19;
- to facilitate discussion between DFID and civil society to ensure that gaps in the international response are highlighted;
- to work collaboratively to develop solutions and ways of working to maximise the effectiveness of work by DFID and civil society to meet the challenge of COVID-19 so that it meets the needs of those most at risk, and;
- to ensure learning and research relating to the crisis are shared between DFID and civil society.
In addition to the Steering Group, there will be four or five working groups that will underpin this group. One of these is the Finance and Funding focused group chaired by Juliet Chua, that I am already part of and which continues to meet every 2 weeks.
The first meeting of the Steering Group was last Friday, May 1 and was followed swiftly that evening with some new DFID announcements on support it will provide the sector, which was in response to Humentum and Bond's letter of 3 weeks ago. (See my previous post). The letter from the Secretary of State about the support they were offering and the reply to Humentum's previous letter are attached.
The key new flexibility that was announced was that DFID will apply the UK Cabinet Office guidance on supplier relief to DFID aid programmes delivered by both private sector and civil society partners. This allows DFID to make advance payments and – for a limited period – pay the staff costs and overheads of programmes temporarily unable to continue operations. DFID have stated that this short-term support will keep essential aid programmes running using funds already allocated for those programmes and is a policy that will be reviewed in June.
I have checked with DFID and this flexibilities is open to legal entities headquartered outside the UK as well as UK-based organizations. However, it is important to note that DFID have also stated that requests for this sort of flexibility will need to demonstrate that they have followed all other sources of business support measures from their own governments first.
One key point I made during the Steering Group meeting was the need for more clarity and speedier and more effective communication by DFID in general and specifically about the funding pipeline. As what we are hearing from finance leaders is that their organizations are or will need to cut program capacity if they cannot gain more certainty over the likely future funding they would be able to access in the response.
In response DFID did say that there will be new funding being distributed through country programmes in the next few weeks prioritising health and prevention; livelihoods; job creation and supporting the social protection system, plus secondary impacts, including girl's education. They did not provide precise numbers but said that it will be in the £100s of millions and they anticipate that about 25% of this will be for programs that end up being delivered by NGOs.
In another meeting I had with DFID last week I looked at the heatmap that they have generated from their country-by-country survey they have been conducting with over 200 of their larger suppliers. They allowed me to view redacted screen shots and it is clear this is a rich picture of program capacity, which also highlight the areas with biggest challenges, such as Bangladesh and the DRC. It is clear they plan to use this data in future procurement.
I would be very interested to hear your reactions to the new flexibilities announced and your steer on what further asks of DFID we should be making on your behalf in the weeks ahead.
Best wishes
Tim
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Tim Boyes-Watson
Global Director, Alliances & Advocacy
Humentum
tim.boyes-watson@humentum.org------------------------------