Experiences with a threefold humanitarian innovation approach

Experiences with a threefold humanitarian innovation approachDaniel Kerber

How can design become an effective tool for humanitarian innovation?

The focus of MORE THAN SHELTERS is on the creation of appropriate solutions in the humanitarian context and the efficient planning of emergency interventions. To do so the organization builds on design, meaning the contextual creation and planning of systems, structures and products. Such integrated planning and the inclusive design on different levels ensures participation of all stakeholders and affected parties and considers human habitats to be organic environments that need to be acted upon on all layers that define their reality.

With this understanding MORE THAN SHELTERS developed a threefold humanitarian innovation approach consisting of product design, social design and eco-system design. How these design processes can look like in practice and how they point towards a paradigm shift within humanitarian aid interventions will be the topic of this talk.

Guiding questions are thereby:

How can product design become a driver for improvement of human reality in emergency situations?
What social design tools and methods have proven to be successful in the field?
How can innovation be embedded in the complex eco-system of humanitarian response?

To illustrate the application of this approach and to show how answers to these questions look in humanitarian practice, practical examples from MORE THAN SHELTERS’ projects in the refugee camp Za’atari, Jordan and in post-earthquake Nepal will be given.

Link: http://www.digitalbauhaussummit.de/talks/#talk-618