The role of local actors in the humanitarian response in the South Sudan conflict

Missed Out: The role of local actors in the humanitarian response in the South Sudan conflict.

Lydia Tannerand  Leben Moro, 2016.

The report evaluates the roles that national organisations have played in the humanitarian response in South Sudan against the OECD-DAC criteria of relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, coverage and connectedness. It finds that:

• Local and national organisations contribute significantly to the relevance of the humanitarian response in South Sudan through their proximity to disaster-affected communities, their understanding of culture and language, and their sensitivity to political and social dynamics. Nonetheless, closeness to affected communities varied significantly between organisations. In some cases, relevance has also been undermined by concerns over national organisations’ neutrality and contingent ability to act impartially. Moreover, the potential ability of national actors to respond to women’s priorities is not being realised, due to the lack of involvement of women’s organisations in the response and the limited number of female staff in senior positions in national organisations.
• National and local organisations contribute to the effectiveness of the humanitarian response through ad hoc timely action, communicating with communities and strengthening accountability to communities. Their capacity was often poorly understood and underestimated by international organisations. However, their work has also been constrained by poor communication and low human resource capacity.
• The comparative advantages of national and international NGOs in terms of efficiency are complex. National and local organisations have operated with significantly lower overheads and staff costs, and when funds are scarce, some staff work without salaries. However, strong, mutually beneficial partnerships require significant investment from INGOs for support, training, monitoring and organisational strengthening.
• Coverage of humanitarian assistance has been a significant challenge in South Sudan. Vast distances separated affected communities. Direct delivery by INGOs accounted for much of the coverage in the response. The majority of South Sudanese NGOs were relatively localised in their reach and thus limited in their ability to scale up. However, they played a crucial and complementary role in improving coverage of hard-to-access areas and in reaching remote communities.
• The connectedness of the humanitarian response in South Sudan has been moderate. Fluctuating funding priorities and changing conflict dynamics posed significant barriers. A lack of funding for recovery and resilience programmes limited opportunities to help communities rebuild their coping mechanisms. However, in some instances, connectedness has been enhanced by partnerships established prior to the crisis.