A) Objectives of the pledge:
The international community has long acknowledged the importance of and expressed support for local leadership and action. Many international actors, however, continue to default to direct implementation instead of working towards handing over roles and decision-making responsibilities. Tangible support for local leadership, channelling of funds towards local and national actors and assistance for identified capacity needs of local partners, has often lagged behind.
Beyond funding, locally led action therefore seeks to secure a fairer and more appropriate distribution of leadership and decision-making authority. This localization provides a concrete a way to address inherent challenges of an outmoded international system and contributes to improving the quality and impact of assistance delivered.
This pledge is related to resolution 4 “Enabling local leadership, capacity and delivery in principled humanitarian action and strengthening resilience” and sets concrete commitments in line with its operational paragraphs, in particular paragraphs 1,2,4, 9,10, 11 and 16.
B) Action plan:
Key outcomes pledging parties are seeking to achieve:
- Equitable partnerships including risk sharing between international partners and NS’s / local and national actors (LNA)
- Greater participation by NS’s / LNA
- Greater investment in capacities of local and national actors
- More funding for local actors
The pledging parties are foreseeing the following individual or joint actions:
Equitable partnerships
- Review internal processes and procedures to ensure they support and/or promote effective and fair partnerships with Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies and other relevant local actors.
- Invest in longer-term strategic and equitable partnerships that are grounded in mutual respect, transparency, trust, shared responsibility and accountability with Red Cross Red Crescent National Societies and other relevant local actors.
- Collaborate on integrating a risk sharing approach into the partnerships through joint identification of risks and fostering equitable dialogue on distribution of risks.
- Increase investment in and take all reasonable measures to ensure the safety, security and well-being of local volunteers, including Red Cross and Red Crescent volunteers.
Participation
- Support and promote locally led humanitarian action through meaningful participation of local actors in key humanitarian decision making and coordination mechanisms.
- Ensure that the voice of people in vulnerable situations is heard on the local, national, regional and global levels through humanitarian advocacy.
Capacities
- Invest in the capacity enhancement of local actors, such as Red Cross Red Crescent Societies including flexible funding for greater institutional resilience.
- Increase investment in the Movement’s pooled National Society Development (NSD) funds, specifically the Capacity Building Fund (CBF) and the National Society Investment Alliance (NSIA).
- Determine and provide a reasonable share/percentage of overhead costs in all project/programme funding to local actors.
Funding
- Actively seek opportunities to increase direct and as direct as possible (one intermediary) funding to local actors and transparently report on those figures.
- Identify opportunities to increase direct and as direct as possible funding to local actors and work towards addressing legislative and administrative constraints around these.
Other
- Promote and streamline due diligence and compliance requirements for local actors while supporting integrity and accountability through measures such as simplified and common reporting requirements and investment in their capacities.
- Support and or engage with the planned IFRC evaluation aimed at measuring the network’s progress in building sustainable locally-led action with particular focus on behaviour, motivation and impact.
C) Indicators for measuring progress:
- Development of Localization or locally-led action guiding principles and action plans by SDC and the SRC
- Incorporation of fair partnership principles in relevant contracts with local actors and intermediary partners.
- Number of local actors with demonstrated participation in planning and decision-making, represented in programme/project steering committees, multilateral events and fora on initiative of the parties.
- Percentage of core contributions to local actors.
- Percentage of funding disbursed to local actors
D) Resource implications:
States and National Societies will determine the resources that may be required to implement this pledge based on the actions to be taken in their specific context.