Joel Charny of InterAction and Gareth Price Jones of Oxfam International briefed participants on the new IASC Humanitarian Programme Cycle (HPC) in this online event. The speakers discussed the HPC from an NGO perspective, while answering questions and comments regarding the new Cycle.

On 17 September 2014, PHAP hosted an online event discussing the new IASC Humanitarian Programme Cycle (HPC) from an NGO perspective. As part of the Transformative Agenda, the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) revised its Humanitarian Programme Cycle (HPC) – a replacement for the previous Consolidated Appeals Processes (CAPs) – so that it could be more useful for HCTs, NGOs and other responders in-country. This webinar provided a briefing on the process of devising this new HPC, what this process was trying to achieve, and what NGOs should expect from this revised approach.  

The event featured Joel Charny, Vice President of Humanitarian Policy and Practice at InterAction, and Gareth Price Jones, Humanitarian Affairs Representative from Oxfam International, and is organized together with the International Council of Voluntary Agencies (ICVA).

Spurred by the large-scale crises in Haiti and Pakistan in 2010, the Humanitarian Programme Cycle was created to guide humanitarian coordination, leadership and accountability in crises and conflicts. It seeks to do this by clearly defining the complementary roles and responsibilities of different organizations involved in humanitarian response. The HPC is a collective, consultative process that hopes to enable all those involved in humanitarian response to see their role in relation to others and position their work according to agreed upon objectives. Specifically, the HPC hopes to create a single strategic process between all international and national actors involved in response, including clusters, sectors, humanitarian agencies, national authorities, national civic society organizations and, above all, affected people.

The NGO community has been active in influencing this process through representatives from InterAction, Oxfam International, and the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC). These representatives have been trying to simplify the HPC process in order to make the ultimate product relevant, useful and effective for NGOs and maximize the HPC’s impact across the world.

About the speakers

Joel R. Charny is currently Vice President for Humanitarian Policy and Practice at InterAction, the alliance of US-based relief and development organizations. Prior to joining InterAction in October 2010, Mr. Charny was the Vice President for Policy with Refugees International, a Washington-based humanitarian advocacy organization. In his tenure with Refugees International he conducted humanitarian assessment missions to Pakistan in the aftermath of 9/11, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, the Chinese border with North Korea, Indonesia and Sri Lanka in the aftermath of the tsunami, the Central African Republic, Burma, Syria, Kenya and Sudan.
Gareth Price-Jones currently the Humanitarian Affairs Representative for Oxfam in Geneva, has over 15 years of experience with INGOs, working around the world with a focus on Asia. He has worked in several countries including Sierra Leone, Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Syria and Haiti, in some of the biggest disasters of recent years including the Haiti Earthquake, the Tsunami response, and the Syrian Civil War. He is a particularly passionate advocate for combined operational and policy/ advocacy work in both humanitarian response and longer term development work.

Recordings

Recording (Adobe Connect)

Watch recording

Recording (downloadable audio podcast)