Thought Pieces

Do you hear the winds of change

Do you hear the winds of change

From November 9 to December 15, 2023, we explored the collective wisdom of our vibrant IFRC Network through a global survey. A total of 2,060 responses were gathered from volunteers, staff and leaders from 106 countries. They generously shared their thoughts and expectations for the future. Their responses are proof of the energy and richness of our Network, guiding us on a path of adaptation and improvement and portraying a landscape of both considerable and complicated threats alongside hope for the IFRC network and its future.

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Why do we need a glocalized development? Way to decentralize aid

Why do we need a glocalized development? Way to decentralize aid

It has been six years since the humanitarian agenda has reached a milestone after the UN Secretary General’s call for turning locally-led humanitarian action at the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016. This was a call to change the function of global humanitarian system as the international humanitarian actors are falling back to meet up with the increasing needs derived from protracted natural hazards and long-lasting armed conflicts. As the costs of services increase and the high level of risks restrict international actors’ actions, aid has come to a bottleneck.

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Digitalisation in Humanitarian Action: the path forward

Digitalisation in Humanitarian Action: the path forward

As crucial key enablers in delivering effective and timely humanitarian aid to the people in need, digital technologies allow aid organisations to improve collaboration and communication while enabling the delivery of aid more efficiently; rendering a tailored emergency response based on the needs of the beneficiaries. In this scope, digitalisation is one of the Movement’s prioritized topics because it is rapidly shaping how our humanitarian operations and assistance activities are carried out; therefore, impacting how the humanitarian sector is serving the aforementioned affected populations. To stay up-to-date and relevant in different contexts, the humanitarian sector is testing and adopting digital technologies on a multitude of different levels in order to improve the speed, efficiency, and effectiveness of humanitarian operations.

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Baking Social Impact Business into Sustainable Humanitarian Financing Model

Baking Social Impact Business into Sustainable Humanitarian Financing Model

How can we better co-design and prototype emerging technology with communities at the center? Over the past year, Nepal Red Cross, Cameroon Red Cross, Nesta UK, and IFRC Solferino Academy explored how emerging technology, specifically Artificial Intelligence (AI), could support the effective delivery of humanitarian work by involving communities in the design in two very different contexts. This project was done during a global pandemic and ongoing emergencies with the everyday complexities of humanitarian response. 

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Intelligence collective de crise : Aperçus et leçons clés du Cameroun et du Népal

Intelligence collective de crise : Aperçus et leçons clés du Cameroun et du Népal

comment pouvons-nous mieux co-concevoir et prototyper les technologies émergentes en plaçant les communautés au cœur du processus ? Au cours de l’année écoulée, la Croix-Rouge du Népal, la Croix-Rouge du Cameroun, Nesta UK et l’Académie de Solferino de la FICR ont entrepris cette réflexion. Les équipes ont exploré comment les technologies émergentes, en particulier l’intelligence artificielle (IA), pouvaient contribuer à l’efficacité du travail humanitaire en impliquant les communautés dans la conception, dans deux contextes très différents. Ce projet a été réalisé pendant une pandémie mondiale, avec diverses situations d’urgence en cours et les complexités quotidiennes de la réponse humanitaire.

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Collective Crisis Intelligence: Insights and key lessons from Cameroon and Nepal

Collective Crisis Intelligence: Insights and key lessons from Cameroon and Nepal

How can we better co-design and prototype emerging technology with communities at the center? Over the past year, Nepal Red Cross, Cameroon Red Cross, Nesta UK, and IFRC Solferino Academy explored how emerging technology, specifically Artificial Intelligence (AI), could support the effective delivery of humanitarian work by involving communities in the design in two very different contexts. This project was done during a global pandemic and ongoing emergencies with the everyday complexities of humanitarian response. 

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A call for humanitarian consistency

A call for humanitarian consistency

Maryann Horne, Senior Humanitarian advisor for Crises and Emergencies for Asia Pacific looks at of the global impacts of the Ukraine crisis. She argues that principled humanitarian action and the respect of International Humanitarian Law is more needed than ever.
The reverberations of the Ukraine/Russia crisis are plain to feel. Even if the violence were to de-escalate rapidly, the impacts are creating breaking points in an already precarious post pandemic global reality.

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Introducing collective crisis intelligence

Introducing collective crisis intelligence

AI and predictive analytics are increasingly being piloted to predict humanitarian crises and needs. However, crisis-affected communities are rarely involved in designing, testing or managing these tools. In this blog we introduce our research on ‘collective crisis intelligence’ (CCI), an emerging innovation approach that offers an alternative trajectory for AI development in the humanitarian sector.

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Covid-19 Is a Call for Universalism

Covid-19 Is a Call for Universalism

Crises are by definition breaking points. Something that we thought would hold – peace, health, transit system, electric supply, a way of life, a society – shatters. While dealing with the crisis, our understanding of the vulnerability of our world increases, as does our understanding of how to prevent the catastrophe from happening again. The first-hand experience spurs innovation and recalibration that will, if built correctly, lead to increased resilience.

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