NGO collaboration on cash programming

The annual meeting of the Grand Bargain (GB) – a facilitation group made up of global humanitarian leaders from Sweden, the US, OCHA, UNICEF, IFRC and InterAction – held on 27th June saw the presentation of a letter of intent endorsed by the CEOs of the Collaborative Cash Delivery (CCD) Network partnership. Together with ACTED, the 15 international non-governmental organisations operate in every crisis context globally that provides cash programming and deliver the majority of ‘last mile’ humanitarian cash assistance.

With this statement, ACTED reaffirmed its commitment to greater collaboration to ‘deliver timely cash and voucher assistance to people affected by crises’ in partnership with other CCD network members.

As a collaborative cash partner, ACTED is already actively participating in 15 country-level pilot projects and was instrumental in supporting the establishment of a national-level CCD network in Ethiopia that is active in the country’s cash delivery sector. By implementing the new model, it provided the Ethiopia consortium the framework they needed to move things forward for the Ethiopian cash community and will benefit other sectors and the aid community as a whole. Read more about the CCD Network’s multipurpose collaborative cash project in Wollegas, Ethiopia funded by ECHO in the document below.

The statement (below) said that, alongside our vision of ‘collective impact that leaves no one behind’, these organisations have a ‘shared belief that collective cash programming should always respond to the local context, strengthen local capacities and ensure a community-focused approach’. With this agreement, senior leadership with CCD network’s partners reaffirmed their organisation’s commitment to greater collaboration to enable, facilitate and drive a shared CCD vision, agenda and operational support to harness the efficiencies of working together. ACTED looks forward to working with its fellow CCD network partners in Ethiopia and other localised contexts to ‘deliver efficiency gains that save lives’ and ‘optimise our collective delivery in line with Grand Bargain commitments’.

Grand Bargain announcement statement: Global Collaboration Agreement, Collaborative Cash Delivery (CCD) Network, June 2019

The CCD is an NGO led global collaboration network dedicated to responding to global humanitarian needs. The CCD accelerates organizational efficiencies by harnessing and leveraging in a timely, complementary and systemic way the capabilities of its 15 NGO members. Founded on the momentum of the Grand Bargain in 2016, the CCD aims to deliver timely cash and voucher assistance to people affected by crises wherever markets are functioning.

The CCD’s vision is one of collective impact that leaves no one behind. The Network has been designed to deliver efficiency gains that save lives by enabling multiple actors to assemble themselves in ways that are tailored to the needs of the response and capitalize on local knowledge and global expertise. Where it has been deployed, the CCD has avoided duplication, improved the efficient use of resources and created comprehensive programmes tackling rapidly changing needs.

In addition to offering a coordinated platform for the delivery of cash at scale in crisis contexts, the CCD is developing the capability to optimize our collective delivery in line with Grand Bargain commitments that extend beyond workstream three. The CCD is grounded in a shared belief that collective cash programming should always respond to the local context, strengthen local capacities and ensure a community-focused approach. The strength of the CCD is at the local level where we have initiated 15 national collaborative delivery platforms demonstrating the dividends of simplified, harmonized structures and adapted operating models that create space for our teams to organize and work together in new ways.

The Network aims to achieve:

• Collective impact – bringing our members together in a structured way to contribute to common humanitarian outcomes
• Interoperability and reduced barriers to collaboration
• Shared capacity and pooled resources
• Global and local products and services through Response Builder to promote easy, customizable and scalable collaboration across the cash value chain (using contextualized platform standards, collaboration products & services, local CCD network capabilities, analysis & decision insight)
• Systems change – enabling a new approach to the existing cash ecosystem

The CCD is an efficiency accelerator and our organizations intend to harness its potential to reduce competition, streamline management costs, and maximize impact at field level. In the coming year, our global collaboration will focus on the following priority areas:

1. Joined up analysis for cash and voucher responses in 10 countries: CCD members continue sharing their capacities and capabilities to undertake joint assessments, share information, and conduct joint needs and response analyses to complement other non-CCD actors. The CCD’s governance structure also prioritizes the inclusion of local actors, whose knowledge and insights contribute to improved priority setting and targeting of assistance.
2. Work to reduce management costs where possible in 10 countries: CCD members continue to centralise capabilities and share capacities rather than duplicate them. Where possible, we will invest and secure funding to build out common tools that inform response management and collaborative decision-making that reduces duplication.
3. Reduce reporting burdens through simplified and harmonized models: CCD members will finalize the development and adoption of common standards for interoperability, including finance reconciliation and reporting. Recognizing that successful localized responses must first be underpinned by quality local partnerships, we will collaborate to create a common partner agreement framework and common due diligence parameters for CCD members with the aim of extending harmonized agreements beyond the CCD.
4. Invest in transparency to improve trust in partnerships and accountability to affected people: CCD members will finalise transparent common standards for operational collaboration for key issues such as global data sharing, recipient management and technical resource mainstreaming. Funding allowing, the CCD will build out a new decision insight tool to deepen our understanding of people’s humanitarian needs and fulfill them better than we have been able to before.

As CEOs of the CCD Network members, we acknowledge the unique strengths and strategic priorities each member brings to this collaboration. We will continue to strengthen our network, building on the belief that joining up our operational capabilities will confer long-term advantages for the people we aim to reach in humanitarian crises worldwide.

By endorsing this agreement our 15 organizations reaffirm senior leadership’s commitment to enable, facilitate and drive a shared CCD vision, agenda and operational support to harness the efficiencies of working together.

This statement is supported by:

Action Against Hunger

ACTED

Adeso

CARE International

Catholic Relief Services

Concern Worldwide

Danish Church Aid

Danish Refugee Council

International Rescue Committee

Mercy Corps

Norweigan Refugee Council

Oxfam America

Relief International

Save the Children Netherlands

World Vision International