* Any views expressed in this opinion piece are those of the author and not of Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Dr. Ahmed Al Meraikhi is the U.N. Secretary-General’s Humanitarian Envoy, based in Doha, Qatar. He was appointed on Dec 8 to build stronger humanitarian partnerships in Qatar, and with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region and beyond. In January, Al Meraikhi met U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Stephen O’Brien, and many other UN leaders at the U.N. headquarters in New York to discuss his vision for this role.
In an interview with OCHA (Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs) he discusses what he sees as the priorities for 2017.
How would you describe your role?
The way I see it, my key role as Humanitarian Envoy is to bridge the practical and perceptual gaps between States, the private sector, NGOs and UN agencies when it comes to humanitarian efforts. I have started with this trip to the U.N. Headquarters to gain insight into how the UN can better engage with emerging donors and continue to build its partnerships with Gulf countries.
Why is there a need for this role?
It is amazing what we can achieve when we tackle a problem from a fresh perspective. This is what His Highness Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani of Qatar achieved when he launched the Halab Labieh, or ‘Answering Aleppo’, campaign in December last year. His Highness announced the cancellation of Qatar’s National Day on Dec 18, turning a day of celebration into one of fundraising out of solidarity with the victims in Aleppo. By taking this bold step, he helped raise US$80 million from private citizens to provide life-saving aid to families in Aleppo whose lives had been torn apart by conflict.
This early achievement illustrates the abundant possibilities for more engagement with less-traditional donors. Private firms, foundations, individuals and Governments across the Gulf want to exercise their generosity and invest in humanitarian action, but they need guidance on how to interact with the UN system. The U.N. system has been set up to work with traditional donors, but the roadmap is unclear when it comes to the GCC and others. That is where I come in.
Tell us more about your 2017 action plan
In my role as Humanitarian Envoy, my work will fall along four main pillars: mobilising resources, raising awareness and advocating for principled humanitarian action, and developing policy and providing leadership.
On the first, to mobilise resources, we need to involve the government, NGOs and the private sector to create dynamic new partnerships capable of responding to the complex humanitarian needs the world faces. As global politics continue to shift, the rise of the private sector will play an important role in new funding sources. I intend to approach foundations and companies and look at Islamic social financing mechanisms as vehicles to fill funding gaps left by traditional donors.
The kinds of trilateral partnerships I would like to see would involve, for instance, a funding entity, such as a company or foundation; a technical entity providing support, such as an international NGO or the U.N.; and the recipient who sees the effect of a functioning system on the ground. I envision that these partnerships will grow out of increased South-South cooperation and encourage engagement with small- and medium-sized entities.
The second pillar is advocacy and awareness. First, we need to feel out the donor climate to understand what each donor wants and needs from humanitarian agencies and how to fulfill this, including giving them the kind of recognition that they need. U.N. agencies and their partners launch detailed humanitarian response plans crisis by crisis, but donors need to know more about what these plans mean, how they will be put into practice and their end goal. Donors need to see that they are putting their investment in the right place and that they will get maximum value from their efforts.
Donors and U.N. agencies alike need to focus their mindset on achieving a sustainable partnership and not just meeting internal metrics, and ensuring that donors are actual real partners that will lead this dialogue. Donors want and need to be part of the system. They do not want to be seen as just another ATM.
I want to see donors move from a position of trust to one of influence. There are many gaps to overcome to reach this point, and the key ingredients to surmounting them are open dialogue and awareness. This trust, this awareness, has been built up at missions in New York and Geneva, but it has to be reinforced right through to the capitals if it’s to have any impact.
Thirdly, I will focus on policy –outlining clear mechanisms through which investors can channel their funding. U.N. agencies have rigorous monitoring systems that enable donors to see exactly where their money is going and how it is being used, but we need to show donors this. We now need to show that these systems can be nimble and flexible and can fulfil donors’ needs.
I recently met with the Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) who has agreed to receive my proposal to establish a Humanitarian Unit, with the GCC to improve coordination among GCC countries and act as a focal point for the UN. In all these efforts, we will focus on humanitarian and development goals in line with the New Way of Working that came out of the 2016 World Humanitarian Summit.
Finally, the fourth pillar will be to exhibit leadership across the region to bring about these changes, and to leverage support through pledging conferences and humanitarian response plans. I will start with Qatar–the generosity of the Qatari people and leadership of the government in humanitarian action is a good model to replicate.
What are your next steps?
I intend to spend the next three months visiting each of the Gulf countries to meet with stakeholders and potential private sector partners. I will also make several field visits to see where funds are going and how they are being spent. I plan to support the upcoming humanitarian funding conferences for Syria, which Qatar is co-hosting, and for Yemen, and hold a private sector conference to bring emerging donors together with U.N. entities to explore funding and partnership possibilities.
In the region, I plan to reach out to the League of Arab States, the GCC, the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and individual states. Over the second half of the year, I will broaden my geographical focus and conduct several donors visits, including to Azerbaijan, Brunei, India, China, Brazil and the African Union, as well as to the more traditional humanitarian donors: US, UK, Canada, Australia, ECHO and Japan. The way I see it, when you throw a stone it creates a series of ever-wider circles, and you move from one to the next.
