ILO-FAO Technical Workshop on the Integrated Livelihood Assessment Guidelines in Emergencies
A technical workshop was held on the mornings of the 8th and 9th of March 2007 at ILO Geneva for the review of the Integrated Livelihood Assessment Guidelines for post-crisis settings, jointly developed by FAO and ILO. The first workshop of this kind took place at FAO (Rome) on 6-7 February to discuss a preliminary version.
The workshop, organized by FAO/TCER and ILO/CRISIS, gathered ILO officials from several units and departments of the EMPLOYMENT, SOCIAL DIALOGUE and SOCIAL PROTECTION sectors.
It was opened by the Executive Director of the Employment Sector, Mr. José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs, and was attended by ACTRAV, INVEST, EMP/LED, EMP/SFP, SKILLS, SOC/SEC, SECTOR, INTEGRATION, TRENDS, STAT, EXREL, and CODEV.
In consideration of the importance of this initiative within the framework of the UN Humanitarian Response Reform and the IASC Early Recovery Cluster, a number of key UN agencies also attended the workshop, namely UNDP, UNHCR, UNITAR, and UNHABITAT.
In his introductory remarks, Mr. José Manuel Salazar-Xirinachs stated that “Placing the employment and livelihoods recovery factor as one of the priorities in emergency response is tantamount to helping the affected people to reduce their dependency from external aid. Comprehensive assessments promoting national capacity building should therefore receive special attention”. Referring to ILO-FAO partnership, he also remarked that “Our task is to work closely together in order to help this initiative become operational and lay the foundations for further UN-System joint initiatives addressing the issue of livelihood protection in its wider sense and therefore promoting socio-economic empowerment, self-reliance, labour rights, human dignity, and equal opportunities for all”.
The ILO-FAO collaboration for joint emergency response and implementation of livelihoods recovery programmes started in 2006 within the IASC Early Recovery Cluster. FAO and ILO have been tasked to jointly coordinate the Livelihood and Employment sub-cluster. In recent months, two consultants, under the technical backstopping of ILO/CRISIS and FAO/TCER, have put together practical guidelines for an integrated process of joint rapid livelihoods assessment. The process involved consultations with relevant ILO and FAO technical units, to ensure the comprehensiveness of the final output. This tool would be used in the aftermath of sudden-onset natural disasters and, eventually, will be revised to enable its application to other types of crisis.
A more advanced version of the guidelines will be tested by ILO and FAO through training events which will be organized starting June 2007 in a number of pilot countries.
As a follow up to this workshop, ILO and FAO will be engaged in strengthening the cooperation in order to be able to respond to sudden-onset crisis by organizing joint damage and needs assessment missions, joint programme proposals and concerted joint policy dialogue with the donor community. The prospects of this cooperation are already very encouraging.
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