Gang Karume Augustin is a DRC national and worked for 12 years as the Global Emergency Coordinator for IRC from 1998-2010. Here we speak with Gang about how he got involved with the Start Network and where he sees the future of humanitarian action in DRC.
I, like many of you, have been reading about and watching videos on the riots, the police brutality, the incidents of racial injustice and racially motivated violence of the last several weeks linked to the murder of George Floyd by US police in Minneapolis. This makes me deeply sad and deeply angry.
Today Start Network's five hubs have launched a bold paper aimed at catalysing a more local response to the immediate needs of COVID-19 needs and to accelerate a lasting step-change in humanitarian response.
Shonnasgacha is a small village of Keshobpur Upazila of Jashore district where 210 families live in a 1.5 sq. km area. While the country was waking up to the COVID-19 threat in the early stages of the lockdown, the locals of Shonnasgacha village took measures to protect themselves.
On 28th March 2020, Start Fund Bangladesh, the national fund for the Start Network, activated its first alert in response to predictions made by the national Forecast-based Warning, Analysis and Response Network (FOREWARN).
Start Fund Bangladesh developed standing operating procedures (SOP) after taking stock of current happenings and in-depth discussion with donors and humanitarian leaders. The SOP targeted safety measures at multiple levels to ensure the ultimate prevention of transmission at the community level. Some of these included: Tracking physical health of staff and volunteers throughout the project period; In addition, all personnel involved in the project needed access to personal protective gear (masks and sanitizers) Adopting new practices at the organisational level: providing accommodation facilities to staff and volunteers if needed; giving compensatory allowances to those working in direct response; increasing organisational cleanliness as per WHO standards Following strict guidelines during response and: distributing relief items through door-to-door delivery and drawing distant circles.
One of the ways that Start Fund Bangladesh is shifting more power to local organisations is by ensuring they have more access to funding for operations costs, otherwise known as the Indirect Cost Recovery (ICR) method, this enables them to improve and develop.
Dan’s commitment to working with local actors first started when he worked for Christian Aid back in the nineties, and he has always been keen to see localisation in the Start Network agenda. Dan is now leaving War Child to take up the position of CEO at Farm Africa, but we were able to chat with him one last time about the need for system change in the humanitarian sector and how the Start Network is attempting to do this.
We share some stories on the unique space that this Start Fund Bangladesh holds in providing essential support to under-the-radar crises.
Start Network has announced five founding hubs to be based in countries and regions affected by crises, localising resources and decision-making to improve the quality of humanitarian aid.
