Overview
Across the East Africa region, consecutive good seasons transformed food security conditions from the initial low point in 2011, which was a great relief coming out of a severe drought. However, the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) continued working with other players including government and regional bodies such as the Inter-Governmental Climate Information, Prediction,
Early Warning and Application for Sustainable development (ICPAC) in resilience building attempts, to avert serious impacts during the next drought emergency. The Indian Ocean Islands (Madagascar RC, Seychelles RC, Comoros RC and Mauritius RC) National Societies were placed under the support of the IFRC EARR with effect from January 2013 after previously being under the IFRC Africa Zone. This meant that the EA regional office needed to strategize its resources including personnel and finances to extend this important support The East Africa regional Representation, in 2012, targeted its advocacy work towards stakeholders who increasingly played a significant role in supporting EA NS. These included the African Union, IGAD and East Africa Community (EAC). The EARR Office continued to co‐chair the Regional Inter‐agency Working Group (IAWG), the Regional Humanitarian Partnership Team (RHPT) and the Inter‐agency Sub Groups (DRR/CC, FSNWG, Security, Quality, and Accountability) these are coordination and influencing bodies that involved humanitarian actors, such as INGOs, UN, and IGAD within East Africa region. A new partnership with IGAD on resilience, aiming at establishing a 5-year resilience program funded at national and regional levels was developed. This is part of a wider strategy looking at how to better address resilience policy and funding opportunities in the region. A joint call for action between IGAD and IFRC was published in June and discussions are on its way with the EU and the US on their own resilience initiatives.
In the reporting period, the IFRC Planning, Monitoring, Evaluation and Reporting (PMER) department supported the National Societies in planning; Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) capacity assessments;
Evaluation processes; PMER trainings; quality assurance and submission of reports to relevant stakeholders as well as support in Resource Mobilization (RM). M & E support aimed at ensuring well functioning M&E systems and tools to support delivery timely and reliable reports from program and projects implementation; contribute to organizational learning; and knowledge sharing by reflecting upon experiences and lessons learnt. The department also supported NS in organizing high-level meetings, learning and communications support.