Linking EU’s humanitarian and development interventions in the context of resilience building: The case of Ethiopia

This is a concept note explaining the EU RESET Programme (EU - Resilience Building in Ethiopia) elaborated jointly by ECHO and DEVCO and based in the ongoing interventions in 34 districts of Ethiopia.

The approach is based on the premise that chronic humanitarian and longer term needs and recurrent food insecurity, mainly - but not only - caused by drought can be more efficiently addressed via a longer term resilience approach, linking humanitarian and development actions, than via short term reactive rapid response actions and disconnected development activities.

The strategy consists of an integrated approach where different partners - working in close coordination - implement a multi-sectoral resilience program together with the local authorities in a defined geographic area. These areas (currently 8) are called "clusters of woreda and were selected on the basis of their repeated vulnerability. Its demarcation mainly depends on homogeneity of the food and nutrition security levels or the livelihoods and agro-ecological diversity.

This concept is based on 4 cornerstones for building resilience:

• Improving the provision of basic services (health, wash, nutrition, etc.)

• Support to livelihoods

• Safety Nets

• Disaster Risk Reduction

These pillars are complemented by other areas of support such as: natural resource management, sustainable land management, climate change adaptation and social protection.

For each cluster ECHO and DEVCO embark on a joint analysis and needs assessment, a joint strategy and a joint action framework for each of the clusters. However, the different interventions are funded on the basis of a Division of Labour between ECHO and DEVCO.