Shaping the future: Our strategy for research and innovation in humanitarian response.

A global organisation that finds solutions to complex humanitarian problems through research and innovation..
Our purpose is clear: we work in partnership with a global community of humanitarian actors, researchers and innovators to improve the quality of humanitarian action and deliver better outcomes for people affected by crises.
We empower the humanitarian community. Find out how we can support you...

We work with people affected by crises

Credits photo: Dr. Rebecca Horn / Queen Margaret University

Why we do this

Populations affected by crises are experts in their own lives and circumstances. Their varied and valuable contributions must be heard and incorporated into innovation and research agendas.

People’s needs should be the driver for innovation. But too often the thoughts and ideas of those directly affected by crisis are marginalised and not factored into key decision-making processes. Innovation and research divorced from specific needs runs the risk of being ineffective, inappropriate – even harmful – and a waste of scarce resource.

What we do

We build strategic partnerships with networks that are connected with populations affected by crises. And we fund innovation and research led by local actors.  

We work with local partners and people within a crisis context or country, where possible, to gain their perspectives, insight and expertise. This informs our programmes of work and means our solutions are focused on the most pressing needs.

"Improving outcomes for people affected by crisis is at the heart of our work." - our guiding principle #1

Credit: Qatar Red Crescent Society, 2018

What we’ve achieved

  • Given that the Asia-Pacific region is home to 40% of natural disasters and 84% of people affected by natural disasters worldwide, we’ve formed a strategic partnership with the Asian Disaster Reduction and Response Network (ADRRN) and its membership of national and local NGOs. We’ve also targeted our innovation grant calls at local and community-based actors to ‘get closer’ to the communities ADRRN works with.
  • We’ve funded and supported innovations and research led by local actors – like the research project by Young African Refugees for Integral Development (YARID) which explored how to help refugees access finance. YARID conducted research with refugee communities and more than 30 savings groups. YARID had access to, and trust within, the community and was able to gain insight into how those groups operate, save and loan to each other, and the factors that make community-based micro-finance models work.
  • We’ve run innovation challenges, specifically seeking the perspectives of local actors and communities. Our gender-based violence (GBV) funding call (‘Taking a local perspective on measuring the impact of GBV-programming in emergencies’) led to grantees reflecting collectively on impact measurement practices in their specific contexts. As a result, they identified fresh lines of enquiry or approaches. See an example here.
Teaching music with young children using community resiliency model skills in the Philippines. Credit: Rural Development Initiatives in the Islands of Leyte Inc.

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