US $150 million pledged for emergency fund

Ministers from key donor countries pledged $150 million on Thursday for an emergency fund that would enable the UN to respond more rapidly to sudden emergencies and divert resources to the world’s most neglected crises. Attending the World Summit at UN headquarters in New York, representatives from over 20 countries and senior UN aid officials met to discuss the creation of the Central Emergency Response Fund (CERF), a key element of the UN Secretary-General’s reform package that calls for more predictable funding for humanitarian emergencies. Luxembourg's minister of cooperation and humanitarian action, Jean-Louis Schiltz, told reporters that UN member states had made the pledge to the fund which was intended to be operational in early 2006. "This means that once it is set up, the fund will immediately have these funds available, provided by Sweden, United Kingdom, Norway, Netherlands, Switzerland and Luxembourg," he said, adding that this was new money, in addition to current aid funds. The pledges demonstrate a gathering momentum among key donors to correct shortcomings in the financing of humanitarian action, widely considered to be too slow, unpredictable and media-driven. The United Kingdom’s secretary of state for international development, Hilary Benn, told reporters that the discussion had centred on ways to ensure that the UN had the tools to do the job. "The current system we have right now is that when the fire alarm button is pushed, the UN has to pass around a hat in order to get petrol for the fire engine and water for the tank," he said. "The other point is that there are fires in the world all the time, and we give more to some than others. This is not fair and needs to change." Benn added that the United Kingdom was prepared to contribute $70 million each year as well as up to $100 million, on a basis of $1 for every $3 provided by others, as an incentive for other donors to contribute. Other donors announced that they would consider supporting the fund at a later date. An expanded CERF could ultimately provide up to $450 million in grants to bolster an existing revolving loan facility of $50 million. The UN’s Emergency Relief Coordinator, Jan Egeland, said Thursday's meeting signified "a go-ahead from our closest donor partners to the concept of a central fund, which was a key component to the World Summit’s outcome document". He added: "In the two years as Emergency Relief Coordinator, I have been struck as to how uneven our response is. It's also often too late because we have to wait for funds." Egeland said the creation of this fund would mean an emergency response could be mounted in days as opposed to months. It would also give the UN the ability to attribute resources to forgotten emergencies that had not received the support, often due to a lack of media attention. Egeland cited the poor international response to the floods in Guyana in January, which had been eclipsed by the Indian Ocean tsunami disaster. Early intervention could also be cheaper. In the case of the locust swarms in the African Sahel last year, it was widely acknowledged that an early intervention would have been cost effective. Instead, a $9-million appeal by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization to spray locust larvae in February 2004 received a poor response and had to be revised to $100 million, after the locusts had infested eight countries in the region. Sweden’s state secretary for international development cooperation, Annika Soder, said her country would carry the reform through the UN General Assembly, so that the fund would be in place for January 2006. Officials of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Egeland would manage the fund, in consultation with humanitarian agencies and relevant humanitarian coordinators. Member states would serve on a governing board and an annual donor conference would be held to discuss the fund's replenishment.