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Partnerships & Practice

The Partnerships and Practice stream supports excellence in humanitarian action by leveraging the research outputs and influencing policy and practice in the region and globally.

Vanuatu, Photography by Kersom Richard

Stream overview

The research program is dedicated to creating real time evidence and critical thinking within the context of humanitarian response and analysis.

This stream comprises practice papers and guidance note series, the Research Advisory Committee, monitoring and evaluation for the research program and supporting the sector through events.

Beach in vanuatu
Vanuatu, Photography by Kersom Richard

About our practice papers

Beyond Humanitarian Horizons’ three long-term research streams, practice papers are critical to inform and engage practitioners and influence policy in real time and stimulate discussion and inform practice.

 

Conducted in partnership with national organisations, these papers also serve to amplify and elevate the voice and evidence generated from the Indo-Pacific context, to help inform and influence real time global humanitarian sector debate and reform.

Practice Paper under the spotlight

No Turning Back: Local leadership in Vanuatu’s response to Tropical Cyclone Harold

In the midst of the COVID-19 global pandemic, Tropical Cyclone Harold, a category 5 cyclone, hit Vanuatu on Monday 06 April 2020. The Vanuatu government and the humanitarian community recognised early on that the response would be different by necessity. No international surge deployments were available, and technical expertise needed to be sought internally. Within an increasingly strong Vanuatu humanitarian community, national and local actors stepped up to demonstrate that humanitarian local leadership is more than an aspiration in the Pacific.

This practice paper, conducted in partnership with the Vanuatu Association for Non-government organisations (VANG), is a rapid analysis of Vanuatu’s response to Tropical Cyclone Harold, 50 days after the disaster. In exploring the extent and implications of the locally-led response, it intended to stimulate discussion and inform localisation practice in Vanuatu and in the region.

No Turning Back: Local leadership in Vanuatu's response to Tropical Cyclone Harold

Communications

Research can only achieve influence if the results are in the hands of the right practitioners and policymakers at the right time. Humanitarian Horizons focuses on producing accessible and practical publications that enhance and promote excellence in humanitarian practice.

Central to the programs communication strategy are our partners, who share research findings across diverse networks, co-host dissemination events, and launch communication products to national, regional and global audiences.

HAG invests in translating research in local languages, and shares results and outcomes with communities and researchers who contribute to and/or have an interest in the research outcomes.

Myanmar, Photography by Greta Carroll
Myanmar, Photography by Greta Carroll

Tracking Impact

Our M&E Framework articulates our research objectives and how we measure the influence of our research. We believe in the importance of conducting and sharing our research in a way that promotes ownership, uptake and use.

Tracking the influence and impact of research is notoriously difficult, even for practitioner-oriented research such as ours. Nevertheless, at HAG we believe it is possible to set objectives for influencing humanitarian practice based on the evidence that emerges from our research program.

Impact tracking – a snapshot

Tracking so far against outcome 1 highlights that research is responsive to regional needs to support effective humanitarian action in the Indo-Pacific.  This has particularly been the case for COVID-19. Tracking also highlights that there is an opportunity to improve our understanding of how responsive research supports effective humanitarian action.

Reach and Reality: Tracking the impact of our research

Research Advisory Committee

The program’s Research Advisory Committee, which meets biannually, is comprised of regional experts from government, private sector and NGOs.

The role of the Research Advisory Committee is to provide strategic advice for the research program and inform research priorities, processes and findings.