UUSC Support for Locally Led Aid in Sudan
Summary
In 2024, Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC) committed $25,000 to the Strengthening Local Humanitarian Leadership Philanthropic Collaborative (LHL) Call to Action for Sudan Fund to support human rights and localized crisis response by the end of 2024. This initiative is committed to contribute $6.5 million to support locally led aid in Sudan. The ongoing conflict in Sudan has resulted in one of the largest, overlooked humanitarian crises in the world. Sudanese locally led approaches, mutual aid, and emergency response rooms have become the most effective methods to reach those in need. While the humanitarian sector is often slow to adapt to innovative funding models in access-constrained environments, locally led approaches and mutual aid groups can efficiently distribute resources and transfer decision-making power to local groups. This coalition advocates for locally led approaches and mutual aid groups as critical scaling pathways for donors across the aid ecosystem in Sudan and beyond.
Approach
Participating members of the Strengthening Local Humanitarian Leadership (LHL) Philanthropic Collaborative and partners in the coalition will make an initial collective contribution of $6.5 million to an eligible intermediary and commit to channel funding and decision-making power as directly as possible to ERRs and other mutual aid groups in Sudan.
Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC) will contribute $25,000 of funding to the Center for Disaster Philanthropy’s “Call to Action for Sudan Fund” by the end of 2024. Contributions are intended to be unrestricted community grants, with funders transferring agency to emergency response rooms (ERRs) / localization coordination councils (LCCs) and other local groups to decide priorities and how funds are allocated and spent.
LCC/ERRs will provide documentation of the process, flow of resources and risk management controls governing the fund allocation, management and oversight, and an appropriate account of how funds were used including the activities/outcomes/reach after funds have been spent.
Funders commit to accept reports in flexible formats, as able.
UUSC provides unrestricted funding to support locally-led relief and rebuilding efforts that serve those most left out of the traditional humanitarian aid efforts. This often means prioritizing the needs of women, LGTBQI+, and ethnic and religious minorities.
Case studies, impact stories and/or education and advocacy materials will be produced to demonstrate feasibility and impact. These will be used to educate philanthropy and mobilize further funding throughout the life of the CTA.
Philanthropy has a crucial role to play in piloting, testing, proofing and documenting the viability and efficacy of the scaling pathways for donors to reach mutual aid groups while obtaining adequate assurances that risks are being managed adequately.
Action Plan
Background
A year into the conflict in Sudan, and with the recent famine declaration in North Darfur, the pace of response is falling short of the needs. Over 25 million people are in need of assistance, 10 million of them displaced, and the threat of widespread famine is imminent. Sudan is one of the largest, overlooked humanitarian crises in the world. Where international organizations would typically mobilize a sizable, comprehensive response, the ongoing insecurity, access, and regulatory barriers stifled these efforts in Sudan.
In its place, a network of agile, decentralized, and hyper-local mutual aid groups have organically emerged. Many locally-led NGOs as well as mutual aid groups, which include Emergency Response Rooms or (ERRs) , and Women Emergency Response Room (WERRs) are providing humanitarian aid and many other forms of assistance and services that straddle the humanitarian-development and peacebuilding nexus in new and creative ways. These mutual aid groups operate somewhat independently, but in a coordinated fashion and are the main mechanism for reaching millions of people in need in Sudan.
Mutual aid groups are also the most effective actors, combining to form a patchwork national network, to scale up life-saving aid as the situation continues to deteriorate. In Sudan, moving money and resources at scale is proving impossible, partly due to security challenges and insufficient funding, but primarily due to strict donor compliance requirements and bureaucratic impediments, attitudes to risk, the unfamiliarity and lack of consensus on the most “appropriate” intermediary pathways to these groups.
UUSC is committed to engaging in trust-based philanthropy which centers the lived experience and expertise of proximate actors such as ERRs. Sudanese mutual aid efforts are building trust, legitimacy and seeking to prevent further damage to the torn social fabric in Sudan. They are empowering communities, not creating the dependence that traditional aid often generates.