Ethiopia Cash Working Group

Minutes of the CWG Meeting
Tuesday, 24 October 2017
10:00a.m.,OCHA Office

  1. Review of the 26September meeting and action points
  • The OCHA co-chair welcomed Juliet Lang, OCHA Global Cash Advisor, on mission
    from Geneva, and Hannah Hames, ERC Consortium Project Coordinator, on mission from Save the Children UK.
  • The OCHA co-chair informed that unfortunately UNHCR would be unable to attend the meeting, and that in lieu of Refugee Cash Coordination Group (RCCG) agenda item, WVI would be providing an update on its “Cash Transfer Programming Operational Manual.”
  • Minutes of the 26 September CWG meeting were reviewed and endorsed.
  1. Updates from CWG Steering Committee, ICCG and updated CWG ToR
  • The OCHA Global Cash Advisor provided an overview of her 10-day mission and the outcomes of several meetings held with CBI implementing partners, donors, inter-cluster coordinators and the CWG Steering Committee.
  • In the CWG Steering Committee meeting held on 17 October, the committee agreed on the need to strengthen the CWG ToR, by including minimum requirements for Steering Committee members and clarifying some of the objectives of the group. There was also the overall consensus that the CWG required a permanent and clearly identified place within the current humanitarian coordination structure.
  • To strengthen linkages with the UNHCR and the ARRA-led RCCG, the CWG Steering Committee invited UNHCR to be a Steering Committee member.
  • The Cash Advisor informed that inter-cluster coordinators had agreed for the CWG to become a sub-group of the inter-cluster group, with the OCHA co-chair providing the link between the two groups. Cluster Coordinators would ideally be attending the CWG, but in instances where they are unable to do so, the co-chair would be providing updates during ICC meetings and attend the meetings of those clusters implementing cash/voucher programs. This issue would then need to be raised to the EHCT to formalize the coordination structure.
  • The Global Cash Advisor also reemphasized that OCHA was mandated with coordination and not with implementing cash programs and did not possess the technical expertise to deliver several of the objectives of the group, such as developing a Minimum Expenditure Basket, and encouraged CWG members to take the lead on some of these objectives. The CWG Steering Committee also discussed the possibility of having two-technical co-chairs of the CWG with OCHA retaining secretariat functions to meet some of the more technical objectives of the group, and this would be revisited when the term of the current co-chairs comes to an end in December.

Action Point

  • CWG members to review the revised CWG ToR and provide comments by Friday 3 November. OCHA to consolidate and share the updated version via email to the group for endorsement.
  1. Overview of the ERC Consortium pilot
  • The Save the Children UK Project Coordinator of the ERC Consortium pilot provided an overview of the program for the uptake of quality, collaborative, multi-purpose grants (MPGs) in Ethiopia. While the Consortium will not provide direct assistance to crisis-affected populations, it is intended to have an indirect, positive impact on their lives by means of influencing humanitarian actors to design better quality, more collaborative MPG programmes. Through an ‘MPG Toolkit’ the Consortium provides technical and strategic support to country-based humanitarian organizations and government agencies, enabling them to engage in collaborative assessments and decision making.
  • SCI informed that it was working on identifying woredas in Somali region in which to roll out the program and would be meeting with several partners to seek their views on the issue. SCI acknowledged that though the pilot would have limited geographical coverage, it was confident that tool kit would be able to be applied in other areas.
  • SCI informed partners of its intention to create a “Task Team for Response Analysis” to oversee and draw together all the various element of the ECHO’s ERC Funded pilot for the uptake of quality, collaborative and muli-purpose cash. The Task Team is expected to play a key role in bringing together and analyzing the information generated by the assessments. As the composition of the Task Team is expected to include cash experts from the CWG, SCI invited interested partners to express their interest via the Project Coordinator.

Action Points

  • CWG members interested in becoming a member of the ERC Consortium’s Task Team to contact the Project Coordinator (Hannah Hames, SCI UK, ).
  • OCHA co-chair to share Task Team ToR, and ERC Consortium background documents with the CWG.
  1. Update on the “Cash Transfer Operational Manual”
  • WVI provided an update on the drafting process of the “Cash Transfer Programming Operational Manual”. OCHA expressed concerns that the manual had already been shared with NDRMC without review by the CWG, to which WVI responded that the draft version had been requested by NDRMC and that a preliminary version had been shared with the CWG Steering Committee for comments. One NGO urged caution with sharing with government ahead of endorsement, as some NGOs are currently conducting pilot projects which may not adhere to the document’s guidelines.
  • The CWG was in overall agreement for the need for a standardized approach in cash programming and looked forward to reviewing and endorsing the document, but cautioned that that rather than “guidelines” the manual should be referred to as “Standard Procedures”, as not all partners can be expected to follow/be held accountable to the standards set out in the manual.
  • Under the feasibility section of the manual, the OCHA Global Cash Advisor suggested the DFID-funded “OCHA/WFP/UNHCR/UNICEF Cash Feasibility Preparedness Framework” study conducted in 2015 be used as a reference.
  • The OCHA co-chair informed that it would be circulating the draft version of the manual for inputs/comments, and urged all those members unsure about the content of the manual to please share it with their respective technical experts for comments/edits as the document will need to be endorsed by the group.

Action points

  • OCHA to circulate the “Operational Manual” providing the CWG with a 7 November deadline for comments/inputs. OCHA to seek the endorsement of the manual via email after the 7 November deadline.
  1. WFP Fresh Food Voucher Presentation
  • WFP provided an overview of its “Fresh Food Voucher” program which aims to improve the diet diversity among pregnant and lactating women and children between 6 and 23 months, while stimulating local fresh food markets. WFP is expecting to test making this programconditional on PLW and children’s (between 6 to 23 months) regular visits to health center and/or post in the hopes that this conditionality will ensure women and children are regularly monitored on health indicators and increase the usage of health facilities and uptake of services.
  • The program will target 11,000 households in Kobo, Dessie Zuria and Habru woredas in Amhara for a year, and beneficiaries will be registered into the WFP Scope Platform.
  • WFP will utilize mobile money services in the form of a restricted wallet that can only be redeemed at identified retailers for a range of fresh food items which can be used multiple times a month by beneficiary
  1. Update from CWG members
  • Oxfam provided an update on its “Drought Response Program, Somali Region and Refugee Response Program, Gambella Region’ in operation since August 2016 targeting 3,5421 households.
  • Oxfam described some of the issues they faced, including the cash transfer value in Somali region, which is not covering even half of the food MEB let alone the full MEB of food and ES/NFI. Oxfam urged the cash transfer value be aligned with the MEB (Food MEB and Non-Food MEB) in view of the current prevailing IPC level 4 and the CWG focus its efforts in identifying an MEB, at the regional level, for the country.

Action point

  • Oxfam to provide a presentation of its CBI in Somali region at the next CWG meeting.
  1. AoB
  • OCHA co-chair informed that despite a slow start to identifying the MEB, work would continue and the MEB Technical Working Group would meet again before the next CWG. One suggestion is for the cluster leads to be tasked with identifying MEB items under their specific sector and to hold discussions with the SCI Livelihoods Expert currently tasked with identifying the Household Economy Assessment (HEA).

Action point

  • OCHA co-chair to call another MEB TWG before the next CWG meeting to rekindle efforts in identifying an MEB at the regional level.

Name / Organization/Agency
Lilian Mutiso / IOM
Abdulkadir Jemal / Mercy Corps
Praemeenah Poobalan / WFP
Fragrance Manyala / WFP
Solomon Bekele / WV
Tesfaye Abebe / SCI
Minetti Andrea / ICRC
Getahun Shibeshi / FH
Theodros Eshetu / Oxfam
Solomon Medhane / Oxfam
Kidist Belayneh / NCA
Dr. Abebe Shiferaw / NCA
Joanna Olsen / CRS
Alemayehu Girma / CARE
Kourtney Rusow / DFID
Mesfin Abebe / TearFund
Yared Ayele / NRC
Minetti Andrea / ICRC
Mohammed Bedru / IRC
Temesfen Markos / PIN
Hannah Hames / SCI UK
Juliet Lang / OCHA Geneva

*** The next CWG meeting will be held on Tuesday 28 November in OCHA Offices***

1