Nigeria Cash Informal Working Group Meeting Minutes

Nigeria Cash Informal Working Group Meeting Minutes

Thursday, January 14th, 2016

2-3:30 PM

Meeting Location: International Medical Corps (IMC)

Plot 882 OluAwotesu Street, directly opposite Kuriftu Plaza,

Off Idris Ibrahim Crescent, Jabi, Abuja

Meeting Minutes

• Welcome (Sarah Oteri- IMC)
• Introduction of Participants (Maggie Holmesheoran-CRS)
• Actor Mapping- Update(Maggie Holmesheoran- CRS)

The contact sheet and actor map was updates to collate information about where organizations are working, they type of cash programming conducted, and which donor funds the activity

• Partner Updates(Maggie Holmesheoran-CRS)

ICRC: Sheikh Mohammed introduced RichardAcaye to the group. He was previously based in Yobe with ACF, and now joining ICRC as the Cash and Markets Advisor. ICRC’s cash programming in Yobe also reported a few challenges. The project wanted to use a prepaid card that was not personalized. The bank disregarded the wishes of ICRC and printed all the details of beneficiaries on the card. Because of high levels of similarity of names in the state this caused confusion. In this project each HH received 21,000 NGN per month, intended to cover food as well as other necessary items. The new programming would provide roughly 14-15,000 NGN per month. Programming is expanding into Borno and Adamawa. Cash for livelihoods will be linked to returns.

ICEED just completed an assessment in Adamawa about livelihoods training for building clean cooking stoves. ICEED hopes to roll out clean cook stove trainings in more locations in Adamawa.

FAO- cash-based programming seems to be the new trend which is getting a lot of attention in the humanitarian world. In January, two people from CASHCap at NRC will be arriving in the country to provide support and develop a forum to streamline foodbasket items, cash programming minimum standards, etc.

CRS continues to use cash programming for emergency food security support in Yobe and for agriculture and livelihoods support in Sokoto and Kebbi. Additionally, CRS will be rolling out markets-based WASH using the same e-voucher technology as the food security program this February.

Save The Children has recently reported their cost of diet to donors and are looking at options for providing cash grants for food, which has previously been provided as in-kind assistance. SCI has also provided cash for livelihoods in Borno State.

Harmonization- Important but needs to take into account the differences in value chains. Additional, targeting criteria and processes are also important to make sure that targeting is easier.

Need to conduct a mapping exercise covering what the grant amount is for NFI, food, livelihoods, general cash.

• Discussion Round 2: Should the CWG be ad-hoc or formalized? (Mayen Olmedo- OCHA)

The formalized group would complete 4Ws, assessment results, feedback mechanisms, and shared learning. The added value of having a Cash Working Group is only if the conversation had contributes to partners’ work. If we do formalized we will need a TOR and a workplan to guide us in the process of working together. This has to be a decision made by the group. If we do decide to request formalization we would present the proposal to the Intersector Working Group who would in turn advocate for formalization to the HCT. Additionally, advocacy for more cash programming would be possible if there is a formal voice represented in the ISWG.

Feedback:

Nigerian RC feels formalization would be positive for increasing collaboration, and NEMA/SEMA should also be included.

ICRC shared that cash transfers are quickly becoming the most popular mode of assistance delivery. Formalization is good to bring this reality to the forefront of the general humanitarian conversation.

InterSOS raised the key issue as the TOR- the cash WG should be separate from other WGs and have a clear mandate to avoid confusion on roles and standards.

FAO concurs with ICRC on formalization recommendation. The CWG could be multi-sectoral in focus, cutting across other sectors. Cash is not yet recognized as a sector, and as such being formalized as a technical working group/cluster will be difficult.

OCHA clarified that the CWG is designed to complement the other sectors. For example, during the Typhoon Haiyan response measured private sector involvement and disaster preparedness. This group had two parts: the general group and the steering committee. The steering committee met monthly to do actor and private sector mapping.

The Nigerian RCagreed that going back to the TOR is a crucial piece to discerning what the group should look like. This will determine if it should be a WG or a TWG.

ICEED supported the idea of a steering committee.

ACF contributed the perspective that cash is a means, not an end. But looking at trends cash is likely to become a cluster, like logistics, because it is growing increasingly large.

STC raised the issue that the group will need to factor in other organizations that are not based in Abuja and are doing cash.

Oxfam asked whether this group should this be for only emergency responders or for emergency and development actors together. There was no firm consensus on this, but it will be kept for discussion in further meetings.

The decision was made that work up a TOR during the next meeting, and get a smaller group together to develop something to present to the larger group. Ghilda (Mercy Corps), Mayen (OCHA), Torron (NRC), Richard (ICRC), CashCap, Maggie/Friday, Mustapha (STC) will meet to work on the TOR during the first week of February.

The next meeting will be held on Thursday, February11th at 2PM at the OCHA office in Maitama.

• CALP Training Updates(Mayen Olmedo- OCHA)

Mayen attended an active learning event in Nairobi in December. CALP for East Africa is willing to support Nigeria for trainings. CALP West Africa has also been in touch and has been informed about the cash working group. CALP WA is trying to strengthening support to all countries, and are willing to do a one day workshop for developing a conversation about challenges in cash programming. The CWG is still waiting for information regarding how trainings/CB activities would be funded and plans to request a list of trainings offered. Additionally, a regular rotation of their Level 1 and 2 trainings would be helpful to build a cohort of capacity in the country. If sectors have money for capacity building and lots of cash actors they could provide funding for training.

• IMC Shares- Cash Programming for Nutrition in Sokoto State(Sarah Oteri- IMC)

An assessment detected poor dietary diversity in HHs in Sokoto state. Diets were mostly carbohydrates and some beans, without broad diversity. IMC has been implementing CMAM and did the assessment to understand what causes malnutrition in Sokoto. Reduction of ration size was one of the primary coping strategies used in the communities. The program was designed to increase dietary diversity to address MAM as a complimentary modality for addressing multiple causalities of malnutrition.

The program targeted 5000 HHs with both SAM and MAM cases, and implemented at 500 OTP sites. Each OTP site was assigned cases. Beneficiaries were selected through discussions with community leaders and formation of a selection committee. After beneficiaries were selected IMC conducted a verification process for the beneficiaries. An agreement was signed with ECHO bank and they used money agents to cash out the HHs on a monthly basis. The program used community volunteers to conduct mobilization activities, particularly getting HHs to come to OTP sites on the correct days to receive cash. A program officer verified using beneficiary ID cards that the correct people were receiving money.

Each beneficiary received roughly 5000-6000NGN per month for 6 months. To determine the levels they combined estimated HH size of 6 and consideration of costing on food used in cooking demonstrations. PDM included FCS, DDS, and child nutritional status. HHs showed significant improvement over the course of the program, based on a comparison done with non-beneficiary HHs. But HHs reported that they used a significant portion of cash on other things like hygiene items and medicine. Out of 5000NGN typically 500NGN went to soap and 500NGN went to medicine. But hygiene items and medicine were not factored into the initial calculations.

Lessons Learned:

1. Cooking demos play a key role for improving dietary diversity, especially since there were so many young mothers in the communities of implementation.

2. Rolling registration would be a better way to manage the program and they were not able to support really needy families that came through because they had already allocated all the funds for the program.

3. Duplicate registration is very possible and needs to be washed for. One instance where a mother registered at two OTP sites and was getting two cash distributions.

• Any Other Business(Maggie Holmesheoran- CRS)

Early recovery and livelihoods working group meeting: Thursday, January 21, 10AM, NEMA Office.

Next meeting presenter- OCHA and IRC

Location- OCHA Office-Maitama