What a resource! The Good Enough Guide is small enough to tuck away in a carry-on bag, but full of important reminders on how to best respond in emergency situations. When not responding to an emergency, the guide serves as a great reference for determining the effectiveness of program activities by encouraging us to ask the right questions."

Kristi Tabaj
Technical Advisor
Mercy Corps Afghanistan

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The IWG and the ECB report

In 2003, Emergency Directors from seven of the largest International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGOs) active in emergency preparedness and response began to discuss this challenge. This group, the Inter-Agency Working Group (IWG) on Emergency Capacity, launched a systematic analysis of their shared capacities, resulting in the publication of a Report on Emergency Capacity in 2004.

What did that research reveal? It identified 4 key capacity gaps constraining our ability to provide timely, effective and high quality preparedness and response to emergencies. These included:

Staff Capacity – to respond faster in emergencies and raise the quality of response with better trained and more rapidly deployed staff
Accountability and Impact Measurement – to improve accountability to people affected by emergencies and improve the measurement of impact
Disaster Risk Reduction – to help communities reduce their vulnerability to disasters and to support cohesion within and beyond the IWG agencies on risk reduction issues
Information and Communication Technologies – to better understand information needs in emergencies and the appropriate technology to gather, analyze and disseminate that information

Over the past three years, with the support of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Microsoft Corporation, these agencies and their partners have tackled these issues through the first phase of the Emergency Capacity Building (ECB) Project. Working in more than 30 countries and with more than 20 partners from across the humanitarian community, ECB Project teams have developed and published more than 20 research findings, field tools and practical guides to issues as diverse as building trust in emergency teams and making accountability happen in the field. The overarching goal of the ECB Project has been to improve the speed, quality and effectiveness of the humanitarian community in saving the lives, safeguarding the livelihoods and protecting the rights of people affected by emergencies.

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