At mid-2009, large-scale humanitarian action is responding to ongoing needs in dozens of countries around the world where millions of people are afflicted by conflict, natural disaster, or the accumulated stresses of extreme poverty and vulnerability.  To help communities and governments aid people in distress, hundreds of humanitarian organizations are working with impartiality, neutrality, independence and humanity – as well as efficiency, effectiveness, and strategic planning.  To combine their strengths and work together as more than the sum of their parts, six months ago they put together as usual a common humanitarian action plan for each major crisis, which is presented to donors as a consolidated appeal to make it clear what resources are needed to support the most-affected people through the worst of the crisis and to set them on the road to recovery and self-sufficiency.  Halfway through the implementation period for these appeals, the team of humanitarian organizations in each country presents its stakeholders an updated situation analysis and progress report: the Mid-Year Review.

Some crises have continued along the trajectory predicted in the common humanitarian action plans of six months ago; others have changed significantly.  Acute food insecurity in Kenya has deepened and widened, and its refugee camps have seen a new influx of Somalis fleeing acute fighting there.  Inside Somalia, the number of displaced people is swelling, even as the costs of humanitarian operations in Somalia’s insecure environment rise.  The occupied Palestinian territory is still reeling from the effects of the conflict in Gaza at the start of the year.  In Sri Lanka, the end of the long war against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam has left 285,000 people displaced and in need of sustained help, both in the camps and as they begin to return to their places of origin.  In Zimbabwe, funding requirements have increased due to a combination of deepening need and vulnerability, and (more positively) a new scope for humanitarian action and access following the establishment of the power-sharing government.  Similarly, in Iraq, funding requirements have gone up in part because of a need to take advantage of opportunities to prepare for return and resettlement.  Perhaps most dramatically, displacement stemming from armed action in parts of Pakistan has suddenly crested to over two million people, who need a large-scale aid operation immediately.  On the positive side, the first half of 2009 has been quiet on the front of natural disasters, necessitating only two flash appeals (Namibia and Madagascar, the latter emergency stemming from a combination of drought and civil unrest).  But needs persist in the protracted crises – those mentioned above plus Afghanistan, Central African Republic, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Nepal, Sudan, Uganda, and the West Africa region – for water and sanitation, shelter, protection and human rights monitoring, nutrition, mine action, health, food assistance, emergency education, and economic and agricultural recovery.

As the humanitarian system continually strives to improve the way it works, it is encouraging to note that the voluntary funding on which humanitarian action depends has been donated at a better pace than most previous years.  In dollar terms, the total new funding committed to these appeals to date in 2009 – $3.2 billion[1] – exceeds that at the same point in any previous year this decade; and (combined with funding in late 2008 carried over to this year) fulfils 49% of the requirements of these appeals.  However, donors cannot stop there.  Funding requirements not yet met are also higher than ever in dollar terms ($4.8 billion).  The global recession puts pressure on the aid budgets of all donor governments, but immeasurably more pressure on crisis-stricken people in poor countries: jobs – already rare – are lost; remittances from relatives abroad decline; food and fuel prices remain high; farming inputs become harder to access, making (along with climate change) food production less secure.  If just a fraction of the hundreds of billions of dollars recently committed by governments to private financial institutions were dedicated instead to humanitarian action, these appeals could already be fully funded, and all people in need could be getting the best available protection and assistance, on time.  Humanitarian organizations appeal to decision-makers in rich country governments to appropriate a fresh round of funding now at mid-year to fund fully these effective, efficient humanitarian action plans in time to save lives, end suffering, maintain dignity, and restore self-reliance for the 43 million people to be aided under this appeal.