People are losing trust

Action for the Needy in Ethio­pia (ANE) is a local aid orga­ni­sa­tion in Ethio­pia. What issues is ANE curr­ently invol­ved in?

Eyuel Fikru: As a local aid orga­ni­sa­tion, ANE is active in all regi­ons of the coun­try. We mainly carry out huma­ni­ta­rian and deve­lo­p­ment coope­ra­tion projects. As a speci­fic exam­ple: we are invol­ved in distri­bu­ting food for refu­gees in the Benis­han­gul-gumuz, Oromia, Amhara and South regi­ons of Ethio­pia, and in impro­ving hygiene and sani­ta­tion faci­li­ties in the Somali, Tigray, Afar and other regi­ons of Ethio­pia. In addi­tion to that, we are also invol­ved in shel­ter and infra­struc­ture, envi­ron­ment, educa­tion and health.

TP: Do you work with part­ners in these projects?

EF: It depends on the circum­s­tances and on the project in ques­tion. Fund­rai­sing also varies from project to project. We are curr­ently in the process of finis­hing a project in the Oromia region. We recei­ved dona­ti­ons from UN OCHA (United Nati­ons Office for the Coor­di­na­tion of Huma­ni­ta­rian Affairs) and imple­men­ted the project by oursel­ves with the support of govern­ment stake­hol­ders. We also carry out projects toge­ther with part­ner orga­ni­sa­ti­ons and try to form consor­tia. We work with nume­rous part­ners, such as the UN World Food Programme and other inter­na­tio­nal aid orga­ni­sa­ti­ons like Welt­hun­ger­hilfe from Germany. We are curr­ently working on a project that we want to imple­ment with HEKS from Switz­er­land and CEFA from Italy. We have applied for funds from the Italian government.

TP: So you colla­bo­rate with others in a variety of combinations?

EF: How a project is struc­tu­red depends on many factors. The needs of the commu­nity are just as rele­vant as the requi­re­ments of the donors.

TP: What role is played by colla­bo­ra­tion with other local organisations?

EF: Of course, we work with many orga­ni­sa­ti­ons in Ethio­pia, both govern­men­tal and non-govern­men­tal. In order to anchor our projects with local people, we rely on this colla­bo­ra­tion with other local orga­ni­sa­ti­ons. We usually work with a variety of orga­ni­sa­ti­ons. This allows us to comple­ment each other. It means we can support the projects more broadly. This colla­bo­ra­tive way of working is much more effec­tive in both asses­sing and addres­sing the commu­nity demands.

This colla­bo­ra­tive way of working is much more effective

Eyuel Fikru

TP: Does it also promote connec­tion to the local community?

EF: Of course it promo­tes the connec­tion as we are stron­gly supported by the local commu­nity. On top of that, our grass-roots enga­ge­ment has put us in a posi­tion to be more close to the people and under­stand what they need.

TP: What chal­lenges do you fore­see in the coming years? Will climate change become a grea­ter problem, for instance?

EF: We are alre­ady facing diffe­rent chal­lenges in the diffe­rent regi­ons. In the east we had to cont­end with floo­ding, while in the south there is inter­mit­tent drought which comes every few years, where it was very signi­fi­cant in Borena zone due to a lack of rain for about six years. We have also been busy deal­ing with the conse­quen­ces of an earth­quake in recent months. Chan­ges such as climate change will affect us differ­ently in diffe­rent regi­ons. This can be diffi­cult for live­stock. In other regi­ons, mala­ria is again beco­ming a signi­fi­cant problem. Above all, we have the effect of having chal­lenges that affect seve­ral factors and seve­ral sectors. We have to deal with the conse­quen­ces of droughts and floods, but also with the civil war that erupted in 2020 – that, and the conse­quen­ces of that, are still having an impact. This makes it diffi­cult to clarify what the affec­ted people need. I see many diffe­rent chal­lenges. We need the support of inter­na­tio­nal organisations.

TP: How is ANE affec­ted by the stop­page of help from USAID?

EF: At the moment, we do not have any projects that directly involve USAID. We had a close rela­ti­onship in the past, until 2023. But various part­ners with whom we work on projects used to receive support from USAID. So the loss has still hit us hard because of that, albeit indi­rectly. For instance one of our largest projects supports refu­gees in the Benis­han­gul-Gumuz and Amhara regi­ons where we provide food in coope­ra­tion with WFP (World Food Program) for most of the refu­gees which are from Sudan due to the conflict in that coun­try, leading many refu­gees to flock to our border region in recent years. In addi­tion to food distri­bu­tion, we also provide schools with food. This encou­ra­ges students to attend school. These projects were majorly funded by various donor orga­ni­sa­ti­ons, where one of the largest was USAID. We even worked with repre­sen­ta­ti­ves of the orga­ni­sa­tion. Not only that but the budget cut has caused some orga­ni­sa­ti­ons like UNHCR to mini­mise their part­ners and work with limi­ted imple­men­ting part­ners. ANE is one of the part­ners to be redu­ced from its project imple­men­ta­tion in UNHCR projects. As a result of this, we had to reduce the number of employees. We also had to recal­cu­late the rati­ons for the refu­gees and cut them by 15 to 16 percent. As a result, the project is losing the trust of the people who depend on this help. They are less open today than they used to be. ANE is also affec­ted by all these measu­res. We were also in the process of recrui­ting the team for a project that depen­ded on funding from USAID. We had to stop that, too.

TP: Were you able to anti­ci­pate this loss of funds in any way?

EF: As a huma­ni­ta­rian orga­ni­sa­tion working in deve­lo­p­ment coope­ra­tion, we have an inte­rest in what is happe­ning inter­na­tio­nally and we try to follow those events. We look at what might happen. We’re cautious. We also kept an eye on the elec­tions in the United States.

TP: So you try to assess the conse­quen­ces for your work and your options?

EF: We try to think about what it means if one candi­date or another is elec­ted – what our opti­ons are. We expec­ted a reduc­tion in enga­ge­ment. But we did not expect an imme­diate halt to acti­vi­ties. We could not fore­see conse­quen­ces of this magni­tude. It hit us imme­dia­tely, with no advance warning. That meant we couldn’t react ahead of time, as we would other­wise have done. We had to lay off our employees. We didn’t have any other opti­ons. Nor did the employees.

TP: How do you feel about the fact that other count­ries, such as Switz­er­land, are also redu­cing their commit­ment to deve­lo­p­ment cooperation?

EF: In the past fiscal year – which, in Ethio­pia, begins and ends in the middle of the year – more than half of the food supply budget came from abroad, accor­ding to a report in our local news­pa­per. That’s 8.5 percent of the country’s total tax volume. Inter­na­tio­nal orga­ni­sa­ti­ons such as the various UN orga­ni­sa­ti­ons, as well as many others, finance this. A reduc­tion will ther­e­fore have a pain­ful impact on us.

TP: So the conse­quen­ces are far-reaching?

EF: I can give you an exam­ple of a project in the conflict-affec­ted region of Tigray in the north. We are trying to rebuild the sani­ta­tion faci­li­ties and water station for the popu­la­tion, which numbers more than 10,000 people, as well as supp­ly­ing seeds. We were able to launch the project in 2022 with funding from the German govern­ment, among other donors. The project was plan­ned to go on for longer to ensure that it would be sustainable. We thought we could conti­nue with it to cushion our exit stra­tegy. We reali­sed that that would be helpful for the popu­la­tion: we should have slowed down our exit. Local leaders and farmers could have supported the commu­nity better. Now, howe­ver, it seems that support from Germany will be discon­tin­ued at the end of the year.

TP: And that’s the end of the project?

EF: Because, in addi­tion to the lack of funds from the USA the support from Germany is also ending, we have to end the project. We cannot guaran­tee conti­nuity. We’re going to have to lay off ever­yone working on this project. These are the chal­lenges we are curr­ently facing.

TP: Is it only the Euro­pean count­ries and the USA that are redu­cing their commitment?

EF: The global effect is that people used to be more open to our concerns. In the past, our enqui­ries were answe­red promptly, at least. That is no longer the case today.

TP: Do you see any pros­pects of other count­ries and orga­ni­sa­ti­ons filling that gap?

EF: We recently spoke with the King Salman Foun­da­tion. The orga­ni­sa­tion is based in Saudi Arabia. They usually donate on an annual basis. They come by once a year. They ensure the supply of food for two to three months. We distri­bute it.

TP: Are you trying to expand this involvement?

EF: We are exami­ning various opti­ons. We also want to imple­ment other projects. We are also approa­ching the govern­ment of Kuwait. And recently we also had a discus­sion with the Chinese and Japa­nese embas­sies. We expect to be able to win over Asian count­ries as part­ners. But it won’t be that easy and demands a lot of time and hard work.

TP: Do you see any other options?

EF: We are trying diffe­rent orga­ni­sa­ti­ons and forms of colla­bo­ra­tion – seeing if we can apply for resour­ces. We are also looking for new oppor­tu­ni­ties at the local level in the private sector. This could be compa­nies with corpo­rate social respon­si­bi­lity program­mes. We are exami­ning various opti­ons, but it is not easy to find addi­tio­nal resour­ces. Howe­ver, we do ever­y­thing we can to support our orga­ni­sa­tion and, above all, the people who depend on our work.

TP: If you no longer have funds from abroad, will the conse­quen­ces go beyond the purely financial?

EF: Of course. The impact is not just one-dimen­sio­nal. As a local orga­ni­sa­tion, we rely on the experts and their exper­tise. They empower us in many areas. As a local orga­ni­sa­tion, we are experts in the local context. We know the local people and their needs. We know the circumstances.

TP: And can you comple­ment the orga­ni­sa­ti­ons from abroad with your specia­list knowledge?

EF: There are many inter­di­sci­pli­nary topics where we lack exper­tise. For exam­ple, matters concer­ning gender or the issue of sexual explo­ita­tion, cash-based inter­ven­ti­ons, the moni­to­ring and evalua­tion process of our projects, successful appli­ca­tion for funding and also effec­tive commu­ni­ca­tion and mana­ging the diffe­rent report­ing systems. Usually, we receive trai­ning from the orga­ni­sa­ti­ons we work with at the begin­ning of a project. They improve our capa­bi­lity in these areas. They also support us during the project if we have any ques­ti­ons. Without this colla­bo­ra­tion, this would not happen. And, of course, the fact that we have to lay off employees has consequences.

TP: Does this exacer­bate the loss of know-how?

EF: Our employees have built up expe­ri­ence over the years. They have gained know­ledge through nume­rous trai­ning cour­ses. We are losing important employees. We will face a shortage of trai­ned staff for new projects. So it’s not just about money. We are losing a lot of exper­tise. And we are losing our reputation.

TP: What does that mean?

EF: The people who rely on us expect us to finish what we star­ted. Up until now, besi­des some of the projects that are inter­rupted as a conse­quence of the USAID pause and the immi­nent deduc­tions from other sources, we are trying to sustain the other projects at hand. But if we stop projects right in the middle, it directly hits our repu­ta­tion as people will lose trust in our aid orga­ni­sa­tion. In addi­tion to that, it may exceed to the extent of endan­ge­ring our organisation’s existence.