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Seoul – The COVID-19 pandemic has created unprecedented challenges never before faced by the global humanitarian community. It has not only exacerbated existing crises but also put more people at risk, particularly those already in vulnerable conditions. This new crisis calls for more efficiency and effectiveness in humanitarian interventions amid great uncertainty and limited access to the field. Well-conducted needs assessment has therefore become even more essential to achieve this goal.  

As a result, it is evident that Republic of Korea (ROK) humanitarian actors, NGOs and donor agencies alike, are in need of new capacity development in developing humanitarian interventions in the context of COVID-19. In order to address the needs of the ROK humanitarian community and bolster evidence-based programming capacity, IOM RoK held a two-day workshop on data collection and needs assessment for humanitarian project design on June 23-24, 2020 in Seoul.

The workshop sought to provide participants with both theoretical and practical knowledge and skills on fundamentals of humanitarian needs assessment, with emphasis on community engagement.  

“Conducting a proper needs assessment is the first step to achieve the Do No Harm principle in any humanitarian operation. However, crisis contexts are often complex thus require trained skills and expert knowledge,” said Miah Park, Head of Office, IOM ROK.

"This workshop is timely for ROK humanitarian practitioners as many of them are preparing for the COVID-19 response. It will also be an invaluable training on fundamentals of humanitarian intervention planning for new entrants to the humanitarian sphere spurred by the on-going pandemic,” she added.

Starting with an overview of the workshop by Andrew Lind, Senior Regional Emergency and Post Crisis Specialist, IOM Regional Office for Asai-Pacific (ROAP), the workshop introduced the humanitarian coordination system and various types of joint needs assessment and explored core compartments of humanitarian needs assessment such as assessment design, secondary data collection and analysis, and primary data collection techniques.

Other experts from IOM ROAP - Alexandra Valerio, Regional Protection and GBV Specialist, Chandan Nayak, Regional DTM Officer, and Vivianne van der Vorst, Senior Regional Project Manager (DTM REMAP) – also shared their invaluable experience from the field. Multiple group exercises ensured participants had ample opportunities to apply what they had learned into practice on site, with support of IOM facilitators and trainers.

Due to cross-border travel restrictions posed by the COVID-19, the workshop tested a new modality in delivering a training workshop whereby trainers led sessions remotely via an online video conferencing platform. A total of 29 ROK NGO workers involved in overseas humanitarian assistance participated and 28 completed the two-day course.

The workshop was organized as part of IOM ROK’s capacity-building project for Korean humanitarian actors, funded by the USAID Office of US Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA).

Since 2015, IOM ROK has provided a wide range of trainings and workshops to enable Korean humanitarian actors to carry out principled and quality humanitarian interventions that measure up to international standards.

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For more information please contact Jieun Kim, IOM Republic of Korea, Tel.: +82 070 4820 0291, Email: JIKIM@iom.int