Head of the donor team in support of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, the representative of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in the team and Assistant Inspector General of the Center for Humanitarian and Assistance to King Salman Dr. Aqil bin Jamaan Al Ghamdi and his accompanying delegation attended the high-level meeting donor team in support of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. This happened at the United Nations Center for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. for humanitarian data and in-depth case studies in The Hague yesterday.
The meeting was opened by Mariette Schuurmann of the Dutch Donor Support Team of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, welcoming the participants of the second day of the meeting.
During the first session, Sarah Telford, Director of the United Nations Center for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs for Humanitarian Data and In-Depth Case Studies in The Hague, reviewed the tools provided by the center that are used to analyze humanitarian data and their usefulness in supporting humanitarian work, pointing out that The center provides its services in active humanitarian work in a number of countries from, including: Somalia, South Sudan, Bangladesh, Ethiopia and the Republic of the Congo, and it has data and reports on these countries that are available to donors and organizations.
While the second session of the meeting, chaired by Ramesh Rajasingham, Chief of the Coordination Division of the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, was devoted to deep reflections on the expected major disasters in the areas of food, economy and energy. Ramesh Rajasingham noted the impact of food and financing shortages, as well as rising energy prices, on the humanitarian sector, which has been hard hit by conflict, the climate and the coronavirus pandemic.
This was followed by an open discussion on several topics, namely the exchange of views of the donor group on the impact of the expected food shortages, economic deterioration and energy shortages on humanitarian issues and on the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, as well as the collection of ideas to assist the Office of the United Nations United Nations Humanitarian Coordination and Humanitarian Partners What can be done to support humanitarian response and the role that humanitarian agencies, development institutions and international financial institutions can play in humanitarian affairs .
Subsequently, Dr. Aqil bin Jamaan Al Ghamdi, Head of the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs Donor Support Team, Representative of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on the team and Assistant General Manager of the King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Assistance, explained that the role and tasks of the Office for the Coordination of humanitarian action are very important in humanitarian action and are related to the coordination of responses and advocacy for access to assistance, as well as humanitarian support and funding, emphasizing that it is important that humanitarian partners work together to improve coordination, and that the responsibility for humanitarian action also lies with national governments in countries affected by natural disasters, emphasizing the importance of humanitarian agencies continuing to work with these governments to help those affected.
Dr. Aqil Al Ghamdi added that the work of humanitarian agencies and development institutions is complementary and it is important that these institutions work together, especially in fragile and less developed countries that are suffering from crises, natural disasters and climate change, to make up for humanitarian funding gap.
He noted that throughout history, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has provided great humanitarian assistance. In 2021, the Kingdom ranked third among the largest donor countries of humanitarian aid, according to the United Nations Financial Tracking Platform, in addition to providing $96 billion in development assistance. covering 156 countries. He also made financial contributions. Great for regional and international multilateral financial institutions such as United Nations system organizations, Jeddah Islamic Development Bank, Asian Development Bank and other financial institutions.