GLOBAL NUTRITION CLUSTER

Report 2014—2016

GNC donors:

T his report intends to review the key achievements and challeng-es faced during the implementation of the 2014-16 GNC strate-gy. Based predominantly on data and reports from the past 3 years, it also incorporates feedback received from GNC partners

during a panel discussion at the March 2016 GNC meeting held in Wash-ington DC, during which partners presented perspectives on the impact and benefits of the 2014-2016 GNC strategy and work plan. Where possi-ble, the report also provides evidence on how the contribution of the GNC has resulted in increased effectiveness in humanitarian emergencies at country level. The report also endeavours to articulate remaining gaps that the partners, as well as the GNC-CT and CLA have identified for con-sideration in the upcoming 2017-2019 Strategy and Operational Plan. Key achievements and challenges, alongside discussion on next steps are pre-sented in accordance with the four strategic pillars of the Global Nutri-tion Cluster and their corresponding objectives, activities and results.

Content:

Background

Partnership, communication , advocacy and resource mobilization

Capacity development in humanitarian coordination

Operational and surge support to country clusters

Information and knowledge management

2016 GNC Annual Working Meeting, Panel Discussion, Washington, DC, 30 March 2016

The Global Nutrition Cluster (GNC) was established in 2006 as part of the Humanitarian Reform process, which aimed to im-prove the effectiveness of humanitarian response programmes by ensuring greater predictability, accountability and partner-ship. The Global Nutrition Cluster (GNC) is a partnership that includes international NGOs, the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement, UN organizations, donors and individuals and is based around the principles of equality, transparency, responsibil-ity and complementarity. The first GNC meeting of partners took place in 2006.

There are three levels of engagement within the GNC with the following groups: partners, observers and the Nutrition Cluster Coordinator Team at global level herein referred to as the GNC-Ct and the country Cluster Coordination Team herein referred to as CC-CT (these are the Nutrition Cluster Coordinators and Information Managers at country levels). The GNC also has a Stra-tegic Advisory Group (SAG) that provides strategic guidance to the GNC Coordination Team and the GNC. Additionally, specific Task Forces (TFs) are established when needed to work on specific tasks or to guide and support the implementation of the Work Plan. Currently the GNC represents a partnership of approximately 44 organizations and institutions from the UN agen-cies, NGOs, academia, donor organizations and public-private alliances.

From 2006-2009, the GNC focused it work on four strategic areas: 1) coordination and networking, 2) capacity development, 3) resource mobilization and supplies, 4) stewardship, technical guidance, preparedness, and monitoring and evaluation. Signifi-cant achievements were realized during this period including the development of technical guidance and tools such as the Har-monized Training Package (HTP), Nutrition in Emergencies toolkit, Operational Guidance on Infant and Young Child Feeding in Emergencies (IYCF-E), a review of the Management of Acute Malnutrition in Infants (MAMI), a supply and commodity tool kit and support to the update of the SMART survey tool and the Initial Rapid Assessment (IRA) toolkit.

While many guidance were developed between 2006 and 2009, based on reviews, in 2009 there was recognition that the GNC needed to re-organize itself to better support the roll out of these tools and support cluster activities at the regional and coun-try levels. A vision and strategic framework was developed based on discussions in the 2009 annual meeting. This framework outlined key outputs for the GNC at global, regional and country levels. In the July 2010 annual meeting, GNC partners agreed that the Strategic Framework should more explicitly reflect areas of priority activities for the GNC and thus 6 thematic pillars were identified to capture the work of the GNC moving forward: 1) coordination, advocacy and resource mobilization, 2) poli-cy, standards and guidelines, 3) capacity development for humanitarian response, 4) preparedness, 5) assessment, monitoring and information management and 6) best practices and lessons learned. After this meeting, a new Strategic Framework (2010) with these pillars was developed. This framework that has pre-determined outputs guided GNC activities until the end of 2013.

During this time, reviews from the humanitarian response in 2010 and 2011 were conducted by the IASC and these reviews found out that, while emergency response capacity has been reinforced at the global level according to an agreed division of labor for CLA since 2005, challenges still remained in deploying adequate leadership; in putting in place appropriate coordina-tion mechanisms at various levels and in ensuring clear mutual accountabilities as evidenced by several major disasters such as Haiti Earthquake early 2010 and Pakistan Flood in late 2010. As a result, the Transformative Agenda in in December 2011 set out six functional areas and priorities for the clusters at country level and these area:

i. Supporting service delivery ii. Informing strategic decision-making of the HC/HCT for the humanitarian response iii. Planning and strategy development iv. Advocacy v. Monitoring and reporting vi. Contingency planning/preparedness

In 2013, in order to enhance performance of the GNC and align its focus with the Transformative Agenda (TA) and overall Hu-manitarian Project Cycle and other TA related guidance, the GNC conducted a governance review. Recommendations from this review included the development of a three-year Strategic Plan with revised focus to reflect effective emphasis on support to core cluster set out in the Transformative Agenda to country cluster. Accordingly, the GNC 2014-2016 Strategic Plan was devel-oped in November 2013 and endorsed for implementation in February 2014 with contributions from cluster partners, the GNC-CT and the SAG as well as country cluster coordination team. The GNC under the leadership of key partners also developed and costed a two year work plan for 2014-2015 which was then updated and costed to cover 2016 activities. In the 2014-2016 GNC strategy, emphasis were placed on the core purpose of the GNC as a coordination mechanism that should enable country coor-dination mechanisms to achieve timely, quality, and appropriate nutrition response to emergencies. Therefore, in the 2014-2016 GNC strategy, support to country coordination in terms of needs assessment, analysis, decision-making, planning and strategy development, advocacy, monitoring and reporting, and contingency planning/preparedness was emphasized. The strategy also defined a vision for the GNC:

“The vision of the GNC is to safeguard and improve the nutritional status of emergency affected popula-tions by ensuring an appropriate response that is predictable, timely and effective and at scale”.

BACKGROUND

STRATEGIC PILLAR 1: PARTNERSHIP, COMMUNICATION, ADVOCACY, AND RE-SOURCE MOBILISATION Objective 1: To strengthen existing partnerships and support the development of new partnerships to enhance accountabil-ity within a coordinated response

Key Partnership engagement with GNC partners – The strategic planning process has contributed tremendously to strength-ening existing partnerships and reaching out to new partners. During the last three years, the following new GNC partners have joined the cluster as global level and these are GOAL, ADRA, ELHRA and RedR-UK. GNC partners were heavily involved in the process, including in the costing exercise and in leading the implementation of the workplan. The relationship has however been much stronger with the four NGOs who are hosting GNC RRTs and technical RRTs, as well as the UNICEF Programme Divi-sion and the additional five NGOs who are leading the implementation of GNC activities. Partially, this could be due to a series of bilateral meetings to discuss project implementation with these NGOs has positively affected three contribution. According to feedback received from GNC partner in March 2016, having a clear and costed work plan has helped us meet needs and sup-port the field, and has shaped our inputs at the global level and country. The partner also recommended for the need to fur-ther discuss and try different models and provide incentives for partnership. The partner also recognize that, when developing work plans, realistic time frames should be used and the need for greater clarity and capacity around how to understand and engage with global guidance also needs to be re-enforced. While coordination between members is strong, there is still an op-portunity for better coordination. The need to bridge communication gaps by instituting of quarterly calls with all the GNC partners was raised, but this has not been systematically adapted, except for an ad hoc L3 calls that GNC partners have partici-pated in, thus there is a clear need to for the quarterly calls to be instituted. During the 3 year period of strategy operationali-zation, partnership agreements have been were established with:

HelpAge International for the development of a joint gFSC/GNC operational framework for Accountability to Affected Population (AAP) and the development of a nutrition-specific guidance on AAP for country-clusters;

Save the Children USA to support the review of the role of the GNC and nutrition country clusters in technical NiE work and development of the GNC handbook;

ACF-UK to develop a Nutrition Cluster Advocacy Strategy Strategic Framework and an Advocacy Toolkit for country clus-ters as well as for the development of an IM toolkit and IM training package;

ENN to support country the development of cluster documentation and learning in six countries;

RedR-UK to support the updating of the GNC training on cluster coordination in order to align the NCC and cluster part-ners training packages with the Cluster Coordination Competency framework developed by the CLA. The second compo-nent of this partnership with RedR included the development of a roster of thirteen trainers to facilitate all the GNC train-ings (i.e. NCC training and country cluster partner orientation packages).

In addition, partnership with the four GNC partners involved in the hosting and management of the GNC Rapid Response Team, namely IMC, ACF, Save the Children-UK and World Vision Canada, has been maintained and strengthened.

All the above mentioned partnerships involved fund transfers from the CLA to the GNC partner, however, the partners have put in a lot of their staff time on the day to day management of these projects; a contribution that is highly valued, but often time not recognized. In addition to these partnerships, cluster partners (IMC, Save UK and ACF) have also taken initiative under a consortium led by IMC to fundraise for the establishment of a technical surge team to support technical surge needs in emer-gency countries.

The finalization of the GNC Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) which is the key governance document for the GNC has led to the smooth functioning of the cluster. All GNC partners have a Letter of Intent (LOI) for their contributions to the GNC with names of predetermined focal points and the GNC-CT is systematically notified by partners in case of any changes. The stream-lining of the strategic decision making process within the GNC through the establishment of the Strategic Advisory Group (SAG) in 2013 and their ongoing and systematic support has resulted in more the effective and agile governance of the GNC. Both the annual and global partners’ face to face meetings continue to contribute positively towards sharing and decision making within the wider partnership, while the continuous involvement of the NCC/IMOs in all global level annual meetings, bilateral NCC/IMO calls and tailored support to NCC/IMOs has enabled the GNC-CT to systematically identify any key partnership issues at country level to be flagged or addressed at global level.

Objective 2: To communicate effectively and transparently with partners and nutrition stakeholders through email, in tele-conferences and in meeting

The GNC maintained relatively good communication with cluster partners, but given the presence of an effective SAG, partners were only consulted on issues that required collective input. This has resulted in reduced email flow to the wider GNC mem-bership and more streamlined and targeted sharing of information. The two annual meetings of the GNC partners have clear

objectives and the SAG members and the GNC-CT seems to be getting better at having these meetings structured with clear outputs. The annual meetings to which NCCs and IMOs are invited have focused heavily on processes for identifying issues from country level that need to be strategically addressed at global level while these meetings have also been thorough on identifying areas in which country clusters need to improve. Another channel that facilitates sharing of updated information on the global level activities with cluster partners and country clusters and that provides space for NCCs and IMOs to share their experiences is the quarterly GNC News Bulletin. The GNC-CT has published 10 issues featuring key achievements of the cluster, relevant global level updates, and updates from L2/L3 countries, as well as summary findings of cluster coordination performance monitoring in selected countries, RRT deployments and updates on any new UNICEF and IASC guidance.

Objective 3: To ensure that relevant advocacy messages are developed and appropriately communicated to enhance poli-cies, coordination and response capacity

Advocacy Strategy and Tool Kit development

The development of an Advocacy Strategic Framework for the global cluster and the Advocacy Toolkit for Country Level was identified by the GNC partners as a priority area and this strategy was finally developed by ACF-UK. The Advocacy Strategic Framework provides an overarching strategic direction and focus for GNC advocacy efforts by ensuring linkages with relevant initiatives and supports cluster partners in developing common messages to leverage resources and impact for nutrition in emergency work. The strategy was developed in a very consultative manner; initial-ly the concept and process were shared during a face to face GNC meeting and this was then followed by a web-based consultation with the GNC partners and Nutrition Cluster Coordinators to define the broad advocacy aim, objectives and board advo-cacy activities for the Nutrition cluster. This was followed by a 3-day workshop orga-nized by the GNC-CT and ACF-UK in July 2015 that brought together the GNC SAG members, SUN Secretariat and the GNC-CT to further developed the advocacy framework. Three overall goals were developed for the advocacy framework and these are as follows: Goal 1) focuses on effectiveness of the humanitarian response. Goal 2) is about resource mobilization for nutrition in emergencies and Goal 3) seeks to foster the accountability of humanitarian and development agencies to-wards preparedness, response and transition to safeguard the nutritional needs of emergency affected population ensuring that the existing expertise and technical capacity on nutrition in emergencies contributes to inform and shape nutrition policies.

Each advocacy goal is supported by objectives and results, specifying the changes required to contribute to the achievement of the ‘bigger’ goal. For each result, the framework assesses the state of play and key challenges, opportunities and the nutrition cluster role to date. Sample activities were also proposed, although the framework recommends that activities should be fur-ther developed and agreed as part of annual planning processes. The final draft of the GNC Advocacy Strategy was presented at the GNC Annual Meeting in October 2015 for partners’ review and endorsement. This was then followed by the develop-ment of the toolkit for country clusters to support country level advocacy efforts.

Attempts were made at the March 2016 GNC partners’ meeting to prioritize activities that needs to be implemented and the structure for supporting the implementation of the strategy but this has not yet advanced. At the same time, the responsibility for leading this activity moved from ACF-UK to ACF-France under whose umbrella a taskforce would be formed to oversee this work. Unfortunately, to date, despite having a taskforce TOR, the group has not been formed. There is therefore an urgently need for the GNC partners to define within the forthcoming strategy how the priorities set out in this strategy should be imple-mented. The toolkit does lay out steps that can be easily followed by country cluster coordination teams and partners at that level to support advocacy initiatives, but there will be a need for technical support and capacity building for countries, thus country level support on the use of the advocacy tool kit might need to be prioritized by the GNC in the new strategy.

Promotion of Linkages between Scaling-Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement and the Nutrition Cluster - In order to better com-municate the complementarity between SUN and the Nutrition cluster, a document was developed jointly by the SUN Secre-tariat and the GNC-CT, with input from the country Nutrition Cluster Coordinators. This document is to be used by both SUN countries and Nutrition cluster countries to support continued dialogue on the promotion of emergency preparedness and response in the costed national plans of action for nutrition in countries where SUN and Cluster overlaps. The GNC Coordina-tors have systematically participated in the UN Network preparatory work for SUN regional meetings and the SUN Global Gath-ering and in all meetings have strongly advocated and were given space to present how emergency preparedness and response should be included in the country plans of actions being developed by SUN. The GNC-CT also contributed to the Roadmap de-veloped by the UN SUN Network, however, more still needs to be done. At global level, much of this link can be strengthen by implementing the advocacy activities that have been articulated under Goal 3 of the GNC advocacy strategy that seeks to fos-ter the accountability of humanitarian and development agencies towards preparedness, response and transition to safeguard the nutritional needs of emergency affected population ensuring that the existing expertise and technical capacity on nutrition in emergencies contributes to inform and shape nutrition policies.

The Inter-cluster collaboration between the GNC and gFSC also came under this objective including the devel-opment of guidance for country clusters on inter-cluster linkages. This has been shared with the Country Nutrition Cluster Coordinators and the Country Food Security Clus-ters to guide inter cluster work at country level. The guid-ance will allow country clusters to effect Inter- Cluster work on Food Security and Nutrition. In addition, the ICWG between the GNC and gFSC clusters has been re-vived with members who are highly committed and they are currently working on piloting support to countries on inter cluster work to strengthen response planning, imple-mentation, and monitoring and reporting of inter cluster activities between the two clusters. In this vein, interclus-ter visits to support the Whole of Syria and South Sudan emergency responses have been planned and lessons learned will then be elaborated into “how to” guides of inter cluster work so that more countries can work on

strengthening intercluster ties with remote support from the global level. The leadership for the implementation of the existing ICWG Work Plan between GNC and gFSC was agreed and five cluster partners, namely WFP, FAO, ACF and Help Age as well as the gFSC Support team and the Global Cluster Coordination Team, have managed to take forward those activities. This was a very important achievement, given the fact that the workplan lacked leadership for its implementation for over two years.

Under the umbrella of a similar inter-cluster collaboration between the GNC and gFSC, a guidance for country clusters on inter-cluster linkages has been developed and shared with the Country Nutrition Cluster Coordinators and the Country Food Secu-rity Cluster to guide inter cluster work at country level. The guidance allows country clusters to effectively and proactively build inter-cluster/inter-sectoral linkages at every stage of the Humanitarian Programme Cycle (HPC) and ensure a coherent and comprehensive response

Influencing IASC Policy and Guidance development – The GNC-CT consistently represented GNC partners in IASC policy and guidance discussions. Key document released by IASC in July 2015 and shared with the GNC partner include the MIRA Guide-lines, the revised Cluster Coordination Reference Module (CCRM), and the revised Humanitarian Programme Cycles and Emer-gency Preparedness documents. These new sets of guidance formed the basis for updating the NCC, cluster partner and IM training package, while the same guidance is also being used to update the Nutrition Cluster Handbook.

Objective 4: To strengthen capacity of global and country clusters to mobilize resources for improved coordination and re-sponse.

Fundraising to Support Global level cluster functions - UNICEF as the Cluster Lead Agency (CLA) manages and provide financial support for the maintenance of the GNC Coordination Team (GNC-CT) based out of the UNICEF Emergency Programmes Office in Geneva. The two GNC-CT positions, namely the GNC Coordinator and Deputy GNC Coordinator, are paid from the support budget and bilateral donor fundraising by the CLA, while funds were also raised by the CLA to support the cost of 6 RRTs and other GNC Workplan activities from ECHO, DIFD and Swiss government.

In September 2015, a GNC Fundraising Strategy was developed and presented to the GNC partners, however this strategy has not yet been operationalized. Given the narrow donor base that is supporting the GNC activities, it important to improve donor outreach, as the few existing donors are already fatigued. It is also important to note that a number of donors are looking for something innovative to fund which has implications for how the GNC partners identify future strategies, objectives and activi-ties. Despite the fact that the current fundraising strategy is not operationalized, the GNC-CT successfully managed to secure just over $4.3 million against the $5.78 million which was the total cost of implementing the 3 year work plan. Much of the funds that supported the implementation of the 3 year strategy and workplan was from four key donors namely ECHO, DFID, OFDA and Swiss. Additionally UNICEF continued to allocate Core Funds from 2012 up to the present day to sustain funding for the GNC Coordinator position. The funding from the sources listed above managed to sustain the GNC RRT capacity for coordi-nation and IM, Technical RRT, capacity building activities, KM and IM activities as well as the development of number of tools and guidance reported earlier. Funding is still a limitation to GNC activities. Also when funding short term programs, limits long-term planning.

The amount mentioned above includes funds raised by a consortium of NGOs led by the IMC who successfully secured US$ 1,442,000, provided by OFDA directly to the consortium lead agency for the establishment of a technical surge support to clus-ter countries and other emergency countries in the areas of IYCF-E, CMAM, nutrition assessments and WASH in Nutrition activ-ities as well as communication for development activities. This approach would in the long run seem to be the most effective way of ensuring partner involvement and leadership in supporting the implementation of the GNC activities.

Support to country level advocacy and fundraising efforts - The development of country level guidance for resource mobiliza-tion remains outstanding, thus whether or not such a guidance is needed should be further reviewed within the context of the new GNC strategy. This is because a number of factors affect fundraising efforts at country level. Given the role pool fund and

Meeting of the joint gFSC and GNC Inter-Cluster Working Group on the Whole of Syria

Response, Amman, Jordan, 17 October 2016

A brief review of HRP funding trends over the last three years reveals that while requests have remained fairly constant there was a decrease in the levels of funding received from 54% to 37%. Limited technical expertise will require the cluster to re-tain and grow the current human resource pool. At times it is hard to find appropriate staff to fill technical roles. The need for capacity building through online, soft-skills training, coaching and application of tools. When an L3 is activated, the GNC platforms have been systematically shown to raise the profile of these emergencies by organizing conference calls with part-ners, donors and country cluster coordination teams to discuss

priority actions which also included advocacy to meet funding gaps.

The GNC-CT also continued to advocate to the CLA to allocate funding for longer-term cluster coordination positions. These efforts have resulted in the recruitment of longer term cluster staff in a number of countries. To date, resources for cluster coordination positions, 14 out of 34 have dedicated NCCs and 4 have dedicated IMOs. Although, a number of countries still continue to have NCCs that are double hatting, this is predomi-nantly the case in countries where humanitarian coordination is merged with sector coordination or in countries which are not in L3/2 emergency.

Objective 1: To strengthen nutrition sector and cluster coordination mechanisms to ensure effective nutrition coordination functions are available at country level.

Strengthening Competencies for Cluster Coordination and Information Management - The GNC-CT as a part of UNICEF-led Clusters and Areas of Responsibility (AoR) supported the development of the competency framework/strategy for cluster coordinators and information managers; a process initiated by the CLA for all UNICEF led clusters. A comprehensive list of 36 competencies were developed and agreed with the Global Cluster Coordination Unit and these were presented to the GNC partners in March 2015. The GNC-CT then incorporated the priority competencies, such as Leadership, Communication etc. into the revised training package for cluster coordinators. Meanwhile, the systematic orientation of new NCCs and IMOs is being done in line with the agreed competencies, to ensure they have the requisite knowledge and skills and can operate effectively at country level.

Enhancing Global Talent Pool for Capacity Development in Coordination – Through a partnership agreement with RedR UK, a pool of 12 trainers has been established for the GNC, and this pool has made it possible for both the global cluster and country clusters to reach out to already pre-qualified and skilled trainers to support training. The staff from this roster have already been used for all recent cluster coordinators trainings and two IM trainings, while countries who are running their own trainings have access to these consultants, thus reducing the time spent on identifying trainers by both the GNC-CT and country clusters.

Improved Coordination Skills for NCCs and Increased Pool of Trained NCCs - Using the updated training package, during the last 3 years, 85 participants from 27 countries have been trained. This contributed to improving knowledge of IASC pro-tocols, skills in coordination and leadership amongst Nutrition Cluster Coordinators, Information Management Officers and Government officials from South Sudan, Yemen, Ethiopia, Somalia, Sudan, Myanmar, Bangladesh and the Syria cross-border response. Four newly recruited GNC Rapid Response Team members were also among the participants. The knowledge and skills acquired during the courses has been directly used in the functions of the respective clusters or during surge by the RRTs to establish new clusters. In addition, Government and UNICEF staff leading nutrition sector coordination in countries prone to natural disasters or at risk of a deteriorating nutrition situation such as the Philippines, Vanuatu, Fiji, Cambodia, Vietnam and Kenya also benefitted from these trainings. The new knowledge and skills have allowed this group of partici-

STRATEGIC PILLAR 2: CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT IN HUMANITARIAN

COORDINATION

pants to contribute to Nutrition in Emergency coordination activities in support of government within a sector coordination setting and be better prepared to respond to future emergencies in the respective countries. Finally, in November 2015, 17 standby partner staff re-ceived training in cluster coordination in Limerick, Ireland.

In all trainings, there were a good balance of group work and, dia-logue, and the diversity in background and the vast experience of participants in coordination and humanitarian work greatly contribut-ed to effective learning and experience sharing on practical challeng-es and how to resolve them. The overall assessment was that the training was very helpful for transferring skills and understanding for Cluster Coordinators. The package was a good tool for empowering participants to effectively facilitate partnership and collaboration within the nutrition clusters and with other clusters. The result of the training evaluation showed that all participants rated the course as either “Good” or “Excellent”.

Enhancement of country level partnership within the cluster – A 3 day training course was designed for Nutrition Cluster part-ners at country level with the participants including government officials, UN agencies, INGOs and national NGOs. Once in coun-try, the materials were further adapted to suit the respective country context; reflecting local structures, processes, materials, tools and challenges. The terminology used in each country was also adapted to reflect whether coordination is through ‘clusters’ or ‘sector working groups’ etc. The country level cluster partners training also includes a review of the cluster coordi-nation performance by the cluster partners and the NCC, and partners developed a plan of action, with timeline to be imple-mented in order to improve cluster performance in the respective country.

In addition to the formal training, orientation on the cluster approach has also been conducted for cluster teams and partners in Yemen, Guinea, Mozambique and Malawi, immediately after Level 2 or Level 3 emergencies were declared in these countries. In total, during 2014-2016, approximately 200 cluster partners have been trained on the cluster approach, and this number includes UNICEF and other UN agency staff, Government employees and NGO and standby partner staff.

Additionally, as part of the 25% allocation of the RRT time to the host agencies, four RRT host agencies (ACF, IMC, Save the Children and World Vision) have also conducted web-based orientation on the cluster approach for their staff, targeting a total of 315 staff mem-bers, who were trained by the RRTs. This has contributed to better understanding on the cluster approach in the partner organizations and has further strengthened partnership at country levels with these partners hosting RRTs and TRRTs.

Toward improved country cluster transitioning of Clusters – In 2015 a review of nutrition cluster transition plans/processes was conduct-ed to identify factors that facilitate or hinder transition from an IASC activated cluster (or some sort of humanitarian coordination mechanism that adopts cluster principles and ways of working) to government led sector coordination mechanisms. These case studies were undertaken in Ethiopia, Pakistan, Kenya and the Phil-ippines with preliminary suggestions on a checklist/benchmarks to guide transition work at country level. Consolidated case studies finding were presented to the partners at the GNC Annual Meeting in October 2015. The findings from the case studies endorsed the view that transitioning from an internationally led cluster to a nationally led coordination mechanism is a complex process, dependent on the context and capacity for both coordination within the CLA and government. The document provided overall recommendations that were further reviewed and a phase two of the transition study was conducted in 2016 which came up with models for, not only transitioning from IASC activated clusters to sector coordination mechanisms, but models that could be used to strengthen sector coordination before crisis hits. This is thought to ensure strong sector coordination mechanisms which then have the capacity to step up and coordinate a humanitarian response under the leadership of national authorities, supported by UNICEF as a CLA in country. The review also recommended a model to be used whenever IASC activat-ed clusters were needed, with some indicators for such activation. However, even where formal AISC activation is needed, the model articulates how transition should be done systematically to ensure smooth progression back to sector coordination, thus emphasizing the importance of a transition that is a continuous process that ensures enhancement of coordination capacities of the local authorities during non-emergency times.

Updating of GNC tools and guidance – During the same period, the GNC also initiated the updating of the Nutrition Cluster Handbook led by Save the Children USA. So far, this review has ensured that the latest IASC documents issued following the

Participants of the MENA Regional Training of Nutrition

Cluster Coordinators, Dead Sea, Jordan, March 2016

Chad Nutrition Cluster Partners’ Training, N’Djamena,

Chad, March 2016

Transformative Agenda are reflected, as well as new GNC Coordination and IM tools. To date, consultation with key stakehold-ers has been conducted, the outline of the handbook developed and reviewed by the GNC-CT and writing of the chapters is underway and is expected to be completed by December 2016.

The updating of the HTP was also an activity in the GNC work plan (2014-2016), however, lack of funding initially prevented revision and latterly the GNC partners agreed that this activity was not a priority, thus the HTP update, as well as its translation into French and Spanish might need to be revisited. As an interim solution, cluster partners in March 2015, recommended a review of the HTP modules to identify areas that may require an update. This review was completed by a GNC RRT, providing a strong base for the update should it be recommended within the 2017-2019 WP.

In March 2015, a survey was undertaken to establish how the current edition of the Nutrition Cluster Handbook and the HTP were being used. The survey found that overall, approxi-mately 22% of cluster coordination teams and cluster part-ners use the Nutrition Cluster Handbook, while approximately 69% of cluster partners including NCCs use the HTP. Overall, 96% of respondent stated that the Nutrition Cluster Hand-book was useful in their day-to-day jobs. The HTP is mainly for conducting trainings, orientation and to facilitate the de-velopment of specific training materials. The update of these two GNC tools will also address issues identified by this sur-vey which included the user-friendliness and accessibility of the first edition of the Cluster Handbook and the 2nd edition of Harmonized Training Package (HTP).

STRATEGIC PILLAR 3: OPERATIONAL AND SURGE SUPPORT TO COUNTRY CLUSTERS Objective 1: To ensure effective, augmented nutrition coordination/IM support for emergency response

Rapid Response Team Support to Country Clusters – During the reporting period (January 2014- September 2016), the Rapid Response Team of the GNC expanded from five to six members. Consequently the GNC surge mechanism for coor-dination and IM support had three Nutrition Cluster Coordi-nators (hosted by ACF, IMC and SC-UK) and three Infor-mation Management Officers (ACF, WVI, UNICEF), thanks to ECHO, SDC and DFID financial support. Each RRT member is expected to be deployed to support coordination functions in cluster countries for up to 50% of the time, and utilize the remaining time contributing to the GNC WP (25%) and host agency activities (25%). The expansion of the team allowed for deployment of the NCC and IMO as a pair in order to ensure coherent support for both cluster coordination and information management functions.

Given the challenging work environment for RRTs, maintain-ing RRT in this positions for more than 2 years has been a

challenge. None of the original two batches of RRTs, recruited in late 2013 and early 2014, remain in the current team. The current RRT members include Hannoa Guillaume (ACF UK), Mohammad Faisal (ACF UK), Lindsey Pexton (SC UK), Lovely Amin (IMC) and Faith Nzioka (WVI). The 6th RRT, hosted by the CLA in GNC-CT, has recently moved to Afghanistan to take up a NCC position and given funding constraints a decision was reached not to replace her.

From January 2014 to date, the RRT members have conducted a total of 37 missions to 16 high priority countries, out of this, 14 deployments (38%) were to L3 emergency countries, whereas 10 were L2 emergencies (24%). The countries supported from January 2014 to date include Yemen, South Sudan and both Whole of Syria and Syria cross-border (all level 3 emergen-cies), Nepal and Ukraine (both level 2) and Malawi, Somalia, Sudan, Afghanistan, Nigeria and Mozambique. In total, in this pe-

GNC RRT on deployment conducts Cluster Meeting, 18 August 2015, Sanaa, Yemen

riod RRTs were deployed for 235 weeks, with an average deployment duration of 6.7 weeks per country or per deployment.

Utilization of non-deployment times by RRTs - During the non-deployment times, RRTs are expected to contribute 25% of their time to the GNC work at global level, contributing to the GNC WP under the GNC-CT supervision, while the remaining 25% is to be spent on the work plan of the host agency. During the reporting period, 10.6% of the time was spent on pre and post de-ployment work which typically involves background reading and communication with a country pre-deployment, remote sup-

port to the country after deployment (as the UNICEF coun-try offices recruit dedicated cluster staff or brings on board another surge staff), briefing of new cluster coordi-nation staff in the country of deployment, as well as the finalization of end of mission reports. Additionally, 27% of the non-deployment time was spent on the implementa-tion of aspects of the GNC WP which included support to the development of the Information Management Toolkit, consolidating best practices on contingency planning in nutrition clusters, updating Humanitarian Response Plan tips for nutrition clusters, remote support to country clus-ters on coordination and information management sup-port, assisting the GNC-CT in drafting of the GNC bulletins and updating the GNC website. As regards the time spent with the host agency support, 19% of RRTs time was spent on capacity building of agency staff in the cluster approach and nutrition in emergencies in more than 20 countries.

Support to in-country or remote support on Country Cluster Coordination Performance Monitoring (CCPM) exercise

The CCPM exercises allows country cluster partners and the cluster coordination team to take a critical look at how the cluster is performing on the core functions. After the results are out, the cluster partners and the coordination team agree on a set of practical actions that need to be taken by the collective part-nership as well as by the cluster coordination team to im-prove the performance if and when required. From 2014 to date, the GNC-CT has provided support to 15 countries to conduct Cluster Coordination Performance Monitoring (CCPM) exercises (Afghanistan (2), Bangladesh, CAR, Chad, DRC, Ethiopia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Nepal, the Philippines, Sudan, Somalia, South Sudan (2) and Yemen). This support included the facilitation of the validation exercise in a work-shop setting with cluster partners after the CCMP findings were shared and helping partners and the coordination team at country level to develop plans of action in areas where the cluster function is not well delivered. On average, the CCPM exercises have rated the performance of country nutrition clusters from “Satisfactory” to “Good”. However, the cluster functions that continue to perform poorly, thus requiring improvement, are advocacy, preparedness and contingency planning. Unfortunately, these are the areas

CCPM Validation Workshop, Kabul, Afghanistan, 2015

where the GNC has done very little and needs to improve its support to cluster countries in these area In countries where CCPM exercises were conducted more than once, namely in Somalia, Afghanistan and South Sudan, there is a clear trend show-ing continuous improvement in the way those clusters perform in the core cluster functions. The GNC-CT has closely moni-tored the progress of the action plan implementation in countries and provided support as and when needed.

Surge Support through Standby Partner deployment – Additional surge support has also been sought through UNICEF’s standby partners (SBP) to fill the gaps in surge requests which could not be met by deploying RRTs given that the demand for surge support outweighs the existing number of RRTs. From September 2014 to date, a total of 20 requests for NCCs and IMOs were received and submitted to SBP agencies, of which 9 requests were filled for CAR, Sudan, South Sudan, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and Ukraine.

Evaluation findings of the GNC support to country Cluster Coordination platform, capturing both RRT and GNC-CT support - A formal evaluation of the support provided by the Global Nutrition Cluster to national coordination platforms was conducted during the reporting period. The evaluation’s objective was to assess, systematically and objectively, the relevance, effective-ness, efficiency, connectedness, coverage and sustainability of the GNC RRT support role to countries in L-3 emergencies and chronic crises, and the relationships with the partners hosting the RRTs. The secondary focus of the evaluation was to review the broader GNC-CT operational and surge support to country coordination platforms. The evaluation covered the period March 2012 through September 2014 and captured both deployment and non-deployment periods of the RRTs. The evaluation found that the RRT mechanism was relevant and effective and meets a very crucial need. The report also highlighted challeng-es faced by the GNC partners at country level, including a lack of capacity for nutrition in emergencies (NiE) across the board. It recognized that surge through the RRT mechanism is a short-term solution to addressing capacity gaps in cluster coordination and highlighted the need to address capacity issues more sustainably. Eight out of seventeen evaluation recommendations were prioritized and a Management Response Plan (MRP) was developed detailing actions required to address each recom-mendation and clearly defining those responsible. The MRP is structured around three areas: Support to GNC RRT Systems; GNC Support to Cluster Coordination Platforms (countries) and Actions that needs to be taken by the cluster-lead agency. Additionally, during the reporting period, the GNC-CT also provided support for the recruitment of NCCs for South Sudan, Su-dan, Somalia, Afghanistan and Yemen and this has contributed to the identification of NCCs who have the right level of experi-ence and technical knowledge to lead cluster coordination at country level.

The GNC supports the following countries with activated nutrition clusters: Afghanistan, Central African Republic (CAR), Chad, Colombia, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Ethiopia, Liberia, Malawi, Mali, Niger, Somalia, South Sudan, Yemen. A cluster activated in South Turkey for N. Syria response also receives regular support. Regular support is also provided to countries with activated nutrition sectors: Bangladesh, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Guinea, Haiti, Kenya, Mauritania, Mozam-bique, Myanmar, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Sierra Leone, Sudan, Ukraine, Vanuatu and Zimbabwe. Nutrition Sectors in Jordan and Syria are part of the Whole of Syria response receive a special attention from the GNC.

GNC support to country Cluster Coordination platforms through a Help Desk - The GNC Help desk was established to provide regular support to Nutrition Cluster Coordinators, IMOs and Rapid Response Team members in all cluster countries. The GNC Help Desk is directly managed by the GNC Coordination Team and has the following specific role: (1) Provide new and existing Nutrition Cluster Coordinators at country level with technical assistance on coordination/IM and NiE during different cluster milestones (HNOs, SRPs, HRPs, Flash Appeals, transition plans, etc.), as well as mentoring and remote training/orientation ses-

sions on specific cluster related topics and (2) establish a systematic platform for regular communication, experience exchange and feedback with country nutrition clusters through monthly and bilateral teleconferences with NCC and IMOs and by review-ing documents such as the country Humanitarian Response Plan. Upon establishment of the HelpDesk a list of 33 countries with sector and cluster coordination structures in place and entitled for remote support was developed. Information was sys-tematically sent to these countries, inviting them to participate in all calls and bring any issues to the HelpDesk when needs arise.

Since its inception in June 2015 the GNC HelpDesk has managed to provide real-time support to 29 nutrition clusters and sec-tors, with an average of 8 countries supported per month. The support provided can be divided into several areas from which some of main ones are:

Induction and mentoring of newly appointed NCCs and RRTs (7 persons),

Organization of remote orientation sessions on cluster approach for partners (87 persons trained),

Support to CCPM exercise (15 countries),

Support to HNO and HRP development (7 countries),

Ad hoc support regarding cluster/sector coordination concerns (29 countries who have received varying levels of support from one time/easy to solve to more extensive support).

The HelpDesk has also maintained close contact with country Cluster Coordinators and IMOs through the organization of 10 monthly NCC calls, with an average of 14 participants from different countries per call.

All activities undertaken and concerns observed during the HelpDesk support to countries are shared each month with the GNC-CT through the submission of monthly reports and attendance to all relevant calls at global level.

The Help Desk also supports identification of countries where CCMP could be undertaken jointly with the GNC-CT.

Tailored IMO Conference call for technical IMO discussions, cross cluster learning and experience sharing - In addition to the monthly NCC calls, a regular IMO conference call has been established, facilitated by RRT/IMOs to address IM related discus-sion and information exchange. The calls focus on providing updates to countries on new developments and best practices in information management from the GNC-CT, IASC, and Global Inter-cluster Information Management Working group. In addi-tion to this forum for information exchange between countries in information management, since 2014 IMOs have also been included in annual face to face meetings which have been organized by the GNC for NCCs since 2011.

Objective 2: To enable the country cluster staff to access required technical support:

GNC partner contribution to Technical surge in support of cluster countries and emergency countries – Started in late 2015 by a consortium of GNC partners, namely IMC, ACF and SC and funded by OFDA, the Technical Rapid Response Team aims to ad-dress surge capacity gaps in the domains of IYCF-E, nutrition assessments, CMAM and Behavior Change Communication/Wash in Nutrition. There are currently 5 Tech RRT members in addition to a full time technical Program Manager. The project is built upon the experience of the RRT project and includes similar time allocation arrangements, with technical surge advisors being deployable 50% of their time to large-scale sudden onset L3 and other humanitarian emergencies. The average length of de-ployment is 6 weeks (ranging from 4-10 weeks).

To date the Tech RRTs have been deployed 14 times for a total of 558 days (~80 weeks) to South Sudan (3), Ethiopia (2), Yemen - remote (1), Syria/Turkey (1), Niger (1), Mozambique (2) and Nigeria (3). The focus of the deployments was Assessments (3), CMAM (4), IYCF-E (5) and SBC (2). Feedback received to date indicates that the Tech RRT members have contributed greatly to strengthening the technical capacity of country clusters and other emergency countries that required technical support for assessments, analysis, and to effectively plan, implement and monitor nutrition cluster-specific interventions with the technical quality required. In order to ensure complementarity of resources between UNICEF as a CLA, who have also recruited addition-al surge support for IYCF-E, a discussion on the management modality of the technical surge mechanism has taken place to ensure smooth running and complementarity between the RRT, TRRT and surge support from CLA, as well as SPB surge sup-port.

STRATEGIC PILLAR 4: INFORMATION AND KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT

Objective 1: To ensure country level clusters have the harmonised tools and guidance required for effective information management

The IM/KM strategy was developed and endorsed and this document guided the work of the GNC under strategic pillar 4. The IM work was overseen by the IM/KM taskforce consisting of the GNC partners and co-led by ACF and ENN.

Global level support to consolidation of Information Management guidance and tools

A consultant recruited and managed by ACF-UK conducted an extensive review of available IM tools but unfortunately this process culminated in nearly one hundred tools, while also identify-ing remaining gaps. The list was considered too long for busy field-based IMOs to plough through in overly time-constrained emergency environments. In order to review and select the few tools needed, the GNC-CT organised a work-shop during which a thorough review of the toolkit content was undertaken. This was attend-ed by the GNC-CT, GNC Helpdesk Officer, all RRT IMOs, the South Sudan IMO and ACF -UK. During this meeting, the existing tools were prioritised

and the most urgent gaps highlighted. This process resulted in a total of 27 core tools. A follow-up workshop was then orga-nized to develop the missing IM tools amongst the core list and these were allocated to RRTs and the Help Desk to develop, a

process finalised by the end of October 2015. The operationalization of the IM Toolkit by country

clusters early this year has strengthened and improved IM functions in cluster countries and the training in IM helped to ‘jump-start” cluster information management in newly activated cluster countries.

The development of the IM training package was led by RedR under ACF-UK’s PCA with the GNC. The package was piloted in Nairobi in August 2016 with a group of 28 participants from 12 priority countries. The next training will take place in October in Amman, Jordan, immediately after the GNC annual meeting, involving 25 participants.

Objective 2: To strengthen systems and capacity for documenting and sharing information and knowledge/learning in effective cluster response at country and global level

Through the partnership agreement with ENN, six countries, namely Philippines, Yemen, Ukraine, Somalia, Bangladesh, and South Sudan have developed case studies that highlight experiences and learning around nutrition coordination and Nutrition in Emergency response within a cluster setting. The selection of the thematic areas was done through survey monkey and countries thereafter identified the topic on which they can contribute some learning. The themes addressed in the case stud-ies include governance, partnership, preparedness, capacity development, and nutrition information systems. These case studies were presented and discussed at the 2015 GNC Annual Meeting and were then published in Field Exchange in June 2016. The KM project experience has been positive and productive with six case studies developed with ENN support and effective country cluster contribution. However, the GNC still faces knowledge management (KM) challenges around address-ing real time knowledge gaps, staff have time to KM activities, keeping materials up to date and ensuring quality translations, how to promote and incorporate learning, and maintaining institutional memory, even during staff turnover.

First GNC IM Training Participants, 8-12 August 2016, Nairobi, Kenya

GNC partners: GNC observers: Introduction

The Global Nutrition Cluster (GNC) w

Contact:

c/o Office of Emergency Programmes (EMOPS), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) 5-7, Avenue de la Paix 1202 Geneva, Switzerland

Email: gnc@unicef.org Skype: gnc.geneva http://www.nutritioncluster.net

Josephine Ippe

GNC Coordinator

jippe@unicef.org

Ayadil Saparbekov

GNC Deputy Coordinator

asaparbekov@unicef.org

For additional updates on the GNC work, kindly visit GNC website www.nutritioncluster.net