On 25 September 2003, the Humanitarian Policy Group (HPG) held a meeting at ODI to launch the Group’s report on needs assessment and decision-making in the humanitarian sector, which is the result of a year-long study begun in June 2002 and funded by the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), ECHO and AusAID. It forms one part of a wider package research commissioned by the Montreux group of donors looking at the current system of international humanitarian financing.