Recently the humanitarian community has been discussing how to improve the delivery of quality and accountability to recipients of aid.  Consultations have focused on

• a) the use and relevance of current standards and
• b) the potential for a developing a compliance mechanism for verifying and benchmarking how well humanitarian agencies apply principles and standards of quality and accountability.

Some key questions are now emerging. Does the system need to change the way that standards are implemented? Is there potential for a single core standard for humanitarian action? Is the system ready for a new system of certification? If so, what will it look like? What are the certification criteria? Who will do the verifying?  

ALNAP hosted this open meeting to air and explore these and similar questions. It presents a unique opportunity to learn first-hand about the outcomes and findings emerging from the Joint Standards Initiative,  a collaborative effort by HAP, People in Aid and the Sphere Project to promote greater coherence between existing standards,  and the Certification Review Project, an initiative sponsored by the Steering Committee for Humanitarian Response (SCHR) to explore the potential of a certification system to promote greater compliance of humanitarian principles and quality and accountability in humanitarian actions.

You can now view the recordings from this event on the Audio/Video tab.