Solidar Suisse humanitarian aid aims to improve the living conditions of people affected by natural disasters or armed conflicts. Our interventions include short-term disaster relief, reconstruction, livelihood restoration and disaster risk reduction. Currently, Solidar Suisse implements humanitarian aid programmes in Nepal, Lebanon, Bangladesh and Indonesia. In El Salvador and Pakistan Solidar Suisse implements projects for disaster risk reduction.
WHAT WE DO
In a refugee crisis or in the aftermath of natural disasters, affected persons are often left with little more than the clothes they wear. They lack shelter, safe drinking water, food, basic household items, and protection. Solidar Suisse supports them with basic assistance in form of relief goods, or, whenever possible, cash assistance. Access to water is provided through drilling of bore wells or repairing existing water supply systems. In order to ensure that the assistance reaches the most vulnerable and matches the priority needs, our teams carefully consult those affected, in close collaboration with local authorities and local partner organizations.
Solidar Suisse provides technical and financial assistance to vulnerable households who had lost their homes, enabling them to reconstruct their houses. In order to ensure that houses and infrastructure is built in a disaster-proofed manner, Solidar Suisse trains local artisans in disaster resistant reconstruction techniques. Small business grants provided to affected households are often used as tool for economic recovery. It allows them to purchase lost assets and recover their livelihoods and build a sustainable basis to earn a living.
These efforts lead to tangible results which enhance the protection of these communities, such as an early warning system in a flood prone area, enhanced technical and institutional capacity of the local civil protection department in responding to disasters, or the existence of contingency plans for health facilities and schools.
QUALITY & ACCOUNTABILITY
We constantly improve the effectiveness and quality of our assistance. To achieve this, Solidar Suisse adheres to relevant technical standards, such as SPHERE Standards, and we are member of the Core Humanitarian Standards Alliance.
As signatory of the Code of Conduct for the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement and NGOs in Disaster Relief, Solidar Suisse commits to provide principled humanitarian action, which implies that we deliver humanitarian action in an impartial and independent manner.
PARTNERS AND NETWORK
We coordinate our assistance with the government of the host country and other aid agencies operating in the same area to avoid duplication and ensure assistance is provided in an efficient manner. We do not work in isolation but collaborate with other organizations which complement our work.
Solidar Suisse is member of SOLIDAR, the European network of progressive civil society, labour movement organisations and progressive parties. It is member of the Swiss NGO DRR Platform, a network for knowledge exchange and coordination to increase effectiveness and quality of Swiss NGOs work related to Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA). It is also accredited partner organization of SWISS SOLIDARITY, and official partner of ECHO, the European Commission's Department for Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection.
