Accountability to affected people (AAP) is an active commitment to put vulnerable and affected people at the centre of humanitarian action. It stems from past failures of the humanitarian system to meet the needs and recognize the abilities of people affected by crises. Committing to AAP means empowering people to participate in decisions and shape programmes that affect their lives and livelihoods. A set of definitions and commitments pave the way for truly accountable humanitarian assistance now and in the future. FAO has made progress in implementing AAP across regions and programmes, and has identified a range of experiences and good practices.

In 2019, the Leave No One Behind and KORE teams in OER at FAO joined forces to develop a template designed to capture good AAP practices. The examples presented in this document have been identified and documented, in collaboration with FAO decentralized offices, using this template. This compendium showcases various examples from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Yemen, and aims at demonstrating how the Inter-Agency Standing Committee (IASC) AAP commitments have been promoted and upheld by various FAO country offices. The final objective of this initiative is to share knowledge on good and promising AAP practices, and to incrementally move towards more accountable and protective programming.

SOME KEY TAKEAWAYS

• On Gender: AAP is a “people-centred approach to humanitarian action, sensitive to the dignity of all human beings, the varying needs of different segments within a community, and the importance of ensuring that women, men, girls and boys can equally access and benefit from assistance.” An important part of accountability is protection from sexual exploitation and abuse (PSEA), the responsibility of humanitarian, development and peacekeeping actors to prevent and respond to incidents of sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) by United Nations (UN) and implementing partner personnel, including non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and intergovernmental organizations, against beneficiaries of assistance and other members of affected and local populations.
  
  
• Gender-sensitive programming and inclusive staff engagement in Afghanistan: In Afghanistan, FAO strives to address and transform gender relations in the field while improving gender equality in its office. Engaging local female staff, who can work as knowledge brokers and intermediaries to communicate and consult with female beneficiaries, facilitates the inclusion of women and their perspectives and priorities into humanitarian programmes. The FAO office in Afghanistan established a women’s working group with all female staff based in different provinces and regions of the country. FAO is also part of the UN Gender in Humanitarian Action working group in Afghanistan, which aims to determine and address PSEA and gender equality issues in the country through the active participation of government counterparts and other organizations. FAO takes part in different gender-related fora from different line ministries.
  
  
• Northeastern Nigeria is traditionally a patriarchal society with rigid gender norms. In some communities, women are less likely to express complaints, ideas or general interests in the presence of men. Mixed gender meetings and community consultations with women, men, girls and boys are typically disaggregated by sex to ensure full and meaningful participation and to break the norms that discriminate against women.
  
  
• FAO in Bangladesh aims to have effective systems in place for preventing and responding to incidences of SEA among the most vulnerable populations. FAO is a member of the PSEA network for the humanitarian response to the Rohingya crisis in Cox’s Bazar. Through the network, PSEA materials have been developed specifically for the context of the response in the Rohingya language.