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UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (R) listens to Kristalina Georgieva, European Commission Vice-President during a press conference at the International Humanitarian City in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, 17 January 2016. Photo: EPA
A high-level panel on humanitarian financing co-chaired by EU Commission Vice-President Kristalina Georgieva presented a new global model for financing humanitarian aid.
The report of the panel was presented to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in Dubai on Sunday.
In May last year, Ban Ki-moon entrusted a panel of nine experts with the task to seek systematic solutions on closing the large gap in humanitarian financing which at present is estimated to be at USD 15 B.
Georgieva noted that the problem can be solved with the presence of good political will.
In her words, in this affluent world, no one should die or live in humiliation due to the lack of money.
According to her, providing humanitarian aid is not only a moral duty, but also in the interest of separate states as the instability in a certain region could have global consequences.
The panel proposes to deepen and broaden the basis of humanitarian financing instead of depending on a small number of donors.
The experts also suggest that the efficiency and transparency in the activities of humanitarian organisations should be improved.
The panel identified and examined three important and interdependent aspects of the humanitarian financing challenge: reducing the needs; mobilising additional funds through either traditional or innovative mechanisms; improving the efficiency of humanitarian assistance.
The experts established that the best way to deal with growing humanitarian needs is to address their root causes.
The report will be discussed at the World Humanitarian Summit which is scheduled to take place in Istanbul in May.
Georgieva is co-chairperson of the panel together with the Sultan of the Malaysian state of Perak Nazrin Shah.
The EU and its member states constitute the largest donor of Official Development Assistance (ODA) in the world.
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