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The Federal Foreign Office's concept, which State Secretary Susanne Baumann presented in Berlin on Thursday, is intended to serve as a compass for German action in the international humanitarian system.

In the strategy paper, the Federal Foreign Office refers to the 310 million people who are currently dependent on humanitarian aid. Germany is making a decisive contribution to alleviating need and ensuring survival.

Humanitarian assistance should be more focused and efforts should be made to improve coordination between donors worldwide.

To better achieve this goal, the Federal Foreign Office has defined three specific priorities:

• Enabling principle-based aid: We open safe access for humanitarian aid through our humanitarian diplomacy
• Shaping transformation: We adapt the humanitarian assistance system to the needs of our time: more efficient, effective, localized, forward-looking and gender and inclusion sensitive.
• Strengthening key components: We promote humanitarian assistance that is oriented towards needs, that alleviates the greatest need first and that remains flexible when the situation requires it.

StS Baumann spoke of “major challenges” for humanitarian assistance, because the number of conflicts worldwide is increasing and at the same time the resources available are decreasing.

She described the cuts to the humanitarian assistance draft budget as “painful” and at the same time stressed the need to use the existing funds even more “goal-oriented and efficient.”

Learn more: https://www.auswaertiges-amt.de/en/aussenpolitik/themen/humanitarianassistance/-/256630

Background information

Humanitarian aid is part of the integrated German foreign and security policy enshrined in the National Security Strategy.

It reaches millions of people around the world and also helps to anticipate and mitigate the effects of crises and disasters.

Thus, humanitarian aid makes a significant contribution to avoiding the many times higher potential follow-up costs.

However, the humanitarian system is under great pressure. The increasing number of crises and the growing global humanitarian need meet with increasingly scarce financial resources worldwide.

Reform efforts in the humanitarian system point in the right direction, but still need to be stepped up.

Germany is actively involved in adapting the humanitarian system to the challenges of our time. In this sense, the new humanitarian strategy was aimed at improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the humanitarian system.