A girl with brown hair wearing a red dress sits outside above several structures.

Safer Cash Programming in Emergencies

Health and Human Rights 2017-2018

Resources to Those Who Need it Most

As donors and aid agencies increasingly turn toward cash assistance to support people displaced by conflict or natural disaster, evidence-based guidance is needed to ensure that cash safely and effectively reaches those who need it most. From 2017-2018, the Health and Human Rights Program completed the USAID-funded “Safer Cash” project in partnership with the International Rescue Committee. The project involved intensive research in conflict-affected communities in Cameroon and Afghanistan to inform the development of a toolkit for practitioners to better assess and mitigate protection risks that arise in cash programming for vulnerable groups in emergencies, including people with disabilities, older people, and female-heads of households.

(L-R) Two men with brown hair stand next to a woman with brown hair, and two more men with brown hair stand next to her on the other side. All five people are smiling at the camera.
Health and Human Rights Program Director Julie Freccero is with the Safer Cash research team at the International Rescue Committee in Northern Cameroon in 2018.

Today, the Safer Cash Toolkit is being used all over the world, and is available in Amharic, Arabic, Dari, English, French, Pashto, Spanish, and Swahili.

Partners

Logo of Human Rights Center UC Berkeley School of Law
IRC

The Safer Cash Toolkit is a set of three tools and additional guidance to:

  • Generate awareness and understanding of potential protection risks and who is most affected by such risks through a staff training;
  • Ensure cash programs are systematically collecting and using data based on the potential risks to the target population to inform program design;
  • Monitor the risks, and where possible, make adjustments in the current program cycle or learn for the next program cycle.