Luxembourg's development cooperation - Annual report 2012

During the post-emergency phase, populations affected by a humanitarian crisis begin rebuilding their lives and recovering their livelihoods, with the aim of regaining their autonomy and returning to the same – or even better – economic, social and environmental conditions that prevailed prior to the crisis.

As a result of the conflict between armed groups in the eastern part of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the ministry granted a total of 505 071 euros to the Caritas Foundation Luxembourg, Handicap International Luxembourg and the Foundation for the Education of Refugees (RET) in support of reconstruction and rehabilitation projects and of the demobilisation of child soldiers.

In line with commitments made by Luxembourg at the New York donors’ conference on 31 March 2010 to support the reconstruction efforts in Haiti at a cost of 3 850 000 euros from 2010 to 2013, the ministry disbursed 871 724 euros in 2012 in support of reconstruction projects of the following partners: Caritas Foundation Luxembourg, Care in Luxemburg, Objectif Tiers Monde, Luxembourg Red Cross, Handicap International Luxembourg and Action Pour Un Monde Uni.

In 2012 the Caritas Foundation Luxembourg also received financial support for its rehabilitation and reconstruction programmes in South Sudan, Lebanon, the Occupied Palestinian Territories, Iraq, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Colombia and El Salvador. In addition, the ministry supported two rehabilitation projects of Handicap International Luxembourg, in India and Libya. The ministry supported a reconstruction project in the wake of hurricane Sandy in Cuba (with the NGO Luxembourg-Cuba Solidarity), a community restoration project in Ethiopia (SOS Children’s Villages), a housing reconstruction project in Niger (Luxembourg Red Cross) and a project for strengthening community resilience in Somalia (Care in Luxemburg).

The ministry donated a total of 4 319 662 euros to support reconstruction and rehabilitation projects, the equivalent of 10.44 % of its total expenditure on humanitarian aid in 2012. Although this figure is less than the humanitarian aid strategy’s minimum objective of 15%, many of the WFP and ICRC programmes supported by the ministry include components for the protection of livelihoods and the strengthening of local capacities that could just as easily be considered “transition” as “emergency aid” work.