The EMMA toolkit: introduction and overview Introduction

0.1 Introduction

In recent years, international humanitarian agencies have been adapting their responses to emergencies. Many have begun using cash-based initiatives, alongside or in place of conventional relief distributions of food and non-food items. Local procurement is also being encouraged, and opportunities for other innovative responses explored (Harvey 2005, 2007).

These changes in practice draw attention to the need for better analysis of markets. There is a growing realization that the best opportunities for assisting women and men may be missed unless emergency responses are designed with a good understanding of critical market systems. Moreover, lack of this market analysis in humanitarian programmes may be damaging the livelihoods, jobs, and businesses upon which people's long-term security depends.

Markets are a crucial component of how people survive. So understanding how they are functioning and disrupted is critical to any analysis of hunger, and vulnerability to food and livelihood insecurity or poverty.

Paul Harvey, Humanitarian Policy Group, ODI

Market systems matter in emergencies

Market systems play a vital role in supplying critical goods or services to ensure survival and protect livelihoods, both in the immediate aftermath of a disaster and in the longer term. Before, during, and beyond any crisis, emergency-affected women and men also depend on market systems as sources of income and remuneration.

The rationale for EMMA is that a better understanding of the most critical market systems in an emergency situation enables humanitarian agencies to consider a broader range of responses.

As well as conventional in-kind distributions and cash-based interventions, these response options can include local procurement and other innovative forms of market-system support that enable humanitarian programmes to make better use of existing market actors' capabilities, while understanding the risks.

The results of using EMMA therefore are:

• more efficient use of humanitarian resources;

• less risk of prolonged dependency on outside assistance;

• encouragement for the transition to economic recovery.

Gender and market systems

People's relationships with other actors in market systems (i.e. traders, employers, buyers) are shaped by issues of power – which often have gender, class, or ethnic dimensions. We cannot assume that the roles and responsibilities of women and men, and hence their market needs, are the same. EMMA explicitly deals with these differences in its selection of target groups (section 1.6), and deals with power as a component of the market environment in market-system mapping (section 0.11).

0.2 EMMA: what, why, who, and when?

WHAT is the EMMA toolkit?

EMMA is a set of tools (this toolkit) and guidance notes (the reference manual on CD-ROM). It encourages and assists front-line humanitarian staff in sudden-onset emergencies to better understand, accommodate, and make use of market systems. It does not offer a simplistic blue-print for action. However, EMMA does provide accessible, relevant guidance to staff who are not already specialists in market analysis.

The EMMA toolkit adds value to established humanitarian practices in diverse contexts. EMMA tools are adaptable, rough-and-ready, speed-orientated processes designed to reflect the information constraints and urgency of decision making required in the first few weeks of a sudden-onset emergency situation. The EMMA process is therefore intended to be integrated flexibly into different organizations' emergency-response planning.

Although designed with sudden-onset situations in mind, EMMA is also likely to be valuable for staff planning for the transition into the early recovery phase of programming.

WHY use EMMA?

EMMA's aim is to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of early humanitarian actions taken to ensure people's survival; to protect their food security and their livelihoods; and to help agencies to avoid doing harm. EMMA helps front-line staff to both understand the important market aspects of an emergency situation that may not otherwise be considered adequately or early enough; and communicate this knowledge promptly and effectively into programme decision-making processes.

Six reasons why EMMA is valuable:

1. To make early decisions about the wisdom of different direct-response options. EMMA compares the likely outcomes and risks of different types of direct intervention (see Box 0.5) to decide which forms (or combinations) are most appropriate in meeting people's priority needs.

2. To assess opportunities for complementary 'indirect' actions. EMMA explores opportunities for alternative indirect forms of market support (see Box 0.5) that can rehabilitate or assist recovery of critical market systems.

3. To reduce the risk of doing harm. EMMA increases awareness of the potential to harm businesses and households in critical market systems. Hence it can reduce aid dependency, promote long-term recovery, and increase the stability of local markets that provide people with goods, services, and sources of income.

4. To assist in monitoring the performance and accessibility of market systems. EMMA profiles can help agencies to track both the continuing impact of a crisis, and the outcomes of humanitarian actions, on critical market systems. Up-to-date information about market access and performance can alert managers to any adverse effects of humanitarian actions, and enable them to make appropriate decisions about when and how to phase out assistance.

5. To improve the quality of disaster preparedness. Through better knowledge of how critical market systems work, their potentials and vulnerabilities, EMMA market maps and profiles can improve the quality of disaster-preparedness planning.

6. To define the requirements for more detailed market analysis. Where information is poor, time is short, and skills to interpret market data are weak, EMMA can still help managers to define detailed terms of reference for more thorough research of particularly critical market systems.

WHO is EMMA for?

EMMA is for members of staff leading early assessments on the front line during sudden-onset emergencies, and during the transition to early recovery programming. By extension, EMMA is also for their managers and for decision makers responsible for planning initial and early responses to crisis.

EMMA is designed for generalists, as well as staff specializing in...