Small committees of migrants are nominated to work with service providers in settlements to identify and address needs and improve the quality of services.
Community committees are small groups of migrants nominated from sectors in settlements to work with service providers to address key needs and improve the quality of services across service clusters. Community committees consist of a male and female representative nominated by the different sectors in settlements to be responsible for providing input on particular clusters. For example, there are committees for health, WASH, nutrition, etc. In Lebanon, the Palestine Red Crescent Society–Lebanese branch meets these committee representatives weekly to discuss the state of needs and services within settlements and works with them to find solutions to issues raised. This leads to regular and detailed information on issues facing refugees who are exposed to service providers. For example, meetings with the committee flagged sexual violence against women in a settlement.
Strong engagement with migrant leadership is also an important feature of the response in the Dadaab camp in Kenya. Representatives are nominated from the grassroots level to serve on committees. Selected representatives work together with international organizations to identify the main needs of their communities within the camp and contribute to designing a plan to address the issues raised.
Fifty-two meetings are held annually with community committee leaders in Lebanon.
Design. [P1] Focus on needs and vulnerabilities of migrants; [P3] Directly consults migrants.
Implementation. [P6] Partnerships with service providers are developed through these committees to support responses to needs.
Programme. [P9] Responds to displacement of migrants.
- Identifying and addressing sensitive issues. It requires time and patience to get migrants to open up about issues such as sexual violence within communities.
- Regular engagement of migrant leadership groups is important to build trust with the community and flag sensitive issues within the community which may otherwise be missed.
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