ALNAP’s next Biannual Meeting, hosted by DARA will take place from 4th- 5th June at the Real Fábrica de Tapicerías in Madrid. The theme on day 1 will be “News Media and Humanitarian Aid” and will be chaired by the BBC reporter Kate Adie OBE. As usual, Observer Members are invited to participate at the events on the 4th June. Full Members are expected to participate on both days of the biannual.

Please register here

The 24th Biannual Meeting will be held in Berlin and hosted by the German Foreign Ministry on 3rd-4th December 2008. Please put the dates in your diary.

During the last few months, the ALNAP team has been busy finalising the 7th Review of Humanitarian Action, copies of which all Full Members should have now received. Highlights from this edition include a very insightful chapter on how organisations have fared when trying to make changes and improvements and the edition also contains the most comprehensive analysis to date on system wide joint evaluations in the humanitarian sector.

The publication will be launched at ODI on Thursday, 8th May. The main authors of the review, Paul Clarke, Margie Buchanan-Smith and Maurice Herson, will all make presentations. James Darcy will act as discussant and John Mitchell will chair the event.

More information about the launch event

Hard-copies of the 7th RHA can be purchased here.

Evaluation Humanitarian Action: Trends and Issues

A draft of ALNAP study on Evaluating Humanitarian Action: Trends and Issues is being finalized and will be sent to an advisory group for comments shortly.

The Secretariat welcomes Karen Proudlock and Sakunthala Mapa into the ALNAP team. Karen has been appointed to the new post of Evaluation and Research Officer. Sakunthala is our new Communications Officer. Both started work in the beginning of April.

Real-time Evaluation Guide

Ben Ramalingam and Tony Beck have recently completed the first draft of the Guide on Real-time Evaluations. Copies are currently with peer reviewers. The Guide is due to be piloted from mid-May and finalized by the end of the year.

29th - 30th January 2008, Geneva
John Mitchell was a presenter at the Aid & Trade Conference in Geneva. John spoke about lessons from the international response to the tsunami emergency and the Pakistan earthquake.

31st January 2008, London
Ben Ramalingam ran a workshop on Field Level Learning at a People In Aid seminar

1st February 2008, Geneva
Ben Ramalingam moderated one of the sessions at the ICVA Conference. Ben’s session was premised on the main finding from the TEC recommendation and was called “Flipping the System”.

8th February 2008, Geneva
John Mitchell was a keynote speaker at People In Aid’s International HR Conference. John spoke about “The changing context for INGOs”.

Read about this address in People In Aid's April Newsletter (page 4)

5th March 2008, London
ALNAP Steering Committee Meeting

Forthcoming Events

8th May 2008, London
Launch of ALNAP’s 7th Review of Humanitarian Action

4th-5th June 2008, Madrid
23rd Biannual Meeting

6th June 2008, Madrid
ALNAP Steering Committee Meeting

Other News

The World Conference of Humanitarian Studies (WCHS) 2009 will be held from 4th-8th February 2009 in Groningen, the Netherlands. It will be the first time that scholars and practitioners from all over the world will convene and discuss such a broad range of issues pertaining to humanitarian crises and humanitarian action.

You can find information, register and submit a panel proposal at www.humanitarianstudies2009.org