IICA-Sphere India, National Consultation on Partnership Standards for forging meaningful partnerships between Govt, Corporate, Civil Society, Academia, Youth and Media as whole of society as envisioned by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi during Covid 19 Response.

The Partnership Standards aim to nurture trust between partners while promoting accountability, improving performance and overall collective impact in humanitarian, development and resilience building works in India.

By Onkareshwar Pandey

New Delhi, Feb 25, 2022:

For the first time in the post COVID 19 scenario to commemorate the good work done by various actors across the country during pandemic, to document the challenges faced by them at various levels and to develop a roadmap of futuristic collaborations for greater Collective Impact, IICA (Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs, Ministry of Corporate Affairs) in collaboration with Sphere India is organising  an important National Consultation on Futuristic Collaboration for Collective Impact on 26th Feb, from 9:30 am to 5:30 pm at India Habitat Centre, New Delhi. 

The National Consultation, which is being organised as part of the Azaadi ka Swarn Mahotsav (@India75) will also have four regional consultations with representatives from state and union Government, Civil Society Organisations, Corporates, Academia, Youth and Media. Over 200 organisations are expected to take part in this mega consultation on Partnership Standards while linking humanitarian and development with resilience.

“The outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) posed an unprecedented threat and challenges to the health, wellbeing, lives and livelihoods of people across India and the globe. Our Prime Minister of India gave a call for the Whole of the Society approach and the Government, Corporates, Civil Society Organisations, Academia, Media, Youth and all other actors in India rose to the challenge to respond to this mega calamity. The road to recovery is also an arduous journey ahead but the coming together of different actors and learnings in the process has opened a big potential to  how India responds to it’s disasters and also prepare, mitigate and reduce disaster risks in future through disaster resilient development. This is why this national consultation has been planned with all stakeholders,” said Vikrant Mahajan, CEO of Sphere India.

The Partnership Standards aim to develop Accountability, Performance Management and Technical Standards for transparentand mutually beneficial partnerships for humanitarian and development with resilience. These standards will converge core humanitarian standards, ISO Standards for CSR Project Management Standards and Technical Standards like Sphere while adapting them for humanitarian and development with resilience scenarios in India.

COVID 19 has been a disruptor and has caused a push back to the collaborative progress made by humanitarian, development and resilience organizations across the world. Considering the challenges and immediate needs, Sphere India initiated the COVID 19 Academy and has successfully conducted over 200 sessions, reaching out to over 1.3 Lakh people successfully conducting 307 sessions with our knowledge partners, and over 150 sessions with government partnerships.

Last year in 2021 during the Covid period, Sphere India in collaborative partnership with NIDM had launched 6 Multi stakeholder Coordination Handbooks at the National and State level in Delhi. Development of these Sector Coordination Handbooks marks a strong commitment between our member/partner organisations towards collaborative advocacy.  These handbooks are envisaged to be operational guide or manual for coordination during emergencies and include practical guidance and advice on how different stakeholders and sector actors can come together to strategize preparedness and response. 

The Regional Consultations in Patna, Mumbai, Bangalore and Guwahati are tentatively planned for 11th, 15th 18th and 22nd March respectively. 

Just two days ago on 21st Feb 2022, the Sphere India, had convened the “Sphere India Leadership Summit 2022-Linking DRR to Development” to commemorate its 19th foundation day in Delhi. Over 100 senior leaders (CEOs/EDs/Directors) of leading humanitarian organizations, CSRs, Academia and senior officials from the Govt had gathered to share, learn and plan together for collective impact in post covid realities.

Mr. Shombi Sharp, Resident Coordinator (India), United Nations who was the special guest of honor in the summit, emphasised that Good disaster risk governance means acting on science & evidence which requires political commitment at the highest level to deliver on the SDGs, and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction.

During the summit, Mr. Vikrant Mahajan, CEO Sphere India presented the Sphere India Strategic Plan 2025 which links with global goals of SFDRR, SDGS, CCA and Agenda for Humanity with Vision 2030. 

Senior leaders of humanitarian, development actors discussed and put forth their experiences on the importance of developing a collective approach between Humanitarian and development actors for mainstreaming Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) in development work, and working towards collating our existing knowledge for development of new knowledge products and evidence-based research for future learning needs of the growing nexus.

Mr. Mohammed Asif, Chairperson of the Executive Committee, Sphere India expressed his gratitude over the work that has been delivered specially in the past two years during COVID. He acknowledged that the path to success has become rather evident as we progress towards the Strategic Vision 2025.

Indian Institute of Corporate Affairs (IICA), that works under the aegis of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs, set up as the premier organization that aims at providing astute and credible intellectual leadership in corporate regulation, governance and running sustainable businesses. It is a think tank that curates a repository of data and knowledge for policy makers, regulators as well as other stakeholders working in the domain of corporate affairs. The IICA is involved in capacity building, research and advocacy and functions  through various schools and centres. The School of Business Environment working in the domain of CSR and ESG is supporting this National Consultation as a Partner.

Sphere India is a National Coalition of Humanitarian, Development, and Resilience Actors in India. The strategic outreach of 155 full members includes key nodal organizations from UN, INGOs, National NGOs, CSR, Academic Institutions, Sector Networks, Expert Individuals, and State IAGs/Networks. The local outreach is evolving with 805 associate members as Sphere India Locally Empowered Organisations Network (LEON)  and 1,80,000 community volunteers (CDRF -Community Disaster Response Force) mapped for varied capacities all over India. Sphere India facilitates multi-stakeholder coordination, knowledge & capacity sharing and collaborative advocacy for enhancing accountability to the affected and at-risk populations.