PHM-Exch> request: UN Secretary General Report on global financial crisis impacts on poor

[Claudio Schuftan]

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From: Maria Hamlin Zuniga <maria at mundonica.com>
from<intl-budget at lists.cbpp.org>


Dear Colleagues:

As you can see from the letter below, Sanjeev Khagram, the Wyss Visiting
Scholar at the Harvard Business School Social Enterprise Program, has
been selected by the UN Secretary General to be the lead writer on a
comprehensive report on the impact the global financial crisis on the
poor and most vulnerable around the world. This report was requested by
the G20 and will provide the only in-depth examination of the crisis
specifically from the perspective of the poor. In order to produce a
report that is comprehensive and meaningful, Sanjeev needs to compile
the necessary data, case studies, and relevant analyses. And, as the
report is to be launched in September 2009, he needs to gather this
information as quickly as possible.

Sanjeev, who is known worldwide for his interdisciplinary and
cross-sectoral work bridging theory and practice, is asking for those
involved in our work, who may have access to data, studies and stories,
and other information on the impacts of the financial crisis on the poor
to get in touch with him at skhagram at gan-net.net [this is the address to
respond to]as soon as possible.
This will be a very valuable report to have available to support our
work to advocate for the poor.

Thank you for any assistance you can provide.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Dear Friends,

I am now the lead writer for the flagship report on the impact of the
global financial crisis on the most vulnerable that the G20 Leaders have
asked the UN SG to assemble for them.  Please see the attached two
documents on the more specific TOR and the second on the larger GIVAS
(global impacts vulnerability assessment system) that is being built so
that there is a real-time meta-database of databases for ongoing
monitoring of impacts of global crises on the poor.

The flagship report will be launched in September, 2009 by the Secretary
General. So as always, the time is short and the data is incredibly
patchy and limited...I have access to virtually all the published and
grey literature at all the major agencies of the UN, IMF, ILO, World
Bank, etc. etc.
However, I am reaching out to you to see if you - or through your
networks - there are any other data sets, case studies, or rigorous
analyses of the impacts on the poor (and the causal mechanisms through
which these impacts are occurring), as well as potential
innovative/experimental  responses that should be highlighted in the
report.  ALSO CRITICAL IS THE VOICES AND EXPERIENCES OF THE POOR AND
VULNERABLE IN THEIR OWN WORDS...

Any broader thoughts on what the main messages of the report should be
would also be welcome.  Below is a broad outline of the main
elements/broad outline of the report.

I would deeply appreciate any information, data, expertize and wisdom
you might be able to offer.  In the meantime, I remain, sincerely yours,

Sanjeev

This REPORTwould start with the “voices of the poor” and thus would
immediately be starkly different from other reports on the global
financial crisis.  It would then move to household and other types of
disaggregated data and analysis and then end with more macro-level data,
trends and patterns …ending with key messages and take aways. In essence
we are flipping the typical approach to keep the “focus on the poor and
most vulnerable.”

SIGNAL MAIN MESSAGES UP FRONT

1. Voices of the Poor – 1/2 page with personal testimonies (A BOX ON
perception data from the poor and most vulnerable)

2. A box simply describing a dimensions of poverty and vulnerability
analytic framework (poverty and vulnerability is not unidimensional,
etc. etc.). – HAZARDS, IMPACTS, RESILIENCE

3. Vignettes of poverty, vulnerability, and coping – 3-5 case stories
that would show effects across dimensions of vulnerability and
RE-introduce informally key messages – ideally these would give a sense
of the “timelines of impacts” and “

4. Disaggregated (dimensions of) impact and vulnerability  – household
or local-community level or similar types of data that would build on
the case stories. – table on categories and dimensions…

5. Aggregated dimensions of impact and vulnerability analysis –  moving
more up to cross-country and cross-regional trends focusing on
macro-economic transmission

channels…again building on the case studies and directing towards the
key messages

(Box synthesizing work on impacts of previous financial crises?)

6. Conclusions and implications – take away key messages about global
financial crisis impacts on poor to date, valued added by this type of
report, critical need for GIVAS

(box on new data gathering and monitoring systems…) – BEFORE AND AFTER
GIVAS…

7. 9 CEP Initiatives – Interventions work

novel insights/multiple types of data


This REPORT will FOCUS on and highlight more sharply:

§  who has been most affected and who has been (or will be) least able
to cope;

initially most affected who were originally less vulnerable – export
sectors…

§  Identify newly emerging (and unexpected) vulnerabilities where these
exist;

urban working poor, migrants, informal employment

§  how vulnerable communities and populations have been affected (above
and beyond their “existing vulnerabilities”) by the economic crisis over
the past twelve months;

§  how (and how quickly) global events translate into local impacts and
shifting vulnerabilities; this could include a “timeline of impact”;
(drops have been dramatic on gdp/capita and employment – much longer to
recover …)

§  Explain the overlay and compounding effects of past and current
global crises (economic, food, fuel, etc.); and

§  how economic stress factors could translate into increased social,
political and even environmental vulnerabilities;

§  Assist decision-makers in understanding the complex interplay of
multiple stress factors in the lives of vulnerable communities;

§  how communities have tried to cope with the crisis’ first wave of
repercussions;

§  Provide decision-makers with a watch list of issues that need to be
urgently addressed to prevent graver consequences in the future.


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