DG ECHO and The ASEAN Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management (AHA Centre) have signed an agreement on disaster management.

This agreement will further strengthen cooperation between the EU and ASEAN countries in in preparedness and response to disasters.

More information here. The signed Administrative Arrangement is also available for your reference here. 

The updated version of the Humanitarian Aid Contribution Agreement (HACA) is now available. It is in place as of March 2025 for all new contracts with the UN and MSSAs under HIPs 2025. Following a targeted amendment of the EU Financial Regulation (recast 2024/2509) some mandatory technical updates and additional clarifications have been introduced to the contractual template, namely:

• Reporting on fraud and irregularities,
• Compliance with core values,
• Protection of security and the public order,
• New provision on Sexual Exploitation, Abuse and Harassment (SEAH),
• Deferred payment of first prefinancing,
• Clarifications on the treatment of any surplus balance and access to the European Public Prosecutor Office (EPPO),
• The provisions on the pillar assessment exercise’s complementary pillars (7-8-9) have been updated and streamlined between the General and Special Conditions,
• The wording of certain Definitions (Article 1, General Conditions) has been aligned to the standard Contribution Agreement

Have a look at the Reference Documents page ​​​​​​

DG ECHO has published the Guidance Note for DG ECHO Partners on Flexible Funding Measures. You can find this document on the Reference Documents page.

DG ECHO is glad to announce the publication of its new Health Policy Guidelines: Health Response in Humanitarian Settings.

The document is available here.

A new set of FAQs on Visibility and Communication has been published. Have a look here. 

The French version of the MGA and Annex 3 has been published and is available on the Reference Page.

The Frequently Asked Questions related to SEAH – Yearly Reporting on Allegations have been recently updated. You can review them here.

In November 2024, the single form was updated with the creation of new Key Result indicators (KRIs) for the Health, Mine action, Protection, and WASH sectors.These new features are only related to these four sectors and to new projects (thus not available for  MR of ongoing projects created before November 2024).

For more details on the new KRIs please refer to section 7.2 and the annexes (page 80) of the Single Form Guidelines,  available on the ECHO partners' website https://www.dgecho-partners-helpdesk.eu/reference-documents-ngo  or https://www.dgecho-partners-helpdesk.eu/reference-documents-io

To help you to use these new features, please also carefully read the PowerPoint presentation "MULTI-KRI PER SUBSECTOR"  available on the ECHO partners' website https://www.dgecho-partners-helpdesk.eu/reference-documents-ngo  or https://www.dgecho-partners-helpdesk.eu/reference-documents-io 

Please note the following:

• It is important to only choose the KRIs related to the sub-sector you selected.  In the drop-down menu, the system shows all the KRIs defined by DG ECHO, for all the sub-sectors.  Among this list, only the KRIs linked to the selected sub-sector should be chosen. If you selected a WASH sub-sector, a KRI related to Protection should not be selected as the system will give an error message at the submission stage.

• For each subsector, you should select among the proposed standard KRIs related to this sub-sector those which are the most relevant to the Result.  These KRIs should be used as a priority instead of creating custom indicators. Custom indicators should be used only in exceptional cases to reflect essential dimensions not covered by the proposed KRIs.

• For some of the sub-sectors, compulsory indicators (KRIs marked with an asterisk) have to be selected. In other words, you cannot submit a proposal with those sub-sectors without also choosing the compulsory KRI. You are of course free to select additional standard indicators.

• For sub-sectors without a compulsory indicator, select KRIs among the list of KRIs related to this sub-sector (see point 1 and 2 above). Custom indicators should be used only in exceptional cases.

• When you finalise the chapter 7 of the Single Form, we advise you to launch a ‘print draft pdf’ (see in the enclosed PowerPoint presentation) to identify all potential mistakes that will block the submission of the eSF.

• To benefit from these new features, please ensure your proposal has been created in APPEL after 6 November 2024. Please do not use former eSF you may have created before 6 November 2024.

Please do not hesitate to contact APPEL helpdesk  ECHO-IS-SUPPORT@ec.europa.eu if you have any questions.

You can find here the recording of the webinar "Yearly Reporting on SEAH Allegations", held on January 29, 2025.

The objective of the webinar was to provide guidance on how to compile the 2024 Annual Report on SEAH Allegations.

In case you need further clarification, please contact ECHO-REPORTMISCONDUCT@ec.europa.eu