ReliefWeb is a
humanitarian information portal founded in 1996. The portal now hosts more than 720,000 humanitarian situation reports, press releases, evaluations, guidelines, assessments, maps and infographics.
The portal is an independent vehicle of information, designed specifically to assist the international humanitarian community in effective delivery of emergency assistance or
''relief''. It provides information as humanitarian crises unfold, while emphasizing the coverage of "forgotten emergencies" at the same time.
Origin and development
ReliefWeb was founded in October 1996 and is administered by the
United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). The project began under the
US Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other ...
,
Bureau of International Organization Affairs
The Bureau of International Organization Affairs (IO) is a bureau in the United States Department of State that creates and executes U.S. policy in the United Nations and other international organizations. It is headed by the Assistant Secreta ...
, which had noticed during the
Rwanda crisis how poorly critical operational information was shared between
NGOs,
UN Agencies and Governments. In 1995, the Department's Senior Policy Adviser on
Disaster Management
Emergency management or disaster management is the managerial function charged with creating the framework within which communities reduce vulnerability to hazards and cope with disasters. Emergency management, despite its name, does not actuall ...
led a series of discussions at
UN HQ in
Geneva and
New York City, as well as a conference on the project at the
US Department of State
The United States Department of State (DOS), or State Department, is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy and relations. Equivalent to the ministry of foreign affairs of other ...
in which both ReliefWeb as a product and the internet in general were touted as fresh tools for the humanitarian community. Its official launch was also the launch of the
UN's first disaster website. Recognizing how critical the availability of reliable and timely information in time of humanitarian emergencies is, the
United Nations General Assembly endorsed the creation of ReliefWeb and encouraged humanitarian information exchange through ReliefWeb by all governments, relief agencies and
non-governmental organizations
A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active in h ...
in Resolution 51/194 on 10 February 1997. The
General Assembly
A general assembly or general meeting is a meeting of all the members of an organization or shareholders of a company.
Specific examples of general assembly include:
Churches
* General Assembly (presbyterian church), the highest court of presby ...
reiterated the importance of information sharing in emergencies and of taking advantage of
OCHA
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is a United Nations (UN) body established in December 1991 by the General Assembly to strengthen the international response to complex emergencies and natural disaster ...
's emergency information services such as ReliefWeb in Resolution 57/153 on 3 March 2003.
ReliefWeb maintains offices in three different time zones to update the website around the clock:
Bangkok
Bangkok, officially known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estimated populatio ...
(
Thailand),
Nairobi (
Kenya) and
New York City (United States). Prior to 2011, the three offices were located in Geneva (Switzerland), Kobe (Japan), and New York (USA). The closing of the Geneva and Kobe offices were due to the higher costs associated with these locations.
ReliefWeb has seen steady growth in usage. In 2017, 6,8 million people visited ReliefWeb. In the same year, the website published more than 57,000 reports and maps, 39,500 jobs in the humanitarian sector, and 2,600 training opportunities.
A first major re-design effort was started in 2002 and completed in 2005, which focused on implementing a more user-centric information architecture.
In April 2011, ReliefWeb launched a new web platform based on
open-source
Open source is source code that is made freely available for possible modification and redistribution. Products include permission to use the source code, design documents, or content of the product. The open-source model is a decentralized sof ...
technology to offer a powerful
search/filter engine and delivery system.
In 2012, ReliefWeb began to expand its focus to become the one-stop shop for critical information on global crises and disasters. In November 2012, ReliefWeb revamped the home page, the "About Us" section and the Blog and introduced "Labs", a place to explore new and emerging opportunities and tools to improve information delivery to humanitarian workers.
Services
ReliefWeb disseminates humanitarian information by updating its website around the clock. In addition, ReliefWeb reaches more than 168,500 subscribers through its e-mail subscription services, allowing those who have low
bandwidth
Bandwidth commonly refers to:
* Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range
* Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...
Internet connections to receive information reliably.
ReliefWeb posts maps and documents daily from over 5,000 sources from the UN system,
Governments
A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state.
In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...
,
Inter-governmental organizations
An international organization or international organisation (see spelling differences), also known as an intergovernmental organization or an international institution, is a stable set of norms and rules meant to govern the behavior of states an ...
,
NGO
A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active i ...
s,
academia
An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy ...
and the media.
In addition, a team of cartographers creates original maps focusing on humanitarian emergencies.
All documents posted on the site are classified and archived, allowing advanced searching of documents from past emergency responses. The
database contains more than 720,000 maps and documents dating back to 1981.
ReliefWeb is also a major repository of humanitarian job postings and training announcements. In 2017, 1,605 organizations posted 39,336 job announcements on ReliefWeb.
The job and training sources include Academic and Research Institutions,
NGO
A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from government. They are typically nonprofit entities, and many of them are active i ...
s, International Organizations, Governments,
Red Cross/
Red Crescent
The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement is a humanitarian movement with approximately 97 million volunteers, members and staff worldwide. It was founded to protect human life and health, to ensure respect for all human beings, an ...
Movement and the Media.
ReliefWeb also provides
apps and tools for humanitarians, which enable more targeted personalised information search, with the aim to speed up the delivery of important information.
The apps include functions to search ReliefWeb content,
curate and access humanitarian data, and manage humanitarian personnel.
Awards
ReliefWeb has won the following awards:
* Certificate of Superior Achievement in International Emergency Management (January 1999) from the
United States Government
The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a feder ...
.
* UN21 awards (March 2004) for "knowledge management" and "improvements to the working environment."
*
Web4Dev Award (2006) from the
World Bank for excellence in Web design and best use of the Web as a tool to support development activities.
* Special Achievement in GIS (2010) award for
OCHA
The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is a United Nations (UN) body established in December 1991 by the General Assembly to strengthen the international response to complex emergencies and natural disaster ...
at the 20th Annual
ESRI International User Conference, in recognition of outstanding work with
GIS technology.
References
External links
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Organizations established by the United Nations
Organizations established in 1996
Internet properties established in 1996
Humanitarian aid
American news websites
Web portals