Key Messages
• The cost of humanitarian aid has increased dramatically in recent years, with an estimated 60 to 80 per cent spent on logistics.1
• As demand for humanitarian assistance rises, the sector’s dependence on complex inter- national supply chains presents many challenges. They include sudden and unpredictable spikes in demand; hard-to-reach locations; disruptions due to conflict or disasters; and normal supply-chain problems of leakage, spoilage and other losses.
• Current solutions target the efficiency and effectiveness of the supply chain, and/or focus on reducing the need for foreign goods through local sourcing or cash transfers.
• However, these efforts fail to resolve some key problems:
~ Even when supply chains are improved, they remain vulnerable to disruption and delay, particularly during a cross-border crisis.
~ The large-scale influx of relief goods can disrupt local markets and economies.
~ Commercial supply chains are driven by customer demand, but in a humanitarian emer-gency the lack of market forces and clear information makes it hard to provide the correct quantities and types of goods. ~ The pressures of logistics tend to favour large-scale, standardized resources that fail to address local cultural preferences or the need for one-off products or replacement parts.
• There is an opportunity for new technology or strategies to simultaneously reduce reliance on complex international supply chains, empower local markets, and provide tailored goods and products by producing them at the “hyperlocal” level.
• These technologies include high-tech applications, such as three-dimensional (3D) printing, and low-tech solutions, such as producing goods from recycled and local materials.
Many of these technologies are only just beginning to be used in humanitarian response. But existing pilot projects indicate great potential, particularly in the areas of specialized items and prototyping, combined with the ever-increasing availability and affordability of the technology. To catalyse and accelerate this progress, the humanitarian community should:
• Encourage a broader research agenda around hyperlocal manufacturing, such as 3D printing.
• Expand support for innovation through increased funding and technical assistance to help scale projects.
• Engage with the private sector to develop customized technologies for humanitarian response.
• Foster links and collaboration within and beyond the humanitarian community through spe-cialized networks, social media and open-source design libraries.