UN Volunteer documents WHO’s emergency response in Bangladesh, one story at a time

Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh
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Catalin Bercaru (Romania) joined the World Health Organization (WHO) Bangladesh as an international UN Volunteer in media and communications in May last year. Since September 2017, he has been documenting WHO’s emergency response in Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar area. With the exodus of well over 600,000 people from Myanmar, Catalin has been reporting on the work of WHO teams delivering critical health services to vulnerable populations and supporting partners in the field.

As an international UN Volunteer specialized in communication, Catalin was one of the first people to be sent to Cox’s Bazar to document the response of WHO Bangladesh. “Prior to the escalation of this crisis, there were already established partnerships between WHO, the government and other health partners. With the massive influx of people from Myanmar, strategies had to be adapted to this critical situation,” explains Catalin.

UN Volunteers at the UN Climate Conference (COP 23)

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UN Volunteers at the UN Climate Conference (COP 23)

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Volunteers count. Their work deserves to be counted.

Rafael Diez de Medina, Chief Statistician and Director, ILO Department of Statistics
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The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development explicitly recognises volunteer groups as stakeholders to support grassroots implementation of the 17 Goals. And yet, statistics on volunteers, the work they do, the skills and time they contribute to improve the lives of others are, for the most part, lacking. The International Labour Organisation (ILO)—in partnership with UNV—wants to change that. In this blog, ILO's Chief Statistician and Director of ILO Department of Statistics, Rafael Diez de Medina, explains the need for measuring volunteer work.

The ILO Department of Statistics and the UN Volunteers have joined forces to scale up efforts to improve the global availability, quality and use of statistics on volunteer work. Starting this month, the ILO-UNV partnership will focus on assessing the current status of volunteer work statistics around the world; engage directly with countries to identify good practices and challenges in volunteer work data collection and analysis; and develop practical survey approaches and tools to support countries’ efforts.

UNV Programme Manager in South Sudan speaks on UN Radio Miraya

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Waheeb Al–Eryani, UNV Programme Manager in South Sudan talks about role of UN Volunteers in the country.

Syrian refugee becomes a volunteer at Nea Kavala camp, Greece

International Volunteer Day 2017
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Saleh is a 37-year-old maintenance engineer who fled Syria more than a year ago. Like so many others living in camps across Greece, he brought critical skills and qualifications with him that he was eager to use – this is how he started volunteering to help the camp community.

Saleh started volunteering with the Red Cross’ water and sanitation team soon after arriving at Nea Kavala, helping to ensure people in the camp have access to clean water and safe facilities. But he played more than a technician’s role, and has been central in making sure that the Red Cross has a strong relationship with the community and listens to feedback, comments and concerns from people in the camp.

Disaster risk reduction through youth volunteerism

International Volunteer Day 2017
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Engaging with community members, 450 Youth Volunteers in Myanmar assess disaster risks, discussing the need for activities at the local level to raise awareness on Disaster Risk Reduction and increase their communities’ knowledge and skills on this subject.

The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) programme in Myanmar, in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), runs a Disaster Risk Reduction Youth Volunteer (DRRYV) project in support of the Ministry of Social Welfare, Relief and Resettlement.

SWVR Policy Challenge

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The State of the World’s Volunteerism Report (SWVR) looks at the distinctive role of volunteerism in strengthening community resilience, and the enabling environment that can help maximise the contribution of volunteers around the world to risk reduction efforts.

As part of the report development process, qualitative field research was carried out in 15 communities globally to understand what communities saw as the distinctive contribution of volunteerism to resilience, and the environmental factors that influenced the impact of volunteer work.

Kenyan local volunteers join hands to address drought, deforestation and insecurity

International Volunteer Day 2017
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Local communities in Kenya get together to address the impact of natural disasters and to raise awareness about how to build resilience to catastrophes.

Local communities were mobilised with the support of Action for Sustainable Change Kenya (AFOSC Kenya) to conduct low-cost, feasible actions to build resilience to disasters, as part of the USAID/OFDA funded programme Frontline. Local coalitions composed of women and youth groups and community-based organisations were established to build a movement for change at the sub-county level.

Volunteers help rescue survivors from Harvey floodwaters

International Volunteer Day 2017
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Healthcare worker Jeremy Sparkman cut short his vacation in the Ozark Mountains. Horse wrangler Chris Pustejovksy collected money and supplies and led a convoy down from Fort Worth. Surgeon Rick Ngo paddled over from a nearby subdivision.

On Wednesday, they joined dozens of other volunteers who piloted bass boats, jet skis and aluminum dinghies through the caramel-colored floodwaters of west Houston to ferry hundreds of residents to safety, part of an impromptu flotilla that has played a prominent role in the recovery from the worst storm to hit Texas in more than 50 years.

“I usually just use this boat for drinking beer,” said Sparkman as he steered his flat-bottomed boat around submerged pickup trucks. “But we come together when we need to - that’s what Texans do.”

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