Sida's Contributions to Humanitarian Mine Action

A prime concern with Mine Action Centres is their viability. MACs are entirely dependent on internationalfunding, which again may serve as an obstacle to the natural and logical transfer of responsibilityfor mine action to existing indigenous entities. Accordingly, there should be a reassessment of howMACs are structured in order to ensure their transfer to sustainable national institutions. A furtherimplication is that responsibility for mine action should be placed with existing national capacities atthe outset of an operation, to the extent this is possible.Swedish capacitiesWhile Sweden has been one of the world’s largest donors to HMA, there is no Swedish NGO operatingin mine action. Instead, Swedish mine-action initiatives have come in the form of support toresearch and development projects, the secondment of technical experts and the Mine Detection Dog(MDD) initiative in Cambodia. Our review of these efforts suggests that in order to ensure that responsesto the mine problem meet the needs of those affected by landmines, a concerted effort mustbe made to assess the relevance of projects. In practice, this means the identification of priorities asdefined by populations in individual mine-affected regions, countries or communities. These needsshould serve as the fundamental basis for initiating projects or programmes. Excluding the views andneeds of those in a mine-affected region jeopardizes the sustainability of initiatives and minimizespeople’s sense of ownership of programmes. In turn, the potential for creating long-term sustainableresponses is greatly reduced. More generally, Sida’s broad experience from humanitarian assistanceand development should be used to ensure that the necessary expertise and institutional arrangementsare in place from project initiation onwards. This would include a thorough assessment of all collaboratingpartners, as well as ensuring that all Swedish stakeholders identify with Sida’s HMA policy.Concluding remarksAlthough the most acute threats from landmine contamination may be largely under control withinthe next few years, the problem will still be far from eradicated. At the same time, there is an emergingdilemma in mine action today. While there is a reorientation within HMA, under which new tools andapproaches are being developed to deal more effectively with the problem of landmines, there is alsoa parallel decrease in international interest in the issue of landmines. It is therefore imperative for theinternational donor community to take steps to ensure that the opportunities that currently exist aretaken advantage of. The central challenges for mine action today are to maintain political interest inthe issue, to ensure sufficient levels of funding and to promote responses that can lead to sustainablelong-term benefits for those most seriously affected by landmines.4 Sida’s CONTRIBUTION TO HUMANITARIAN MINE ACTION – Sida EVALUATION 01/06