How can humanitarian and development donors and implementers collaborate across historically divided aid bureaucracies with siloed tools, funding cycles, decision-making processes and incentive structures?
This thought piece highlights Mercy Corps learning on how market systems development focuses on the widespread impact local businesses and market institutions have on their communities over the long-run.
Learning from the 12-month market systems development pilot responding to the latest influx of South Sudanese refugees in Uganda’s West Nile region, the paper reflects on the operational challenges and questions teams face when designing, implementing and evaluating market programmes in the context of wider relief efforts.
It shares the experience of bringing humanitarian and development colleagues together to reflect on what coherence looks like in practice - and to make the call to action more compelling in the quest to find long-term solutions for crisis-affected populations.