An on-going project between EWB-UK and Shelter Centre has been given added impetus thanks to interest from a group of international humanitarian organisations.

Bringing together over a dozen international humanitarian organisations including Medecins Sans Frontiers (MSF) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), Shelter Centre has garnered support for the project which aims to create a booklet outlining how best to plan camps for refugees and internally displaced persons after conflicts, natural disasters or complex emergencies.

The Camp Planning Project, which was started three years ago, was originally scheduled to be completed by November 2008, however difficulties with funding had made the future of the project uncertain.

But this month Shelter Centre identified a consortium of international humanitarian organisations that are now considering an application for funding that could see the project completed by November 2009.

Tom Corsellis, the project manager of the Camp Planning Project and co-director of the Shelter Centre, said the issues with funding demonstrate the lack of resources that are allocated to the provision of shelter and that he is ‘confident’ the new deadline for the booklet will be met.

“There is a lack of funding across the board in the shelter sector in spite of the fact there is a larger spend per family on shelter after a disaster than many other sectors of response” he said.

“There’s a library full of stuff on town planning but as yet there’s not one guideline dedicated to camp planning. There are now guidelines on how to manage camps and even how to close camps, however there is no detailed guidance on hopw to plan them.”

Divided into two sections, the booklet aims to fulfil this requirement by providing a step-by-step guide for the management of both existing camps, known as ‘self-settled camps’, and the planning of new camps or ‘planned camps’, after conflicts, natural disasters or complex emergencies.

Unlike other information available on the management of camps, the Camp Planning Project aims to create a guide that is simple enough for both specialists and non-specialists working in the field to understand.

The authors of the guide also aim to include a number of illustrated diagrams and images to make the booklet accessible to non-English speakers by reducing its reliance on textual descriptions.

According to Tom Corsellis, who has helped plan camps in Africa, Asia and Europe, the consequences of failing to meet international standards in the planning of refugee camps can be disastrous.

"If you build camps too close to local populations you run the risk of damaging their relations with those in the camps, and building camps too close to a border can destabilise a whole region" he said, adding "Poorly planned camps also run the risk of fire spreading, soil erosion, landslides and flooding”.

In 2006, volunteers from EWB-UK worked together with the Shelter Centre to draft an introduction and one of the two sections dealing with the planning of camps in advance of the settlement by refugees.

Last year EWB-UK volunteers worked with MSF to draft the second section concerning the management of camps where settlement has already taken place, but revisions still need to be made before the drafts can be distributed.

"The role of the EWB-UK interns is to produce, under close management, a proof of concept draft of the guidelines that will be used in the future by the major agencies worldwide" said Corsellis.

"Competent and dedicated interns enable us to do work that needs doing, not the work that it is easy to find funding for".

"If something as fundamental as guidelines to plan camps have not been developed, it is important to understand why and to join with agencies to overcome these challenges".

Began almost three years ago, the Camp Planning Project is the one of EWB-UK’s longest-running projects since the charity’s inception in 2002.

Past projects have included working with the Shelter Centre to improve its vast online library of documents relating to transitional settlements, and working with the charity to help prepare and modify the charity’s basic training schemes.

Shelter Centre is an NGO that supports communities impacted by conflicts and natural disasters by supporting good practice within the humanitarian community by developing guidelines, technical standards and training collaboratively".

• All Shelter Centre projects are free and open source. Information about this or any other project can be found on the Shelter Centre website.
• Find out more about EWB-UK's placements in 2008