2023-10-18 07:07:29
After studying Business and specializing in marketing, Sara Barbeira’s (Irún, 49 years old) professional career seemed destined to develop campaigns to sell products. But while she was working for a telecommunications company, a co-worker of hers made her change her mind and she ended up working for the NGO World Vision. “As soon as I did a little research I thought, this is my thing,” she says. Since then, she has wanted nothing to do with anything other than the Third Sector. Since 2017 she has been director of the Emergency Committee, an institution created that year and which brings together SOS Children’s Villages, Educo, Médicos del Mundo, Oxfam Intermón, Plan International and World Vision to act together to raise funds when a humanitarian catastrophe occurs. . Until now, they are still waiting to activate the alert regarding the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Ask. Spain already had the NGO sector very developed. Why create the Emergency Committee?
Answer. There were three reasons why it was decided to launch it. Firstly, Spanish society has always been very supportive in humanitarian emergencies, and this was demonstrated in Haiti in 2010. It was one of the European countries that gave the most funds at an individual level. Another reason is because both companies and the media often do not know who to turn to when things of this type happen. Finally, because a model of union between NGOs, media and companies is a good idea to give a single voice and for the cause to be the protagonist.
Q. Speaking of issues that are protagonists. What are they doing in the conflict between Israel and Palestine?
A. Since last week we have met daily to learn about the situation and the deployment of humanitarian aid that each NGO is going to carry out to help the civilian population. Some of them have already started, for example distributing vouchers to the most vulnerable families. Soon we will have all the information on the NGOs’ action plans and we will be able to make the decision to activate it.
Q. What has to happen for it to activate? When is the disaster button pressed?
A. At first it was done when natural disasters occurred, such as the earthquake in Turkey and Syria. There also has to be at least three of the committee’s six NGOs operating in that area, because it is very important that the teams are there to operate as quickly as possible. The other premise that used to exist was that it was a media emergency, that the media was on top of it, unfortunately. But things have changed.
Q. What has changed?
A. That we have gone through a pandemic and our NGOs were already used to those that occur in Africa, but who was going to tell us that we were going to be asking for help for a country like Spain. See Doctors of the World field hospitals here… Ten years ago it would not have occurred to us that we would need it. The war in Ukraine has also made us expand the concept.
Sara Barbeira, coordinator of the Emergency Committee at the Impact Hub Space, in Madrid. Jaime Villanueva
Q. In Ukraine there were many individual aid initiatives… Are they effective?
A. Of all that solidarity and materials that people donate, we must take into account the cost of transportation, because it costs much more to bring tons of blankets from here than to buy them in nearby areas. In addition, NGOs buy on the ground to reactivate the local economy and at a much lower cost. On the other hand, these institutions work with a roadmap, analyze the situation and needs. Despite the good intentions of all these people, it is likely that what arrives is not the priority, the urgent thing. And in almost any catastrophe there is the danger of human trafficking.
Q. Do women still come out worse when there are disasters?
A. Although emergencies are different, there are always basic needs, which are basic necessities, and then those intended for the most vulnerable: women, children, the elderly and the sick. In countries like Afghanistan, women have been prohibited from working in NGOs for a few months. If they don’t bring money home they can’t feed their children, and if they can’t feed their sons they marry their daughters off before they are 12 years old so they have one less mouth to feed. Everything goes in chain.
Q. The last activated campaign that you have activated is for hunger.
A. Unfortunately it is not news, but it is a current catastrophe, we cannot stop making it visible. Because as soon as something stops being news, you don’t know how much donations drop. Zero hunger is one of the sustainable development goals of the 2030 Agenda, and we are not going to meet it. In fact, there are two causes that have set back the progress achieved so far. In 2022 there were 250 million people affected by hunger, 61 million more than in 2021. Let’s go backwards! And the causes with the three C’s: climate change (drought especially), conflict in Ukraine (in countries like Somalia a third of their cereals come from there) and covid, which stopped all World Food Plan transportation.
Q. In Spain there are political parties that want to throw the 2030 Agenda in the trash.
A. Call us idealists, but those of us who work on this believe that the world can be changed, and although the 2030 agenda is not going to be fulfilled on time, it is a more advanced roadmap than the objectives that were set at the beginning of the year. millennium. I want to believe that if this agenda is not met there will be a 2040 or a 2050. In any case, the Emergency Committee is based on facts, not ideas.
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