The Steering Board of SRTF Approves Its Operational Strategy

Washington D.C./ Gaziantep – Wednesday, 5 November 2014 - The Steering Board (SB) of the Syria Recovery Trust Fund (SRTF) held its 3^rd Meeting in Washington, D.C. today under the chairmanship of H.E. Aiad Koudsi, Deputy Prime Minister of the Interim Government of the Syrian Opposition Coalition (SIG). Opened by Alina Romanowski, Deputy Assistant Administrator of USAID, the meeting was attended by all stakeholders, including Germany, United Arab Emirates, United States of America, Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Japan, Kuwait, United Kingdom, Italy and Turkey, as well as the German Development Bank KfW, SRTF’s Trustee; and the SRTF’s Management Unit (MU) also attended the meeting.

In his statement, the Deputy Prime Minister addressed the current humanitarian crisis in Syria, the pressing needs of the Syrian people and progress made by SRTF in carrying out its operations since the previous meeting of the SB held in Abu Dhabi, UAE, in June 2014

During the meeting, the SB endorsed the SRTF’s Operational Strategy document as presented by the MU. The strategy enhances, expands, and properly delineates the SRTF approach to program planning and implementation by articulating the SRTF strategic objectives, priorities, anticipated results, and corresponding measures of success. It also articulates the principles guiding the SRTF operations and the processes of project selection during the current period of on-going conflict. To ensure the Operational Strategy remains appropriate and relevant to the SRTF’s changing socio-political and operational realties, the MU will update it and submit it to the SB on an annual basis, incorporating the SB’s policy guidance and the operational decisions of SRTF’s Management Committee (MC) that affect the Operational Strategy.

In its presentation, the MU also illustrated the performance of the SRTF’s projects over the past one year (since its establishment) and the challenges they face as well as pipeline projects.

To date, the SRTF’s MC has approved 12 projects worth a total of Euro 19.5 million, focusing on health, water, electricity and food security in the Governorates of Aleppo Idleb and Dar’a. In addition, 10 more projects worth Euro 25 million are under development in the design phase. Addressing a large number of needs in the health, water and sanitation, power generation, education, agriculture and food security sectors, the new projects will benefit large segments of the conflict-affected communities in Aleppo, Idleb, Hama, and Dar’a governorates. The MU has also received 21 applications for projects worth a total of Euro 44 million covering activities in all above mentioned sectors as well as solid waste management in the governorates of Aleppo, Idleb, Hama, Lattakia, Dar’a and Quneitra.

The next meeting of the SB is planned to take place in France in May 2015.

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