NGO Safety & Security Organizations & For-Profit vs. Non-Profit Development

[T]

International NGO Safety & Security Association (INSSA)

The International NGO Safety & Security Association (INSSA) is a non-profit global membership association of individuals committed to improving the quality and effectiveness of safety and security for humanitarian relief and development assistance workers operating in complex and dangerous environments around the world. INSSA does this through four main avenues of programming:

Advocacy, Collaboration, Education & Professional Development, and Standardization.

VISION

A world in which humanitarian aid and development assistance is safely accessed and delivered to people in need.

MISSION

To enhance the professional development and improve the safety and security capacities of those working in the humanitarian aid and development sectors.

I thought some of you might find this interesting. INSSA is an association with a membership open to the individuals who make up the greater humanitarian and development community, however its focus is on all things NGO safety, security and risk management.  It is interesting as it is the first group I know of focusing on NGO Security issues which incorporates both non-profit and for-profit development organizations.

Other excellent NGO Security groups exist but are all exclusive to geography, nationality, operational status or nonprofits some of these groups are:

Security Advisory Group (SAG) of Interaction, which is made up of the security professionals and those with a security collateral duty of its membership.  Interactions membership is exclusively non-profit US based NGO’s

European Interagency Security Forum (EISF), whose members are the security professionals and those with a security collateral duty in international, operational European, based non-profit NGO’s

International NGO Security Office (INSO), is a new group which grew out of the Afghanistan Security Office (ANSO) and is focused on country specific NGO Security collaborations, so far exclusive to non-profit humanitarian and development organizations which have no programs linked to defense type funding

All play an important role in the NGO community; all have different mandates and in some areas are complimentary to each other.

A somewhat unrelated question:

The dialog around the Civil – Military (CIVMIL) issues have been going on for many years now, there are comities and working groups all over the place which “deal” with the issues.  With the ever growing for-profit development sector occupying the same  space, utilizing the same donors and serving the same beneficiaries of non-profit development organizations how different do you think the dialog will be (if there is one) from the CIVMIL dialog?

Examples of for-profit development firms: DAI, CHEMONICS, CREATIVE, AECOM

[T]

The International NGO Safety and Security Association (INSSA) is offering free membershipto all those who wish to join the association. The mission of INSSA is "to enhance the professional development and improve the safety and security capacities of those working in the humanitarian aid and development sectors". The Board of Directors has decided that due to the current economic situation the fee system was a significant barrier to membership and a conflict with the goal to build awareness among the NGO community as a whole.