Beirut – The Government of Italy and the United Nations Development Programme signed a contribution agreement worth two million Euros to support resilience and recovery efforts in Syria by establishing the Resilience Fund for NGOs. The signing ceremony, held in Beirut on 13 July 2023, was attended by Italy’s Charge d’Affaires in Damascus, Massimiliano D’Antuono, Director of the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation office for Lebanon and Syria, Alessandra Piermattei, and UNDP Resident Representative in Syria, Sudipto Mukerjee. 
 
The Resilience Fund for NGOs aims at supporting and scaling-up access to livelihoods and income-generating generating opportunities, improving availability, access, affordability, and quality of essential and social services. 
 
The programme, implemented over an 18-month period, will build upon the Early Recovery and Livelihood sector's needs analysis to identify priorities and ensure effective synergies are created across the response and social cohesion is mainstreamed. Around 25,000 people are estimated to benefit from the programme, with 5,000 directly, including at least 1,250 women and 500 persons with disabilities. 
 
"The Italian-funded programmes towards the resilience of the vulnerable groups aim at mitigating the impacts of the conflict on the communities. This Programme is part of a broader support to UNDP's efforts towards early recovery in Syria, strengthening the partnership established in the last years between Italy and UNDP", said Massimiliano D’Antuono, Chargé D’Affaires of the Italian Embassy in Damascus.
 
"Through the established Resilience Fund, the NGOs will be invited to submit projects focusing on increasing the resilience of the most vulnerable groups. These projects will represent a scale-up respect to the humanitarian response that has been brought about in Syria in the last years. In a protracted crisis such as the Syrian one, it is crucial to focus on Early Recovery and implement an area-based integrated approach, which responds to the needs of the population in a multisectoral way and creates synergies. By doing so, we will have a greater impact on the beneficiaries," added Alessandra Piermattei, AICS Director for Lebanon and Syria.
 
Through the Early Recovery and Livelihoods Sector, UNDP will set up the programmatic framework to provide organizations (NGOs) operating in Syria with resources to implement projects that adopt an integrated area-based approach and align with the resilience and recovery priorities. 
 
UNDP Resident Representative, Sudipto Mukerjee, thanked the Government of Italy for their partnership with UNDP and highlighted the catalytic role this programme will provide to build resilience to the socio-economic crisis and improve livelihoods and equitable access to essential services across Syria. “The added value of initiating this Resilience Fund for NGOs through the early recovery and livelihoods sector is the guaranteed coordination to improve the effectiveness of income income-generating the response to the recovery needs, ensuring no one is left behind. It will support local crisis-affected communities in identifying needs and resources, thus maximizing local ownership and empowerment and ensuring the sustainability of the set interventions”, he said.
 
It is worth noting that the new agreement complements a large joint effort by the Government of Italy and UNDP in Syria, reaching over US$11 million to facilitate the early recovery of vulnerable communities, strengthen their resilience and food security, empower youth including women and persons with disabilities, and improve livelihoods. 
 
 
For further information, please contact:
Dania Darwish, Communications Specialist, Tel: 00963 (11) 6129811 | Mobile: 00963 989857937 – e-mail: dania.darwish@undp.org. For more information on UNDP – Syria see http://www.undp.org/Syria
 
Mauro Pompili, Communication officer, Tel: +961.(0)5.951376  ext.: 205 | e-mail: mauro.pompili@aics.gov.it. For more information on AICS see https://beirut.aics.gov.it/