The Library
Using GIS technology to map shelter allocation in Azraq refugee camp
Yahya Hassune, doesn’t take no for an answer, quite fortunately for UNHCR. About two years ago, Hassune was working on his first day as...
5 ways to better engage with bottom-up innovations by refugees
Want to learn more about bottom-up innovation? Take a look at the Humanitarian Innovation Jam 2016 on Bottom-up Innovation. Local...
Building the creative confidence of young refugees
Months into her first placement with UNHCR in Uganda, Keiko Odashiro was hit by a crisis of conscience. After years spent at the helm of...
#EducateGirls in Zaatari; updates from the Challenge winner
In late 2014 UNHCR Innovation launched its fifth UNHCR Ideas challenge which asked: “How can we support communities and educators to...
The European Refugee crisis: 10 Communications with Communities challenges
The challenge is obscured by ‘complexity’ “It’s like no other emergency” or “there are huge challenges, like nowhere I’ve ever worked” are...
“Event Horizons”: seeing beyond the black hole of training & capacity-building events
UNHCR’s Energy Lab – a collaboration between UNHCR’s Energy & Environment and Innovation units recently ran a Swiss Development...
Why we need to stop turning refugee stories into aid agency vanity projects and start listening
Less than a month ago I attended the World Humanitarian Summit Global Consultation in Geneva. Beyond all the long panel discussions, and...
11 New Year’s resolutions for humanitarian innovation
2015 was a hard year to digest. Now every 1 in 122 humans is either a refugee, internally displaced, or seeking asylum. But a new year...
How the SDGs change the role of humanitarian innovation
In the fanfare surrounding the release of the Sustainable Development Goals it may be easy to miss a shift in thinking that can have a...
Testing Ascend in Costa Rica: refining the solution
Project Background The majority of refugees and asylum seekers in Costa Rica live in urban settings. Because urban refugees are dispersed...
What is prototyping anyway?
Let’s start with what it isn’t. A pilot. Pilots have historically been the default method used in the humanitarian sector when moving...
7 essential resources for a design thinker
I’m not the average person who would be interested in purchasing the newest edition of the Harvard Business Review but walking around the...
No ‘quick fixes’ for refugee education: WISE words from Nansen Refugee Award winner
Aqeela Asifi, the 2015 UNHCR Nansen Refugee Award winner, was recognized for her courageous work and significant contribution to refugee...
How to effectively convene humanitarian innovators
UNHCR Innovation had the pleasure of attending the Global Innovations for Children and Youth Summit - ‘Start-Up to Scale-Up; hosted by...
7 challenges. 439 ideas. 3 updates from our crowdsourcing platform.
Have you ever heard of the concept "the wisdom of the crowd"? It's the idea that the collective opinion of a group of individuals is...
5 lessons learned from rolling out joint innovative energy projects
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
5 information challenges for refugees in Costa Rica
When some people hear the word ‘refugee’, the first images that may come to mind are of boats in the Mediterranean; a tent with the UNHCR...
How to turn setbacks into progress for innovation projects
There are many ways to arrange the proverbial “last mile” before relief reaches people. Since 2014, UNHCR has been testing software...
Connecting elderly refugees through ICT
During the 1990s, about 108,000 refugees fled ethnic tensions in Bhutan and stayed in the refugee camps in eastern Nepal. For more than...
Tablets for Education
Ioannis Papachristodoulou is enthusiastically bracing for failure. The UNHCR Innovation Fellow is currently testing his prototype for a...
How to set up and transition an innovation lab: lessons learned
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
What happens to the 97% of refugees who don’t make it out?
About 40 years ago, my parents and their relatives were stuck in refugee camps after they were forced to flee their homes in Vietnam. They...
How do you measure innovation in refugee education initiatives?
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
Prototyping education innovations: Amplify bootcamp
It is the third day of the Refugee Education Challenge Bootcamp here on the fourth floor of a Kampala office block, and the usually...
5 lessons learned from rolling out joint innovative education initiatives
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
How the world’s top executives are preparing students in Dadaab for leadership
With five camps spread across 41 square kilometers, Dadaab is home to more than 350,000 people. 60% of the Camp population are under 18...
1 prototype; 4 critical questions.
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
5 lessons learned from rolling out joint innovative shelter projects
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
How do you engage innovators?
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
11 ways UNHCR staff are innovating
Have you heard the phrase, “innovation is just another buzzword in the humanitarian sector”? It’s something that I hear over and over...
6 reasons to elevate the importance of tertiary education in emergencies
“For nowhere in the world has sustained development been attained without a well-functioning system of education, without universal and...
What is an innovation lab?
This is an excerpt from UNHCR’s recently released report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014. This report highlights and showcases some of the...
New report: Innovation at UNHCR 2014
Download your copy of the new report, Innovation at UNHCR, 2014 to learn about how UNHCR incorporated innovation into its response last...
Top challenges faced when refining an educational classroom/library kit
We have all seen many ‘kits’ on the market that provide deployable educational resources (be they digital or physical) in humanitarian...
7 art initiatives that are transforming the lives of refugees
If you're visiting Paris over the coming months - the walls along the Seine may look a little different. A photo exhibition along the...
Why the Syria crisis needs the private sector now
Bracing myself for the long haul 17-hour flight to San Francisco from Beirut, I finally have a moment of pause to reflect on the magnitude...
3 ways refugee innovation is being supported in Uganda
This is an excerpt from the Humanitarian Innovation Project’s recently released report: Refugee Innovation: Humanitarian innovation that...
Managing an innovation lab starts with finding the right progress reporting tool
I’ve always believed that managing innovative projects is like managing chaos. A lot of it. As part of our initial planning meeting to...
The best way to achieve sustainable energy for refugees is to make them partners and not just recipients
Meeting the energy needs of refugees and displaced people have long been based on short term and unsustainable projects that are not only...
From second displacement to successful careers: how resettled refugees integrate into their new homes
Resettlement to a third country is seen as one of the promising durable solutions for protracted refugees. This option is also the most...
Redesigning refugee communities
Anicet Adjahossou’s dream job was to work in the humanitarian sector. Yet when he was finally hired by ICRC as a volunteer in 2008 to help...
Hybrid Water Pump & UDDT Latrines
Creating sustainable water and sanitation solutions in Kobe refugee camp. As an engineer working in the five refugee camps located in...
Lessons learnt from prototyping within an innovation team
During my internship with UNHCR Innovation, I have the mission of prototyping a reporting tool to track the monthly progress of projects...
Light impacts SGBV, but not in the way you think
A walk in the dark through Belgangi Refugee Camp In February 2015, I was lucky enough to visit Belgangi Refugee Camp, Nepal at night....
13 revealing quotes on open innovation in humanitarian organizations
It seems like everyday I see a new "Open Innovation Challenge" being launched with a call for the most creative minds to come together and...
What is bottom-up innovation?
This is an excerpt from the Humanitarian Innovation Project’s recently released report: Refugee Innovation: Humanitarian innovation that...
Five common themes that emerged from #HIP2015
Conferences. Some say that if you’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all. You know the scene: name-tagged professionals moving from panel...
4 low-tech solutions for communications in emergencies
Innovation, in the humanitarian realm, is about finding sustainable and dignified solutions to the most pressing issues that affect the...
Barikama means resistance
Housed in an abandoned former textile factory, Barikama Yogurt is a glimpse into what happens when people are forced to create their own...
10 ways to innovate in higher education in emergencies
In reality, education receives only 2% of humanitarian aid. UNHCR considers education a basic right, "one that is vital in restoring hope...
7 videos guaranteed to change the way you see refugees
Raise your hand if you've ever heard the phrase "Put yourself in someone else's shoes." It was one of the most common expressions my...