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Field Article
Prior to initiating the development of
EMMA, a review was undertaken better to
understand the need for such a tool in rapid
onset emergency settings 2 . The review sought to
better understand market analysis needs, decision
maker information requirements, identify
existing market analysis tools, and get a better
understanding of the capacity of field level staff
who would undertake such analysis.
Conclusions underlined the need for a userfriendly
non-specialist analytical tool, as many
existing market analysis tools were too specialist
or development orientated and therefore not
suitable to emergency settings where specialists
are hard to locate.
Why is market analysis in emergencies
important?
During the early phase of a rapid onset disaster,
humanitarian priorities are essentially
concerned with ensuring survival and protecting
livelihoods rather than the assessment of
market-systems 3 , even if the need for this kind
of analysis is increasingly recognised.
The rationale for EMMA is that better understanding
of the key market-systems in any
given situation could enable humanitarian
agencies to consider a broader range of
responses. These responses might include cashbased
interventions, local procurement and
other innovative forms of support to market
actors (e.g. traders) that enable programmes to
make better use of existing market-system
capabilities. This could lead to more efficient
use of humanitarian resources, as well as
encouraging recovery and reducing dependency
on outside assistance.
With few exceptions, crisis-affected households
use markets or other forms of exchange
Oxfam GB, Haiti, 2008
Why market-systems matter in designing early
responses
For ensuring
survival
Market-systems
could supply
food and
essential items
or services
related to basic
survival needs
For protecting livelihoods
Market-systems
could supply or
replace urgent
non-food items,
agricultural
inputs, fuel, tools
and vital services
Market-systems
could maintain
demand for
labour, employment
or production
that
restores incomes
for acquiring food, hygienic items and services,
or for selling products and labour to others.
There is a growing realisation that unless our
responses are designed with a good understanding
of key market-systems, they may
inadvertently damage livelihoods, jobs and
businesses; thus undermine recovery and
prolong dependence on outside assistance.
EMMA – What is it?
The EMMA toolkit is a set of tools and guidance
notes, designed to encourage and assist frontline
humanitarian staff in sudden-onset emergencies
to better understand and make use of
market-systems.
EMMA aims to provide accessible, relevant
guidance to staff who are not already specialists
in market analysis. The EMMA toolkit is
intended to complement established humanitarian
practices in diverse contexts, so that the
EMMA process can be integrated flexibly into
different organisations’ emergency assessments
and response planning. Above all, the EMMA
tools are adaptable, ‘rough-and-ready’, speedorientated
processes, designed to reflect the
information constraints and urgency of decision-making
required in the first few weeks of a
sudden-onset emergency.
EMMA’s Scope
• Sudden-Onset Emergencies: where fast-moving
events mean agencies have little advance
knowledge of markets and limited resources to
investigate.
• A Broad Range of Needs: any market system that
may be critical in addressing priority needs,
including food, non-food items and supporting
services.
• Rapid Assessment and Decision-making:
supporting humanitarian teams to take urgent
response decisions faced in the first few weeks.
Four ‘strands’ run throughout EMMA. At
the start, they may be relatively separate, but
like the strands of a rope, as EMMA proceeds
they (should) come together to provide a strong
and coherent rationale for the final recommendations
to hang upon (see diagram). The four
strands are:
1. Gap Analysis: to understand the needs,
livelihood strategies, emergency situation
and preferences of the target population.
2. Baseline Mapping: to develop a profile of
the ‘normal’ pre-crisis market-system.
Seasonal analysis is included.
3. Emergency Mapping: to understand the
crisis situation, the impacts on marketsystem,
its constraints and capabilities to
play a role in humanitarian response.
4. Response Analysis: to explore different
opportunities for humanitarian assistance:
their respective feasibility, likely outcomes,
benefits and risks.
EMMA helps humanitarian agencies to understand
the important market aspects of an emergency
situation and communicate this knowledge
promptly and effectively into programme
decision-making processes.
Understanding market-related aspects of an
emergency situation means knowing:
• How did affected populations engage with
and use markets as part of their livelihoods
before the crisis, and how they are doing so
now?
• What has been the impact of the emergency
on the most critical market-systems that
people depended upon before the crisis?
• What capacity do these market-systems now
have to supply priority goods and services to
people if the affected population had
purchasing power (i.e. cash to spend)?
• What would be the impact on these market
systems if essential services were brought in
from outside the market area (i.e. in-kind
assistance)?
• How might key market-systems be quickly
assisted to recover or function better so they
contribute more effectively to meeting
affected population’s emergency needs?
Answers to these questions are relevant to
agencies considering the use of cash-based
interventions or prolonged in-kind responses.
They are also important for thinking about how
any response might either encourage subsequent
recovery or prolong dependence on
outside assistance.
Communicating this knowledge means
ensuring analysis results feed into the key decision-making
processes of the organisation. The
toolkit emphasizes succinct, accessible, nontechnical
formats targeted at the analysis users:
programme managers responsible for planning
initial and early responses to crisis.
Two men stand on the roof of their
flooded home in Gonaives, the
fourth largest city in Haiti, following
tropical storm Hanna.
2
Market Analysis Tools in Rapid-Onset Emergencies – Phase
1 report. Albu and Murphy. July 2007 Practical Action
Consulting
3
Market-systems involve a web of people, structures and
rules. Their interactions together determine how any given
item, product or service is produced, exchanged and accessed
by different people. The market-system concept includes
aspects (infrastructure, services, policy, rules and institutions)
that are not always emphasized in value-chain analysis.
3