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Colombia

Cash Week in Colombia - Cúcuta-Medellín-Bogotá, May 6, 8 and 10, 2024

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The CALP Network is a dynamic global network of more than 90 organizations engaged in the critical areas of policy, practice, and research in humanitarian Cash and Voucher Assistance (CVA) and financial assistance in general. CALP members deliver most humanitarian CVA worldwide.

In 2018, CALP began to focus on humanitarian CVA in the Americas. During that period, CALP published five studies, completed several webinars, and online events. It provided more than twenty training opportunities with the network in twelve countries and offered technical assistance on CVA to numerous actors. Currently, CALP has a strong network in the Americas, but there has never been an in-person regional meeting. With funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development's (USAID) Bureau of Humanitarian Assistance (BHA), CALP secured funding for an in-person event. As presented to the donor, the event would provide a key forum for peer-to-peer exchange and learning and real-time learning.

Since its official incorporation in 2016, Colombia's Cash Working Group (CWG) has sought to ensure a coordinated, harmonized, effective and efficient response to CVA interventions as modalities for sectoral and multisectoral interventions. The CWG supports the actors of humanitarian responses who work with people affected by natural disasters, forced displacements, victims of the conflict, returned Colombians or migrants and articulates its work in the territory through nine local CWG.

Colombia's CWG and CALP have a very close relationship. They have provided training spaces, participated in events of both organizations, and provide mutual support to advance the humanitarian CVA agenda at the country, regional and global levels.

Considering this link and the level of interest and influence of Colombia in the Americas region, CALP and the local CWG of Colombia developed a series of joint "Cash Week" events in the cities of Cucuta, Medellín and Bogotá, to identify specific topics of interest for each territory. This selection was made to understand the organizations' experiences iwith CVA at the local level and how it is articulated at the national level.