5.3 Data and information collection and reporting

The IMO collects a range of data for both internal and external reporting. He or she should establish and communicate a regular reporting system where field coordinators input data from CARE’s response to ensure that the IMO can report in a timely manner both within CARE and to external parties (donors, clusters and others). This is particularly important for Cluster reporting, which has its own timelines for submission into its ‘4Ws’ [1] reporting.

An important part of establishing information flows involves socialising the use of data collection templates (such as those that collect SADD – see below), and facilitating the process (via Field Coordinators or MEAL staff) to ensure that field teams understand the need to collect this data and are aware of how to collect it using the template provided.

As the emergency progresses, the frequency of reporting both within CARE (i.e. for sitreps) and externally (i.e. cluster 4Ws reporting) will decrease. Field teams and the CO generally must be informed of these changing reporting timelines, to reduce their workloads and enable them to focus on responding in their respective areas.

[1]4Ws: Who, What, Where & When is a global tool used to capture data and generate information products such as maps and table of achievements to date

For general reporting on the outreach of a response an individual should be counted only once, no matter how many interventions s/he/they benefit/s from. The response team should use deductive methods to eliminate duplications in the total number of people reached by all interventions of the response. There may be two or more interventions providing assistance to the same population groups several times over the course of a response. In this case, the number of beneficiaries may overlap and data collection by intervention can lead to double counting when reporting on the whole response. In case of an overlap between two or more sectors covering the same population, in the same area, please indicate the highest figure reached by one of the sectors.  Record figures for each sector separately for monitoring and evaluation purposes, but never add them together unless they are all geographically separate activities.

To prevent double counting, it is important to design an appropriate monitoring and reporting formats as early as possible in the response cycle to prevent double counting (see M&E guidance in the CI toolkit).

Report beneficiaries of interventions that have taken place: The planned target beneficiaries or registered people of concern cannot be reported as actual beneficiaries if they have not received the actual service or assistance planned.

For further information on how to report population data please refer to Annex 42.12