The Humanitarian Standards Partnership (HSP) releases a new website and navigation tool to make humanitarian standards more accessible.

New website

New HSP website

The HSP is a network of standard-setting initiatives that supports quality and accountability in humanitarian action by promoting the development and harmonisation of standards.

The new HSP website (hspstandards.org) is a portal to products and services provided by the HSP and individual HSP partners. Visit the resources page to browse case studies, COVID-19 guidance and more. Visit the training page if you wish to study humanitarian standards or attend, facilitate, or organise a course or workshop involving humanitarian standards content. Select the facilitation team for your event from various HSP trainer rosters.

Sphere worked closely with BarrierBreak (http://www.barrierbreak.com), a third-party accessibility auditor, when designing and building the new website. Sphere is committed to maintaining a high standard of accessibility as the website is updated and developed in the future.

New HSP Navigation tool

HSP Navigation tool

The HSP currently offers nine sets of standards which focus on Water, sanitation, and hygiene promotion (WASH); Shelter; Food security; Nutrition; Camp management; Inclusion of older people and people with disabilities; Education; Livestock; Economic recovery, Market analysis; and Agriculture.

But the humanitarian sector does not – or should not – work in silos. What if you’re interested in taking a multi-sectoral approach to assessments, cash programmes or environmental considerations? What if you’re interested to learn more about inclusion or WASH, which are the focus of a handbook (or chapter) but are also covered in other handbooks?

The HSP Navigation tool helps you to quickly find relevant information across multiple handbooks, by offering a set of thematic entry points. Each Mapped theme starts with a summary of how the theme is incorporate across the HSP portfolio and continues with a detailed index of key reference points and useful tools.

The HSP Navigation tool is a dynamic resource designed for online use and built onto the Interactive Handbook platform. We will add new Mapped themes, and as HSP handbooks are revised, we’ll update the existing ones.

To request a new theme or for any other feedback, please contact hsp@spherestandards.org.

Accessibility enhancements

Following the accessibility audit that Sphere completed in 2021, a number of the issues identified on the Interactive Handbook have been addressed in the recent upgrade.

Interactive Handbook

The online home of humanitarian standards now looks better, is easier to use, and offers the Minimum Standards for Camp Management (MSCM) for download as a dyslexia friendly PDF.