Appendix D: Glossary¶
This glossary gathers the Rotary, humanitarian and economic terms used in the book. Each definition follows the one given in the chapter shown in parentheses, which explains the term in detail. Rotary Foundation amounts, caps, rates and deadlines are not included: Chapter 10 and Appendix E give them, with the date of the document that sets them. Organization acronyms are listed at the end of this appendix.
Numbers¶
3W, 4W (Who does What Where): a table of which organizations are present, by sector and by location, kept by each cluster and compiled by OCHA; the 4W variant adds "when" (Chapter 12).
A¶
Anticipatory action: action taken before a forecast hazard strikes, based on forecasts and on criteria agreed in advance. In Bangladesh in 2020, it protected tools and livestock without speeding up the return to work (Chapter 15).
B¶
Baseline: a snapshot of the situation taken before the project; after a disaster, it also records what people remember of the time before (Chapter 13).
Build back better: using the post-disaster phases to increase resilience, livelihoods included (United Nations, 2017). Its limit, according to the PDNA guidelines: it brings no fundamental change in the area's level of development (Chapter 2).
Business continuity plan: a plan that describes how a business resumes after an interruption; it says how to restart, not how to avoid being destroyed (Chapter 15).
C¶
Cadre of Technical Advisers: volunteer Rotarians who review, monitor and evaluate Foundation-funded projects and, on request, advise on their design. One of its members visits some global grants while the project is under way (Chapters 6, 10, and 11).
CALP Network: an international network devoted to cash and voucher assistance, author of The State of the World's Cash 2023 (Chapter 5).
Cash for production: cash for work paid by the volume of work done, for example by the cubic meter of rubble in Port-au-Prince in 2011 (Chapter 7).
Cash for work: wages paid for short work of public benefit, at a rate agreed among the organizations involved, with an exit planned from the start (Chapters 4 and 7).
Cash transfers: aid paid in cash; the default option when markets work, with risks opposite to those of in-kind aid (Chapter 5).
Cash Working Group: the forum where organizations align daily wages and transfer values (Chapter 12).
Catastrophe microinsurance: small-value insurance tied to an MFI's loans, like the one Fonkoze launched after the 2010 earthquake (Chapters 6 and 15).
CED (community economic development): a Foundation area of focus governed by a policy statement and guidelines dated April 2024; the subject of the CED guide (Chapters 5 and 10).
CHS (Core Humanitarian Standard): a quality and accountability standard (2024 edition) whose commitments are written from the point of view of the people affected. Without recognized verification, an organization may only write "We are working towards the application of the CHS" (Chapters 3, 12, and 13).
Cluster: humanitarian coordination by sector, created in 2005 by the Inter-Agency Standing Committee. The early recovery cluster led everywhere by UNDP is outdated: since 2016, recovery has run through coordination among clusters (Chapters 2 and 12).
Code of Policies (The Rotary Foundation Code of Policies, Rotary Code of Policies): the collected policies of the Foundation Trustees and of the Rotary International Board, cited in their October 2026 versions (Chapters 2, 10, and 11).
Community assessment: a study of a community's needs, carried out with the community; without one, the Foundation does not consider an economic development project (Chapters 3 and 10).
Contiguum: humanitarian, recovery and development interventions running at the same time, as opposed to the "continuum," where they follow one another (Chapter 2).
Contribution (not attribution): the honest way to state a result when there is no comparison with people who were not helped: the project "contributed" to the change (Chapter 13).
Cooperating organization: a governmental or nongovernmental organization, or an educational institution, that takes part in a global grant project, which must remain "initiated, controlled, and managed by Rotary members" (Chapters 11 and 12).
Cooperative: a business owned and governed by its members. The Japanese cases show it organizing the sharing of scarce tools or owning shared equipment; no study proves that it withstands disasters better (Chapter 8).
Core Humanitarian Standard: see CHS.
D¶
DaLA (Damage, Loss and Needs Assessment): the World Bank's method for assessing damage, losses and needs (2010), based on the ECLAC distinction that the PDNA also uses (Chapter 3).
Damage: total or partial destruction of physical assets, valued at replacement cost at pre-disaster prices (Chapter 3).
DDF (District Designated Fund): the share of Annual Fund contributions that the SHARE system makes available to the district. It funds the district grant and can be committed to a global grant, matched by the World Fund (Chapters 10 and 11).
Disaster guide, CED guide: the first books of the trilogy, Rotary Club Guide: Autonomous Disaster Response and Rotary Club Guide: Community Economic Development (Introduction).
Disaster Response Grant (DRG): a Foundation grant for relief and recovery after a recent natural disaster, requested only by the districts in the affected area; a bridge during the shift (Chapters 4 and 10).
District: all the clubs in a region, led by a governor who changes every year; the district holds the qualification and is the only one that can request disaster response grants and district grants (Chapters 2 and 11).
District grant: a Foundation grant funded by DDF, for small, short activities, such as a community assessment or a renovation (Chapter 10).
DNA-RAG (Disaster Network of Assistance Rotary Action Group): a Rotary Action Group devoted to disasters, cited by the Foundation Code. Its public mission runs from preparedness to support for long-term recovery (Chapters 2 and 11).
Do No Harm: a framework designed for conflicts by CDA Collaborative Learning Projects (2004), the fourth core standard of the MERS. The five-question filter in Chapter 5 is a proposal of this book (Chapter 5).
DRFC (district Rotary Foundation chair): chair of the district Rotary Foundation committee. The DRFC co-signs the use of DDF and confirms that global grant applications are complete and that clubs are qualified; the sitting governor cannot hold the role. Not to be confused with the grants subcommittee (Chapters 10 and 11).
E¶
Early recovery: an approach that meets the recovery needs that arise during the humanitarian phase, with mechanisms aligned with development. "Early Recovery is never just a 'phase'" (Chapter 2).
EMMA (Emergency Market Mapping and Analysis): a toolkit from Oxfam, the IRC and Practical Action (2010) for a "rapid, rough and ready, good-enough" analysis of a few critical markets (Chapters 3 and 5).
Exit strategy: a plan that organizes the withdrawal of outside resources without compromising the results: phase down, phase out, or phase over (Chapter 14).
F¶
Farmer field schools: a training method for groups of farmers promoted by the FAO, which notes that they are not the first point of intervention after a disaster (Part III).
Forecast-based financing: according to the IFRC, early actions funded automatically as soon as a threshold set in advance is reached (Chapter 15).
Four phases: before, during, after, always; a breakdown specific to the trilogy (Chapters 1 and 2).
G¶
Global grant: the Foundation's main tool for a recovery project, carried by two sponsors. It pays for no expense incurred before its approval and for no new construction of a place where people live or work (Chapter 10).
H¶
Host club: the club in the affected area, local sponsor of a global grant; it assesses, designs the project with the community, and oversees implementation (Chapter 11).
I¶
Index insurance: farm insurance triggered by a measurement, such as rainfall, rather than by assessing each loss; little demand at market price, according to a 2016 review (Chapter 15).
International sponsor: a club or district in another country, the second primary sponsor of a global grant; it co-funds the grant and co-signs the reports (Chapters 10 and 11).
L¶
Levers: money, skills, markets and places, the four means of restarting the economy in Part III (Chapters 6 to 9).
Link: a stage in a value chain and the player who holds it; the broken link is often in the middle of the chain (Chapter 8).
Local economic recovery: an ILO approach (2010) that restarts an area through supply and demand and favors local purchasing (Chapter 9).
Losses: changes in economic flows (lost income, higher costs). They last until full recovery and can exceed the damage, or occur with no damage at all (Chapter 3).
M¶
MAG (Market Analysis Guidance): an ICRC and IFRC guide (2014): the larger the intervention, the more cash risks inflation and in-kind aid risks deflation (Chapters 4 and 5).
MARKit: a price monitoring guide (2015) based on a few traders surveyed each week (Chapter 5).
MERS (Minimum Economic Recovery Standards): the SEEP Network standards (third edition, 2017), companions to Sphere. Their "key indicators" judge the quality of a program, not incomes (Chapters 5 and 13).
MFI, microfinance institution: a professional lender of small sums, often also a collector of savings. The club does not lend itself: it funds and checks an MFI that knows its clients (Chapter 6).
MIRA (Multi-Sector Initial Rapid Assessment): an overview of needs by area, in the first weeks (Chapter 3).
N¶
Needs: what it takes to restart. The value of damage is used to estimate reconstruction needs, the value of losses to estimate economic recovery needs (Chapter 3).
P¶
PCMA (Pre-Crisis Market Analysis): a guide from the IRC, Oxfam and USAID (2016); with a baseline built in normal times, an update is enough after the shock (Chapters 3 and 15).
PDNA (Post-Disaster Needs Assessment): an assessment by sector, carried out at the government's request with the European Union, the United Nations and the World Bank (Chapters 2 and 3).
Productive assets: goods used to earn a living (boat, nets, machine, tools, stock, livestock). The MERS call for replacing them only once the population has stabilized (Chapters 4, 5, and 8).
Programs of Scale: a single grant awarded each year by competition to a multiyear program with outside partners; out of reach for a club on its own (Chapter 10).
Q¶
Qualification: the process that ensures that districts and clubs have "the appropriate legal, financial, and stewardship controls in place." One late report blocks any new application (Chapter 11).
R¶
RAG: see Rotary Action Group.
RAGCED (Rotary Action Group for Community Economic Development): the Rotary Action Group for community economic development. The recovery mandate its chair reports is described in no public document, and the handoff from DNA-RAG to RAGCED is a proposal of this book (Chapters 2 and 11).
RAM (Rapid Assessment for Markets): ICRC and IFRC guidelines (2014) for practitioners who have little time (Chapter 3).
Recommendation 205: the ILO Employment and Decent Work for Peace and Resilience Recommendation (2017), addressed to governments (Chapters 1 and 7).
Recovery: the restoration, and where possible the improvement, of the livelihoods, activities and assets of a disaster-affected community (Introduction and Chapter 2).
Recovery file: the pieces the club builds chapter by chapter, from the assessment form to the preparedness plan (Introduction and Appendix B).
Regional grants officer: a member of Rotary staff in charge of grants, who can assess whether an idea is eligible before the application (Chapters 10 and 11).
Remittances: money sent by emigrants to their families, which often arrives before aid (Chapter 6).
Rescheduling: rearranging a loan's repayment schedule after the shock, case by case, preferred to writing it off (Chapter 6).
Rotary Action Group (RAG): an international group with expertise that helps clubs and districts carry out projects. It "is not an agency of RI" and contacts clubs only with the governor's express permission: it is up to the club to call it (Chapters 2 and 11).
S¶
Savings group: a group whose members save together and lend to one another (village associations, rotating savings groups). Its social fund does not hold when everyone is hit at once (Chapters 6 and 15).
Seed fair: a fair where farmers exchange their vouchers for the seeds of their choice (Chapter 8).
Sendai Framework: the United Nations Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030, which calls for preparing recovery before the disaster (Chapters 2 and 15).
Service Project Center: a Rotary resource that A Guide to Global Grants (2025) lists among the forms of support for preparing a project (Appendix E).
SHARE: the system that splits Annual Fund contributions between the District Designated Fund and the World Fund (Chapter 10).
Shift: the move, decided with the district and the authorities, from "saving lives" to "rebuilding lives." This book bases it on the five indicators of the disaster guide, a tool specific to the trilogy, and on two economic signals; no international list exists (Chapter 4).
Shock-responsive social protection: using a public social protection program in the face of a shock, by increasing benefits (vertical expansion) or the number of beneficiaries (horizontal expansion) (Chapter 15).
Sphere: the Sphere Association handbook (2018), which brings together the Humanitarian Charter, the Core Humanitarian Standard and minimum standards (Chapter 5).
Standard measures: the indicators in the Foundation's monitoring and evaluation supplement (April 2015), including businesses supported, people trained and jobs created (Chapter 13).
Start-up grant: capital paid once to an entrepreneur; one-time, announced as such, preferably not by the lender (Chapter 6).
Survivorship bias: the flaw of surveys that question only businesses still alive, and so underestimate closures (Chapters 1 and 13).
T¶
Terms and Conditions: the conditions specific to each Foundation grant, cited in their July 2026 versions; operational rules that can change at any time (Chapter 10).
Three employment tracks: stabilize incomes, restart the local economy, establish lasting employment; a model carried over to disasters by Recommendation 205 (Chapters 1 and 2).
V¶
Value chain: the stages that take a product from producer to customer (inputs, production, storage, processing, transport, sale), each with its people and its money (Chapter 8).
Vouchers: coupons exchanged with merchants or at a fair for goods chosen by the person receiving aid (Chapters 5 and 8).
W¶
World Fund: the share of SHARE contributions managed by the Foundation, which matches DDF committed to global grants (Chapter 10).
Organization acronyms¶
| Acronym | Organization |
|---|---|
| ADB | Asian Development Bank |
| CGAP | Consultative Group to Assist the Poor |
| ECLAC | United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean |
| FAO | Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations |
| IASC | Inter-Agency Standing Committee |
| ICRC | International Committee of the Red Cross |
| IFRC | International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies |
| ILO | International Labour Organization; also its secretariat, the International Labour Office |
| IRC | International Rescue Committee |
| JICA | Japan International Cooperation Agency |
| OCHA | United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs |
| ODI | Overseas Development Institute |
| UNDP | United Nations Development Programme |
| UNDRR | United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction |
| USAID | United States Agency for International Development |
| WFP | World Food Programme |