Quality and Accountability

QualityandAccountability

The operations of Finn Church Aid (FCA) are planned and executed by professional staff with a wide range of expertise and contextual knowledge of our operational environments. We do regular monitoring, evaluation and risk management and base our work on international and internal codes, principles and standards of quality and accountability. 

We have zero-tolerance for sexual exploitation and all forms of abuse.

We abide by the International Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Humanitarian Responses (Sphere Standards) in the quality assurance of our work.

We are a member of the CHS Alliance and the first Finnish organisation to be certified against the Core Humanitarian Standard (CHS).

We implement a safeguarding policy to protect children and vulnerable adults and ensure their best interest.

We require our staff to sign a Code of Conduct that obliges every individual staff member to act ethically and responsibly and respect gender equality and human rights.

We follow the global Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism Policy.

We operate according to good governance and accounting practices across our organisation. 

Complaint handling 

If you think that we have not lived up to our commitments or have witnessed misconduct from our staff member, it is your right to make a complaint

Learning, evaluating and sharing knowledge 

Our local partners are the experts of their context, and we select our partners with care. We support our partners in developing their operations and competence and ensuring that they have a safe and healthy working environment. We invest in developing the professional skills of all our staff and partners and learn together.  

At the beginning of any program, we carefully assess the operational environment, related risks, local resources and other factors that can affect our work. We consider other actors and their objectives and aim to complement them with our added value, thematic knowledge, experience and connections to international and domestic networks. 

Together with our partners, we ensure that local people and communities participate in planning, executing and evaluating projects that affect them. The participation of beneficiaries and the surrounding communities strengthen local responsibility and ownership, which helps projects achieve lasting results. 

We regularly monitor the progress of our programmes and projects with our partners. In addition to follow-ups, we carry out profound programme and project evaluations conducted by independent experts at regular intervals. 

The follow-ups and evaluations keep us informed whether our work is producing the desired results or not. With the help of evaluations, we can make changes to our programmes as early as possible when needed to ensure that we meet our objectives. Both positive and negative experiences help us learn to work better and more efficiently. 

Our internal reporting and evaluation system allows us to share lessons learnt across the entire organisation and with our partners. Our donors, such as the Ministry for Foreign Affairs Finland, also monitor and evaluate us.  

Procurement 

A significant part of the funding for development cooperation and humanitarian work is used to purchase various goods and services to support the most vulnerable people. We ensure that beneficiaries get the maximum benefit from the funds donated to our work while conducting ethical and ecologically sustainable procurement activities. 

Our procurement of good and services regards values, such as good governance, the fair treatment of employees and the minimisation of environmental consequences, alongside financial aspects. We design our projects to strengthen local expertise and livelihoods and purchase locally produced goods and services when possible, which increases the efficiency and sustainability of our work. Particularly after disasters, this helps local livelihoods to recover and people to secure their subsistence.  

We conduct procurements through standardised, open procedures where all tenderers are treated equally without discrimination. FCA’s purchases are carried out in compliance with the Finnish Public Procurement Act. Any acquisitions that exceed the threshold value prescribed by the Act are reported through the HILMA notification channel (www.hilma.fi) maintained by the Finnish Ministry of Employment and the Economy. 

Contact information: 
Finn Church Aid 
P.O.Box 210 (Eteläranta 8) 
FI-00131 Helsinki 


procurement@kirkonulkomaanapu.fi 

Open bidding procedures 

Currently we do not have any open bidding procedures.