The Challenge

Honduras has a per capita income of USD 2,890 and is considered a lower-middle income country. However, high income inequality means that around 60% of the population is living in poverty. Honduras is exposed to a number of high-level natural hazards, including floods, earthquakes, landslides, tsunami, volcanos, cyclones, extreme heat, and wildfires. Food insecurity is also a significant issue, with approximately 20% of the population undernourished.

UNICEF is working with the Government of Honduras to address a broad range of issues, including improving health, nutrition, education and social protection for vulnerable populations.

Addressing these challenges requires fast, reliable access to critical medical goods. However, in Honduras, the clearance process for healthcare imports involves up to 23 steps and can take between 5 to 8 weeks, depending on the product. Delays in processing permits by health and sanitation authorities can further slow down the release of essential goods, hampering the timely delivery of humanitarian assistance.

These delays stem from a complex and fragile system, where approvals are required on a per-consignment basis, documentary requirements can be unnecessarily exacting, public access to process information is limited and coordination among government agencies is sub-optimal.

What We Are Doing

The Alliance project in Honduras is part of the ADEPT programme, an Alliance–UNICEF partnership to reduce the time and cost of importing humanitarian aid, ensuring timely and equitable access for children and vulnerable populations.  

It aims to: 

  • Reduce delays in clearing health products for humanitarian use through process improvement and digitalisation. 
  • Improve information-sharing among government actors by strengthening coordination and using existing digital systems. 
  • Build sustainability by establishing a working group of government bodies, humanitarian organisations and the private sector.  

Process simplification will involve working with relevant regulatory agencies to streamline current procedures, including improving process documentation and replacing physical documents with electronic equivalents using available systems.  

The Alliance will also provide training on new digital processes, along with basic IT equipment and internet connectivity where needed.

The Impact

Reducing border friction will accelerate humanitarian assistance to vulnerable populations across the country. Successful implementation will improve the delivery of medical products for humanitarian purposes by:

  • Reducing pre-shipment processing times for health product documentation.
  • Improving understanding of processes, leading to fewer errors and delays.
  • Increasing visibility of approval processes and strengthening cooperation among ministries, agencies and Customs.
  • Lowering storage costs and reducing delays at the border.