For more than twenty-five years, humanitarian organisations have struggled to preserve their digital archives and records, as they often operate in fast-paced, low-resource emergency environments where long-term record keeping is difficult to prioritise. This session will examine the key factors that threaten the survival of future humanitarian archives, including technological vulnerabilities, a sector-wide reluctance to engage with archival practice, and the temporary, highly collaborative nature of humanitarian work. These longstanding challenges have been pushed to a critical point by recent funding cuts across the sector. We will consider the potential consequences of losing the digital archives and records, not only for humanitarian organisations themselves, but for global historical and accountability efforts.
The session will introduce a proposed response: the Digital Humanitarian Archives Toolkit. Designed for staff working in a wide range of roles—from executive leadership to field operations—the toolkit requires no prior archival knowledge. It provides practical guidance to help organisations create sustainable, useful digital archives from the records they generate in both field and office settings. The author will present a technical overview of the toolkit followed by a practical demonstration and an interactive feedback segment.