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It seems humanitarian donors are leaving civil society organizations - local and international - on the peripheries of the global COVID fight. That's a big mistake.
Let's look at where the money is going.
Let's look at where the money is going.
(As background, @PatrickSaez2 and I wrote a piece in early April expressing concern about this back after the first UN appeal - which proposed that 95% of the money go to the UN - was launched) https://www.cgdev.org/blog/faced-covid-19-humanitarian-system-should-rethink-its-business-model
The UN, INGOs, and local civil society all have vital roles in battling COVID. But as we argued in the piece, local orgs are the most crucial: they have a kind of local credibility and presence that international orgs can't match.
But so far, only the UN is being funded.
But so far, only the UN is being funded.
Of $2bn in reported funding, $1.5b is going to the UN.
Just 36.7m (with an m) has gone NGOs. Of that, only $1.6m is going to local/national NGOs.
Another $81.6m is going to the Red Cross/Crescent Federation, much of which is passed through to local RC societies.
Just 36.7m (with an m) has gone NGOs. Of that, only $1.6m is going to local/national NGOs.
Another $81.6m is going to the Red Cross/Crescent Federation, much of which is passed through to local RC societies.
So even including Federation funding as "local," donor support to local and int'l civil society groups amounts to ~7% of donor support to the UN. Remove the Federation and it's ~2%.
This points to a major weakness in the global humanitarian COVID response.
This points to a major weakness in the global humanitarian COVID response.
Multiple NGOs I am hearing from are unable to scale up efforts because they are not getting $$. Major bilateral donors (esp @usaid) are moving painfully slowly, and UN funding isn't being passed along to implementers.
Again, this checks out. Here's USAID's reported funding:
Again, this checks out. Here's USAID's reported funding:
Here's the UK:
And here's the EU (surprisingly limited funding so far):
Those are the big three humanitarian donors, and in the face of a crisis that requires a heavy local-first, frontline orientation, they are pooling their money predominantly through traditional UN partners. Who in turn don't seem to be moving quickly to allocate it downward.
So rather than using this as an opportunity - and frankly a necessity - to do business differently, humanitarian donors and large agencies are doubling down on an ill-suited business model.
It's disappointing, but it's also dangerous.
It's disappointing, but it's also dangerous.
We've seen the difference a few weeks' delay can make in outbreak trajectory. A robust early response, or its absence, can be the difference between cases in the hundreds, thousands, or hundreds of thousands. There are real consequences to slow disbursement.
Many donors are unable to issue grants directly to NGOs and have to use pass-through pooling mechanisms; that's a reality of humanitarian financing.
But in that case, it's vital that donors pool their funding through the most rapid and efficient mechanisms possible.
But in that case, it's vital that donors pool their funding through the most rapid and efficient mechanisms possible.
When it comes to financing local action, that's unlikely to mean funding through traditional UN agencies. Instead, donors should be leaning more heavily on country pooled funds or mechanisms like the @StartNetwork, which pass money more directly and accountably to local partners.
And where donors choose to fund UN agencies rather than a more direct intermediary mechanism, they need to be pressing hard for reporting on how much of that is being passed downward to local and int'l NGO partners, and how quickly.
(NB: all funding stats are pulled from OCHA's Financial Tracking Service page on the COVID response; link here: https://fts.unocha.org/emergencies/911/flows/2020)
