The Emergency Watchlist is the IRC’s assessment of the 20 countries at greatest risk of new humanitarian emergencies each year. It is based on an analytically rigorous process that deploys 65 quantitative and qualitative variables, as well as qualitative insights from the IRC’s experience of working in more than 50 countries around the world.
- Increase funding for climate adaptation. 50% of all public climate finance to developing countries should be allocated to adaptation by 2025; conflict and climate-impacted countries should receive a higher share of that adaptation finance, and 20% of that funding should flow to nongovernmental partners.
- Support anticipatory action for climate-vulnerable communities. Commit a minimum of 5% of humanitarian budgets to anticipatory action with a strategy to expand by 2030.
- Make climate funding accessible and equitable. Fulfill the $100 billion-per-year climate pledge for climate action in developing countries and ensure funding is accessible to a diverse range of partners.
- Increase the World Bank’s ability to work in complex emergencies by institutionalizing new funding and delivery partnerships with a wider range of actors, including the U.N., I/NGOs and women-led organizations (WLOs).
- States, donors and development banks should increase investment in inclusive social safety nets and cash responses, with a particular focus on Africa.
- U.N. member states should establish a new mechanism to forecast the humanitarian impacts of economic shocks, housed in the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
- Increase funding available to women-led organizations. Accelerate reforms to pooled funds and levels of funding channeled through feminist funds that are able to offer smaller, more flexible grants to local organizations, while holding humanitarian teams accountable for involving WLOs in response design and delivery.
- Bilateral donors and U.N. agencies should rethink approaches to compliance and capacity sharing to increase the ability of WLOs to compete for humanitarian funding.
- Development Assistance Committee donors must commit half of all bilateral official development assistance (ODA) to fragile and conflict-affected states. G7 donors should fulfill commitments to spend 0.7% of gross national income on ODA—a step that would create an additional $168 billion in ODA.
- Expand World Bank resources to drive action against extreme poverty. Donors should commit to triple International Development Association (IDA) funding by 2030.
- Creditors should explore current and new approaches to free financing to support humanitarian response, climate adaptation and social protection.
- Governments should systematically apply a protection-centered approach to reception processes to allow asylum seekers to find protection and access services, and reduce pressure on asylum systems.
- Multilateral development banks should support initiatives that offer displaced people real opportunities for self-reliance by supporting state-led regularization and integration plans—and accessible inclusive services.
- Donors should provide multi-year funding to meet the humanitarian and development needs of refugee and host communities, recognizing the specific needs of women and girls.
- U.N. member states committed to IHL should bring forward response mechanisms applied in Ukraine for new crises as part of a new “accountability menu,” for example by gathering evidence on violations of IHL and documenting and analyzing atrocities.
- Support the France-Mexico proposal to suspend permanent members’ use of the veto at the Security Council in cases of mass atrocities.
- Establish a new independent access organization to get the facts out about the denial of humanitarian access and catalyze action by global, regional and national-level policy makers.
How does the IRC use the Watchlist?
The IRC's Emergencies and Humanitarian Action Unit (EHAU) uses the annual Emergency Watchlist to identify which countries to prioritize for emergency preparedness support. Once a country appears on the Watchlist, the EHAU team will work with the relevant IRC program to develop an emergency preparedness plan, which sets out the practical steps IRC teams can take now to be ready before a new emergency hits, for example by prepositioning supplies or by identifying and vetting potential partner organizations.