The World Bank Group’s Crisis Preparedness and Response Toolkit enables countries to respond faster to crisis, protect development gains, and build resilience in a world where crises have become the new normal. Approved in February 2024, the CPRT includes a range of innovative tools to help countries strengthen preparedness, respond to crises and build lasting resilience and ultimately contributing to achieving a world free of poverty on a livable planet.
Through the Crisis toolkit, the Bank provides more flexibility to help countries put in place more contingent resources and be better prepared for future crises. It also scales up access with speed to new financing for budget support when disasters hit, giving countries immediate access to money to manage the impact of a disaster and assist their citizens.
The Crisis Toolkit place crisis preparedness and response at the forefront of the development agenda, by offering countries transformative tools, drawing on lessons learned from earlier responses to crises. Countries can leverage these tools further by undertaking crisis preparedness reforms and other institution-strengthening measures. This will foster resilience in the long run.
What’s in the Toolkit
Fast access to financing for emergency response: This includes the Rapid Response Option (RRO), which allows countries to quickly repurpose and use up to 10% of their undisbursed Bank financing across the portfolios of Investment Lending and Program for Results to address emergency needs during a crisis. This can be done through Contingent Emergency Response Project (CERP) and Development Policy Financing (DPF) Catastrophe Draw Down Option (Cat DDO).
Substantially scaled-up access to pre-arranged and quick new financing for emergency response: The World Bank Group now provides additional flexibility to help countries put in place more contingent resources to be better prepared for future crises through the DPF Cat DDO and Investment Project Financing (IPF) DDO. It also expedites access to new financing for budget support when disasters hit through the scalable DPF, giving countries immediate access to financing to manage the impact of a disaster and support their citizens with fewer trade-offs between their development priorities and emergency financing needs.
Expanded catastrophe insurance: The World Bank Group offers all countries the option of embedding catastrophe bonds, insurance, and other risk management products into their Bank financing operations. Governments could then be eligible for a payout from insurance mechanisms in a crisis without taking on more debt. This approach mobilizes private capital and passes the risks of high-intensity but low-frequency disasters to international reinsurance and capital markets.
Pause in debt service: The World Bank Group has expanded the Climate Resilient Debt Clause (CRDC) to cover all existing loans in eligible countries (small islands and other small states), allowing borrowers to defer principal and interest payments with enabling fees covered by concessional resources. We have expanded also CRDC coverage to a wider spectrum of perils such as droughts, floods, and health emergencies caused by a biological event. We have also simplified and made the process faster for clients to apply to delay repayments by eliminating certain parametric triggers. Now, once a country has declared a national emergency following a catastrophic event, a request can immediately be submitted to the World Bank to defer payment on a loan.
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Last Updated: Aug 03, 2026