Forced Displacement

Forced displacement is a development challenge, not only a humanitarian concern. The number of people forcibly displaced from their homes, regions, and countries increased sharply around 2010. By 2010, nearly 44 million people were forcibly displaced, the highest number in 15 years. Since then, this number has only grown, at the end of June 2024,  the number of people forcibly displaced across the world was 122.6 million Also:

Among the over 122 million 32 million were registered refugees under UNHCR, 8 million asylum seekers, 6 million Palestinian refugees under UNRWA mandate, 5.8 million others in need of international protection and 72.1 million were internally displaced -- While the international spotlight is on refugees who cross international borders, many forcibly displaced people remain displaced within their own country.  By June 2024, internal displacements accounted for three in five  of all forcibly displaced people. An estimated total of 4.7 million people were newly displaced in their own countries in 2024. Nine in 10 of these occurred in Sudan, Myanmar, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ukraine, Haiti and Mozambique.

Sixty-six percent of refugees had been displaced for five or more years at the end of June 2024 –When people are displaced for a long time, their needs morph from emergency into long-term development needs: jobs, education for displaced children, and the legal frameworks and policies that can make all this possible. These needs are shared by all long-term forcibly displaced people.

Seventy-one percent of refugees are hosted in developing countries – These countries are already struggling to reach their own development goals, and accommodating the sudden arrival of vulnerable newcomers presents a challenge for host governments and puts pressure on their ability to deliver basic services and infrastructure. Given these added pressures, host communities need support, too. 

Forcibly displaced people are particularly vulnerable to food insecurity: millions of them come from countries affected by food crises and in 2024 65 percent of acutely food-insecure people lived in fragile or conflict-affected situations. On top of this, climate change is increasingly intersecting with forced displacement and has the potential to amplify the movements of people within countries and across borders.

Last Updated: Apr 28, 2025

Recognizing that most situations of forced displacement have become protracted, the World Bank Group emphasizes in its Strategy for Fragility, Conflict, and Violence the importance of taking, from the outset, a medium-term development perspective with a view to addressing the socioeconomic needs and aspirations of those forcibly displaced and their host communities.

The 2023 World Development Report (WDR): Migrants, Refugees and Societies provides more explicit guidance on policy actions that:

• encourage refugees’ internal mobility to enable them to move to places with better job opportunities and services;

• promote refugees’ self-reliance by providing predictable and secure terms of stay, right to work, and incentives for the private sector to create jobs; 

• deliver services to refugees through national systems; and

• strengthen institutional and financial arrangements.

The WDR calls for progress in countries of origin to address root causes of forced displacement, as well as to support voluntary repatriation and reintegration. And recognizing that few countries provide external financing and resettlement opportunities, the WDR also calls for determined international efforts to strengthen responsibility-sharing.

The 2021 paper A Development Approach to Conflict-Induced Internal Displacement explores how the WBG can ensure that internally displaced persons (IDPs) benefit more from existing development financing through policy dialogue, sector work, and safeguards. Specifically, it does not call for dedicated financing for IDPs and their hosts, and instead it recommends applying an “IDP lens” across the entire WBG portfolio to ensure that these communities do not face discrimination and exclusion in their access to development benefits. 

Through its development approach to forced displacement, the Bank:

• complements the emergency relief activities of humanitarian organizations

• focuses on addressing longer-term, social, and economic challenges --especially jobs and education-- and on closing gender gaps by empowering women and girls

• benefits both the forcibly displaced and their hosts. 

Going forward, the World Bank, UNHCR and other partners will be working together to implement the Sustainable Responses approach to forced displacement, in line with the Global Compact on Refugees. This strategy focuses on moving from short-term aid to medium- and long-term government-led solutions that foster self-reliance and resilience among displaced and host community people, while supporting durable solutions like voluntary return, resettlement, and local integration.

Financing

For low-income host countries, the International Development Association (IDA) provides financing through the Window for Host communities and Refugees (WHR) for operations that specifically target these groups in low-income countries.

Under IDA 20, the World Bank has a dedicated financing window to support projects that benefit refugees and host communities, for a total of $2.4 billion. Eighteen refugee-hosting countries are eligible for such financing. IDA 21 is expected to continue supporting countries based on its development mandate and comparative advantage as a development institution.  The World Bank’s scorecard includes an indicator to track progress on the number of displaced and host community people provided with services and livelihoods through its support. 

Middle-income countries hosting large numbers of refugees may access funds though the Global Concessional Financing Facility (GCFF), an international partnership launched with the UN and the Islamic Development Bank and managed by the WB that provides concessional financing for development projects that benefit refugees and host communities. So far, the GCFF has provided more than $987 million in grants to unlock $7.9 billion in concessional finance for Armenia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador Jordan, Lebanon, and Moldova. 

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) is leading efforts to engage the private sector in supporting refugees and hosts. IFC works with the World Bank, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and other partners to identify private sector solutions and opportunities for refugees and their host communities. It has four aims: creating jobs by boosting access to finance and entrepreneurship, improving the delivery of basic services like education and energy, encouraging business-friendly policies in refugee-hosting areas, and sharing lessons learned while deepening partnerships.

Data and Analytics

Research at the World Bank Group aims to build the evidence base on addressing the social and economic aspects of forced displacement. Better data and analytics help to inform policies and refine the targeting of development programs that can improve the lives of affected people.

The World Bank-UNHCR Joint Data Center on Forced Displacement (JDC) seeks to ensure effective, reliable, publicly available data to inform decision-making for both the development and humanitarian communities; and to improve the collection, analysis and public dissemination of household level socioeconomic data on those who are forcibly displaced. 

Data collected with the JDC’s support has informed some $3 billion in development program funding across 10 countries, including Bangladesh, Chad, Colombia, and Yemen, with funds from IDA, similar World Bank initiatives, and from other development institutions.  The JDC’s efforts are moving the needle on policy making. In Ethiopia, for example, new data helped inform the government’s directive to let recognized refugees and asylum seekers work in formal sectors.

Last Updated: Apr 28, 2025

Before 2016, most of the WBG's work on forced displacement was limited to analytical and advisory work financed through trust funds.  After the launch of the GCFF in 2016 and financing through IDA's Regional Sub-window for Refugees and Host Communities became available in 2018, the number of projects focused on forced displacement began to grow rapidly. This increase in operations has been accompanied by an expanded data and analytics program.

The World Bank developed in 2020, through a consultative process, a Refugee Policy Review Framework (RPRF) to provide a methodology for systematically reviewing the refugee policy and institutional environments in countries eligible for funding from IDA's Window for Host Communities and Refugees. There have been significant refugee policy developments in all of these countries and, while many of these had been initiated years earlier, others are correlated with the eligibility process for additional funding from the Bank.

The report “Estimating Poverty among Refugee Populations: A Cross Survey Imputation Exercise for Chad”, produced by the Building the Evidence on Forced Displacement Program, developed new approaches for measuring poverty of refugees in a context where comparable welfare data for refugees and nationals did not exist. The research has the potential to be scaled up and used to inform programs for other refugee populations.

The IFC’s Digital Data Corridors initiative allows financial institutions to work electronically across borders and receive international credit histories, identity verification, and bank transaction data in real time. With this information, Ukrainian refugees who ran successful small businesses in their country and were told their credit history was insufficient to obtain financing in their host countries, can now get easier access to credit cards, loans, and other services.

In Bangladesh, the Additional Financing for the Health Sector Support Project has supported immunizations for over 87,000 displaced Rohingya children, has provided access to women-friendly services on sexual and reproductive health and rights and on gender-based violence for over 408,000 displaced Rohingya women and girls, and has increased from 4 to 98 the number of  facilities providing an appropriate mix of family planning methods.

In Ethiopia, the Economic Opportunities Project provided the impetus and financing for the adoption of the Refugees Proclamation, a new law granting more rights to refugees, which was passed in 2019. The Directives established since the passage of the Proclamation have enabled over 2,000 refugees to access residence permits for the first time, including under the Urban Productive Safety Net Project, where refugees and host communities have been engaged in public works and livelihoods activities. The support has helped improve incomes and social cohesion of refugees and host communities in targeted households.

In Chad, an IDA grant has provided, through the Refugees and Host Communities Project,  cash transfers reaching over 70,000 beneficiary households, including 21,000 refugees, between 2018 and 2022. The project is also supporting the capacity building of the National Commission for Refugees (CNARR) to execute its tasks in the refugee camps, benefitting over 200,000 refugees. Separately, the World Bank-UNHCR Joint Data Center on Forced Displacement in Copenhagen, Denmark, supported the Government of Chad to conduct a series of surveys on Chadian and refugee households. Insights from the analytical work helped the government design and pass an inclusive Asylum Law in December 2020, guaranteeing refugees freedom of mobility and equal access to health, education, and justice.

The Development Response to Displacement Impacts Project (DRDIP) is a $630 million regional operation in the Horn of Africa covering Djibouti, Kenya, Uganda, and Ethiopia. The project seeks to mitigate the social, economic, and environmental impacts of protracted refugee presence while also maximizing the opportunities offers. Between 2017 and mid-2023, 5.5 million people, of whom 53 percent are women, have benefited from improved access to basic services such as education, health, water, and sanitation. Livelihood activities have supported over 285,000 people with business grants and training on entrepreneurship, with 150,000 beneficiaries reporting an increase in income. 1,751 infrastructure subprojects targeting water, health and education facilities, and roads and markets have been completed, and another 595 are currently under construction.  397,000 people have been provided access to renewable energy. An additional $3.4 million in funding was provided for the project in Kenya in December 2022 to cover cost increases for schools, health facilities, and water systems subprojects caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A $180 million second phase in Ethiopia commenced in October 2022 and will run until 2027.

Between 2018 and 2023, the Niger Refugees and Host Communities Support Project (PARCA) directly benefited over 1.12 million refugees, internally displaced persons (IDPs), returnees and host communities across its 1,185 geolocated project sites in 18 communes (of which the Government of Niger and the UNHCR classify 11 as fragile) across five regions of Agadez, Diffa, Maradi, Tahoua, and Tillaberi.  Of these, 275,930 are refugees (of whom 244,856 have improved access to public services, and 31,074 have improved access to economic opportunities); and 331,550 are women (of whom 297,305 have improved access to public services, and 34,245 have improved access to economic opportunities).

A total of 373,318 patients benefitted from the 20 newly constructed or renovated functional health centers; 298,261 people benefitted from the 61 newly constructed or renovated functional water points; and 18,882 primary school students use the 148 newly constructed or renovated classrooms.

The PARCA project supported newly constructed infrastructure or renovated 98 other functional infrastructures, including 23 commercial infrastructures that support the local economy, for example, the Telemces cattle market that helped revitalize the surrounding area and benefits 277,203 people. In addition, the 66.6 kilometers of road improvements between Taza and Tillia in the Tahoua region halved the overall travel time from eight hours to four hours between Tahoua city and Tillia.

Income-generating activities improved the livelihoods of 77,847 beneficiaries (including 31,074 refugees and 34,245 women) through a training package and a one-time mobile cash transfer. For example, women in Diffa city doubled the value of corn in October 2022, which they purchased 20,000 FCFA (US$ 32.70 equivalent) per bag and sold as corn flour for 40,000 FCFA (US$ 65.40 equivalent) per bag.

PARCA also strengthened local governance in 15 communes by integrating refugee and IDP needs into 15 annual municipal investment plans over the past five years.

The $750m Second Colombia Fiscal Sustainability, Competitiveness, and Migration Development Policy Financing (DPF), with $31.5m grant financing from the Global Concessional Financing Facility (GCFF), supported the government to implement policies to regularize and integrate Venezuelan migrants into Colombia. A World Bank report informed the government’s policy actions to improve the migrants’ access to basic services and jobs. Some 281,557 migrants (nearly 50 percent were women) obtained Special Permanent Stay Permits (Permiso Especial de Permanencia, or PEP). The permits helped regularize the migrants’ legal status, ensuring that they had access to education, healthcare, clean water and sanitation, housing and childcare services. They also enabled 76,744 job-seeking migrants to get services from the National Employment Agency.

From 2015-2018, with a trust fund grant of $10 million, the Lebanon Municipal Services Emergency Project assisted selected municipalities most affected by the influx of Syrian refugees to provide reliable and quality municipal services and social initiatives.  The project helped to provide and distribute 12,423m³ of municipal water per day to 124,572 people, it collected 79 tons per day of solid waste for 42,584 beneficiaries, and enhanced mobility for 62,481 beneficiaries in 14 municipalities by connecting and rehabilitating existing roads to improve access to markets, schools, clinics, playgrounds, and community facilities.

Last Updated: Jun 25, 2024

The WBG maintains partnerships with humanitarian, development and private sector actors around forced displacement to maximize impact on the ground.

The WBG’s cooperation with UNHCR has become a solid strategic and operational partnership characterized by each organization’s comparative advantages. They complement each other in implementing projects, coordinating policy dialogue with governments, and producing joint assessments, data analysis, and evidence-building research. 

IFC’s Joint Initiative with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) brings together UNHCR’s protection mandate and knowledge of refugee and host communities, with IFC’s expertise in private sector development to design and implement inclusive economic opportunities in forced displacement contexts. 

The WBG has engaged with countries and has complemented UNHCR and other UN agencies – IOM, UNRWA, UNICEF, FAO, WFP, and UN Women– and humanitarian efforts with a development-oriented response to refugee crises that recognizes the protracted nature of displacement, and helps expand access to jobs, infrastructure, and services for refugees and their host communities. 

The World Bank is also part of the Partnership for Improving Prospects for Host Communities and Forcibly Displaced Persons (PROSPECTS) initiated by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The partnership leverages the comparative advantages of five humanitarian and development agencies (IFC, ILO, UNHCR, UNICEF and the World Bank) to help transform the response to forced displacement crises through global, regional, and country-level programs. The World Bank’s efforts under the PROSPECTS program include over 40 country-level, regional and global activities addressing the challenges of refugee education, protection, employment, and livelihoods. 

Last Updated: Apr 28, 2025