Forced Displacement

Forced displacement is a development challenge and not just a humanitarian concern. The number of people forcibly displaced from their homes, regions, and countries increased sharply around 2010 and since then, this number has only grown. At the end of June 2025, 117.3 million individuals worldwide remained forcibly displaced.

Sixty-seven percent of refugees originate from just five countries – Nearly seven out of ten refugees under UNHCR’s mandate and other people in need of international protection come from Venezuela, Syrian Arab Republic, Ukraine Afghanistan, and Sudan.

Thirty-four percent of refugees are hosted in five countries – Colombia, Germany, Turkey, the Islamic Republic of Iran and Uganda hosted over one-third of the world’s refugees and other people in need of international protection.

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.

Recognizing that most forced displacement is protracted, the World Bank Group’s Strategy for Fragility, Conflict, and Violence calls for adopting a medium‑term development approach from the outset to meet the socioeconomic needs and aspirations of forcibly displaced people and their host communities. The 2023 World Development Report (WDR): Migrants, Refugees and Societies urges progress in countries of origin to address root causes, and to support voluntary repatriation and reintegration.

The Bank’s development approach complements humanitarian emergency relief. Together with UNHCR and other partners, the World Bank is advancing a Sustainable Responses approach aligned with the Global Compact on Refugees. This shifts from short‑term aid to medium‑ and long‑term, government‑led solutions that promote self‑reliance and resilience for displaced and host populations, while enabling durable solutions such as 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). Under IDA20, $2.4 billion was allocated to WHR. With UNHCR, the Bank supported policy reforms in 12 of 17 IDA‑eligible countries to improve refugee access to services and jobs. IDA21 is expected to continue support in line with its development mandate. The World Bank’s scorecard tracks numbers of displaced and host community people receiving services and livelihoods support.
• For middle‑income host countries, the Global Concessional Financing Facility (GCFF)—a World Bank–hosted Financial Intermediary Fund—offers concessional financing to support the global public good of refugee hosting. The GCFF currently supports Armenia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Jordan, Lebanon, and Moldova, mobilizing over $1 billion in concessional loan financing from partner MDBs, benefiting at least 6.6 million refugees and 8.4 million host community members.
• The International Finance Corporation (IFC) leads private sector engagement, working with the World Bank, UNHCR, and others to identify private sector solutions and opportunities for refugees and host communities.

Data and Analytics

World Bank Group research builds the evidence base on the social and economic dimensions of forced displacement. The World Bank–UNHCR Joint Data Center on Forced Displacement (JDC) aims to ensure effective, reliable, publicly available data to inform development and humanitarian decision‑making, and to improve the collection, analysis, and dissemination of household‑level socioeconomic data on forcibly displaced populations.

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 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.