The G7 has confirmed its commitment to supporting the scaling-up of anticipatory action and the growth of the Start Fund.
In its policy paper: G7 famine prevention and humanitarian crises compact, the G7 made commitments in five areas to lead international efforts to prevent famine and begin to stem the growth of humanitarian need.
Those five areas included: Address critical funding gaps; Promote humanitarian access, respect for international humanitarian law and protection of civilians; Scale-up anticipatory action; Partner with the World Bank Group and; Strengthen data and analysis.
As part of the section into scaling up anticipatory action, the G7 paper also made a commitment to supporting the growth of the Start Fund. The paper said:
There is compelling evidence that anticipating shocks and releasing pre-agreed funds in advance for activities to mitigate their impact, such as protecting assets including livestock, rehabilitating water sources or vaccinating children before a drought, is more efficient, more dignified and protects hard-won development gains.
11: We, therefore, commit to:
- increase anticipatory action throughout the humanitarian system, including through our funding at the country level, and harness complementary finance and planning by drawing on climate and disaster risk finance and development funds
- seek to grow support to the Central Emergency Response Fund to enable it to more than double the number of anticipatory action frameworks it finances, and support expansion of this approach to the Country-Based Pooled Funds, to better address shocks in conflict
- seek to grow support to the Disaster Relief Emergency Fund and the Start Fund to ensure local, including women-led, organisations can access finance to act ahead of shock
Sarah Klassen, Policy & Advocacy Advisor at Start Network said:
"This commitment by the G7 is an important moment in the sector. Start Network has been working for a number of years to shift the sector from a reactive to proactive approach with anticipatory action and risk financing at the heart. We are extremely pleased to see this commitment made by the G7, we hope now to see this policy put into practice and for the G7 to put its money where its mouth is".
Read more about Crisis Anticipation and Risk Financing.
Read more about the Start Fund.