The EU must not turn its back on the world's most fragile countries

Since the last European elections in 2019, the world has changed dramatically. The number of people in humanitarian need has more than doubled to nearly 300mn, and displacement has soared by almost 40 percent to 110mn.

But this suffering is not being felt equally across the globe - it is being concentrated in just a handful of particularly fragile contexts at the intersection of conflict and the climate crisis.

Until recently, the EU has set the gold standard on humanitarian and development action in these states. As the world’s largest donor of development aid, it has supported millions of people to survive, adapt and thrive.

But over the past mandate, we have seen a clear shift towards a more transactional approach, focused on building partnerships with more stable countries, particularly through the EU’s Global Gateway strategy, which is designed to leverage large-scale investments in infrastructure development. 

While this programme has an important role to play in some countries, it will do nothing to improve outcomes in states that do not have a steady government and where needs are being felt most critically, or to achieve its treaty-based goal of alleviating poverty. It will result in financing flowing to where it is easiest to deliver - not where it is needed most.

The European Commission appears to be doubling down on this approach in its new political guidelines for the coming mandate, announcing a “new economic foreign policy” which claims to reflect “today’s realities” but fails to even mention the EU’s commitment to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and leaving no one behind, including in fragile and conflict-affected contexts.

It is true that delivery in these settings is complex - particularly in places where the EU and broader international community no longer recognise the legitimacy of the de facto authorities. Partnering with governments in stable contexts brings fewer risks and more quick wins. 

However, in the longer-term, the current direction of travel not only cuts off a vital line of support to vulnerable communities, it also undermines the EU’s own strategic priorities. What hope does the EU have of meeting its goals of poverty reduction or the wider SDGs in its own neighbourhood if it shifts funding and attention away from the very places where extreme poverty and instability are found?

At a moment when the EU clearly hopes to establish itself as a leading security actor on the world stage, including by creating a new defence DG, its failure to address fragility and instability pushes in the opposite direction. The EU will not reach its security objectives by withdrawing from the regions facing the greatest unrest.

Moreover, the International Rescue Committee’s (IRC) teams working in fragile contexts across the globe have identified some tried and tested ways to effectively ensure the continuity of critical basic services, build resilience and safeguard development gains - even in the most complex settings. There are five concrete actions the incoming Commission could take to ensure that the world’s most vulnerable communities are not left even further behind.  

First, the EU needs to scale up - not reduce - both humanitarian and development funding for the world’s most fragile contexts. With the greatest needs concentrated in a small number of countries, common sense dictates that a far greater proportion of funding should be directed to these places. The EU should commit half of its Official Overseas Development Assistance to these states, up from the 25 percent disbursed now. 

Second, the EU should focus on developing ways to deliver aid in contexts where it cannot partner with governments or these relations break down. In such states, it will be vital for the EU to partner with civil society organisations - including women-led organisations - who are often best placed to identify those with the greatest needs, conduct access negotiations with key actors, and ensure aid can be delivered to hard-to-reach communities.

For example, in Somalia, the World Bank financed a consortium helping NGOs, including the IRC, to pilot a service providing chronically vulnerable households with monthly cash transfers for two years with a view to driving longer-term change. These sorts of programmes can turn lives around, and should become a blueprint for EU development action in such settings.

Third, the EU should create a new Resilience Fund to be funded jointly by its departments for international partnerships (INTPA), humanitarian work (ECHO), and its neighbourhood (NEAR). This would enable them to better work together to support locally-led NGOs and build partnerships that are better adapted to the realities of protracted crises. This could follow the lead of a trailblazing German government fund, launched in 2019, which supports the design of projects to meet people’s immediate needs while laying the foundation for long-term development outcomes. 

Fourth, states must be supported to better respond to the realities of the climate crisis. Today, the more fragile a context, the less climate finance it receives. And while the EU has taken some positive steps in this regard, in 2022 only about six percent of the EU’s adaptation financing to developing countries was committed to the 16 most climate-vulnerable and conflict-affected countries. This is clearly not enough to help these countries adapt and build resilience. We are calling on the EU to ensure that about 20 percent of its climate adaptation finance goes to these countries, in line with their disproportionate needs.

Lastly, any changes in the EU’s direction of travel on development support to countries in crisis should not be made without deep consultation with civil society organisations like the IRC, which bear witness to the challenges faced by people in fragile states and regions every day, and will face even greater pressures to tackle these with diminished EU engagement.

If the EU turns away from its global responsibilities and obligations, it risks undoing years of hard-won progress towards improving outcomes for people living within the world’s most fragile and conflict-affected states.

We’re calling for it to reconsider this dangerous direction of travel, and uphold its moral, legal and strategic responsibilities to support the world’s most vulnerable, in line with the EU’s fundamental values and its own interests.