Economic Participation and the Global Cost of International Assistance in Support of Refugee Subsistence Needs : A Joint World Bank-UNHCR Report

This joint World Bank and UNHCR report is developed in response to the United Nation (UN) omnibus resolution to coordinate an effort to measure the impact arising from hosting, protecting and assisting refugees. Following this resolution UNHCR, with assistance from the World Bank, led a participatory process to arrive at global cost estimates. This report provides an estimate of the benchmark costs of providing assistance to cover subsistence needs of all refugees in low- and middle-income countries. It complements similar costing exercises done for the education and health sectors. Together, expenses for health, education and subsistence account for most of the fiscal costs borne by governments hosting refugees. The objective of this exercise is to develop a simple, transparent methodology to estimate (i) the global benchmark cost of subsistence assistance; (ii) the global host country contribution to meeting this benchmark cost; and (iii) the complementary assistance needed by the international community to make up the difference between the global benchmark and the host country contribution. These costs are estimated for various scenarios of economic participation. When refugees do not earn any income, the amount of complementary assistance needed to meet basic needs are equivalent to the benchmark cost. But many refugees are able and willing to work. This report recognizes this explicitly, by considering that when refugees earn incomes they need less in the form of subsistence support