The Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees
Inclusive Pandemic Response
The Global Cities Fund for Inclusive Pandemic Response is an initiative to respond to the unmet needs of cities as they support migrants, refugees, and internally displaced people (IDPs) during Covid-19.
The Global Cities Fund provides direct financial and technical support over one year to cities from low-to-middle income countries to implement projects related to public health, livelihoods, and inclusive social services.
The Need
With 95 percent of reported Covid-19 cases in urban areas, cities are on the frontlines of the global public health crisis and its socio-economic impact. The pandemic presents unique challenges to many urban migrants, refugees, and IDPs due to their legal status, their reliance on informal employment, and their restricted access to public health services and benefits. The experiences of many are complicated by language and cultural barriers, xenophobia, racism, and discrimination. In the face of these challenges, mayors and city governments have shown leadership in responding to the needs of their communities, and are doing so with increasingly limited resources. The World Bank projects that local governments may lose 15 to 25 percent of their annual revenues in 2021 alone. Faced with shrinking budgets and minimal access to international loans and funds, cities require new funding streams to respond to increasing unmet needs.
How It Works
Implemented in collaboration with United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), the UN Migration Agency (IOM), and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), the Global Cities Fund:
Offers international donors a pipeline of vetted city-led proposals backed by strong mayoral leadership on migration and displacement issues.
Directly channels international resources to city governments, building precedents of fiscal feasibility while assuming financial oversight and mitigating risk.
Respects the agency, authority, and capacity of city governments and their local partners by supporting projects of cities’ own design.
Accelerates local efforts by providing city grantees with customized technical and advocacy support services, and by connecting them with city peers and international partners.
Elevates city leadership and actions to a global audience of national governments, humanitarian and development agencies, and financial institutions, ensuring global responses reflect and respond to local needs.
Serves as a flexible, simple, and predictable funding mechanism with low overhead and high efficiency.
The Global Cities Fund builds on the Global Mayors Solidarity Campaign launched by the MMC’s Leadership Board mayors in July 2020 to increase support for local policies and initiatives that directly address the Covid-19 recovery needs of refugee and migrant communities in their cities.
The MMC awarded the Global Cities Fund’s inaugural grantees in January 2021 and announced a new round of funding in June 2021. To learn more about the Fund’s grantees and pipeline of investment- and partnership-ready projects, please consult our Project Prospectus.
City Grantees
In its initial stage, the Fund awarded the city governments of Barranquilla, Colombia; Beirut, Lebanon; Lima, Peru; Freetown, Sierra Leone; and Mexico City, Mexico. Collectively, these cities are delivering projects that directly improve the lives of over 3,000 migrants, refugees, IDPs, and marginalized host residents while strengthening each city’s commitment and capacity to sustainably support countless more.
Global Cities Fund for Inclusive Pandemic Response
Project Prospectus
The Project Prospectus elevates more than 20 city-led projects from 18 low to middle-income countries with the potential to serve over 140,000 migrants, refugees, IDPs, and marginalized receiving communities.
Selection Committee
The Selection Committee for the inaugural round of the Global Cities Fund was appointed as a multi-partner body to review applications and select five city grantees for the Fund’s initial awards. Together, Selection Committee members represent a diversity of experiences and skill sets, including mayoral leadership, refugee and migrant perspectives, subject matter expertise, and funding/financial expertise.
Strategic Partners
Our Strategic Partners provide on-the-ground technical and coordination support to city grantees, advise on the development of the pipeline of projects, and amplify the Fund’s impact globally.
In the News
