How OCHA is funded
OCHA needs funding to finance a wide range of humanitarian coordination services. OCHA coordination tools and services are delivered at headquarters to ensure a better and more effective global humanitarian response system, and at the field level to ensure international humanitarian programmes are well coordinated with national and local response. For 2011, OCHA has a programme and administrative budget of US$242 million. Due to its specific mandate, 70 per cent of OCHA’s budget is staff costs (click here to see a breakdown of budget requirements).
In addition, OCHA channels funds to international and national humanitarian partners from Pooled Funds. However, these funds are not used to finance OCHA activities and are not part of OCHA’s budget requirements.
OCHA’s coordination work is funded from the United Nations Regular Budget, Member States’ voluntary contributions and private donations. The United Nations General Assembly approves the Regular Budget every two years. The budget is funded from assessed contributions paid by each Member State according to a formula that takes into account their relative gross domestic product. For the biennium 2010-2011, only 0.6 per cent of the United Nations Regular Budget was allocated to OCHA and amounts to $14 million per year.
Since 2002, OCHA’s budget has quadrupled, while its Regular Budget allocation has remained almost static. This places further reliance on extra-budgetary resources. OCHA’s income overwhelmingly comes from voluntary contributions from Member States and the European Commission (click here to see a breakdown of OCHA donors).
OCHA's donors
Donors to OCHA are grouped in an informal OCHA Donor Support Group (ODSG). They provide financial, political and technical support towards fulfilling OCHA’s mandated coordination activities. The group currently comprises Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Norway (Chair), Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States and the European Commission. Members commit to annual funding of a minimum threshold (currently $0.5 million), preferably unearmarked.
The ODSG’s goal is to support OCHA in fulfilling its mandate by acting as a sounding board and a source of advice on policy, management, budgetary and financial questions. The group also acts as a mechanism for feedback, donor consultation and the exchange of views on OCHA’s strategic priorities, new project initiatives, evaluations and reviews. The group discusses concrete measures that members may take individually or collectively to assist OCHA in better fulfilling its mission and goals on the basis of the humanitarian principles. The group also encourages a widening of donor support for OCHA on the basis of the principles. ODSG meets regularly at the technical level in Geneva and New York, and annually at the high level. In addition, an annual ODSG field mission is undertaken to evaluate OCHA's work at the country level.
