New Report: Aid Cuts Are Dismantling the Women-Led Organizations that Support Women and Girls in Humanitarian Crises

WASHINGTON—Women’s Refugee Commission and Refugees International today launched a new report showing that global aid cuts have significantly impacted women-led organizations (WLOs) despite their essential role in reaching and supporting women and girls in crisis settings—revealing longstanding vulnerabilities in the international humanitarian system. 

At What Cost?: Women-Led Organizations, Funding Cuts, and the Price of Survival, is based on interviews with 28 WLO representatives spanning six humanitarian contexts: Afghanistan, Bangladesh (Cox’s Bazar), Honduras, Lebanon, Sudan, and Ukraine. 

The report reveals that funding cuts have created immediate operational challenges for WLOs in crisis settings—and devastating disruption to services critical for women and girls, including gender-based violence (GBV) prevention and response, mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS), sexual and reproductive health and rights (SRHR), legal aid, education, livelihoods, and community-based protection. 

Key findings include:

• Despite two decades of “localization” rhetoric, WLOs say aid cuts expose failed progress toward funding local organizations. WLOs described the aid cuts as exposing lagging commitments across Global North donors towards efforts of localization and women’s leadership. “For years we have been talking about localization, but when the crisis comes, funding still goes to the same international actors,” said a Lebanese WLO leader.
• WLOs are now competing with large international organizations for a shrinking pot of funding. As international organizations absorbed their own funding losses, they moved into grant pools once reserved for small local groups. “Now the competition is too difficult, and many small organizations will disappear,” said one WLO leader from Cox’s Bazar.
• For women fleeing violence, the loss of community-based services closes a door to safety. Reductions in funding have increased risks for women and girls, while limiting access to critical services. Gender-based violence and sexual and reproductive health services rely on community trust that takes years to build. When funding vanished overnight, women leaders were left unable to keep the promises they made to the survivors, staff, and communities who depend on them. “The funding crisis was not simply a financial shock; it was a breach of trust and confidence in the system,” explained one Ukrainian WLO leader.

“This funding crisis must be a catalyst for transformation,” said Devon Cone, Senior Advocate for Women and Girls at Refugees International and a co-author of the report. “The humanitarian system must confront the longstanding imbalances in power, funding, and decision-making that have left it vulnerable to the outcomes we’re seeing now. We must take this moment to build a humanitarian system that is equitable, sustainable, and accountable to the communities it serves.”

“Long before this funding crisis, women-led organizations were already navigating a humanitarian system that was fundamentally unequal,” said Julianne Deitch, Director of Research at Women’s Refugee Commission and a co-author of the report. “Too often, they have been excluded from the coordination and decision-making spaces where funding priorities are set and critical information is shared, with funding cuts intensifying the consequences of gender-specific barriers, risks, and exclusion. Any meaningful reform must put these organizations at the center of humanitarian action—not at its margins.”

The cuts have pushed WLOs into increasingly unsustainable survival strategies that rely on personal sacrifice, unpaid labor, and organizational downsizing to operate. These adaptations come at significant cost: reduced access to services for women and girls, erosion of hard-won gains in gender equality and women’s rights, loss of technical expertise and institutional memory, and weakening of community-based protection systems. 

The report authors and several leaders of women-led organizations who participated in the research are available for interviews about the report and recommendations. 

For media inquiries, please contact Sarah Massey at SarahM@wrcommission.org or Madison Cullinan at mcullinan@refugeesinternational.org.

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About Women’s Refugee Commission 

Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) improves the lives and protects the rights of women, children, youth, and other people who are often overlooked, undervalued, and underserved in humanitarian responses to displacement and crises. We work in partnership with displaced communities to research their needs, identify solutions, and advocate for gender-transformative and sustained improvement in humanitarian, development, and displacement policy and practice. Since our founding in 1989, we have been a leading expert on the needs of refugee women, children, and youth and the policies that can protect and empower them. www.womensrefugeecommission.org

About Refugees International 

Refugees International advocates for lifesaving assistance, human rights, and protection for displaced people and promotes solutions to displacement crises. To ensure the independence and credibility of our work, we do not accept government or UN funding. Learn more: www.refugeesinternational.org