Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees Announces $50 Million Pledge
Mayors Migration Council calls on funders and partners to help reach new ambitious fundraising goal, as it spotlights the fund’s success in three-year progress report.
New York City, December 7, 2023 — Today, the Mayors Migration Council (MMC) released a three-year Progress Report spotlighting successes of the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees (GCF) and setting a new vision for the fund’s growth.
“To drive momentum and transformative change, we are now setting a vision for the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees to reach $50 million – starting with $25 million by 2025 – so it can support more cities and deepen its impact through multi-year grants and more predictable funding rounds,” said Vittoria Zanuso, Executive Director of the MMC. “We are calling on the philanthropic community to join us and lead by example by localizing their giving and investing directly in cities.”
Created by the MMC in 2021 with a $1 million seed investment to support five cities in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic, in just three years the GCF has become an $8 million fund supported by five donors with a pipeline of 28 city grantees delivering solutions on health, economic inclusion, climate migration, early childhood development, and more.
“With most of the world’s refugees and displaced people living in cities, the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees is a critical tool to help mayors and local governments respond,” said Gillian Triggs, Assistant High Commissioner for Refugees, a Strategic Partner of the GCF. “UNHCR is proud to back the Mayors Migration Council’s ambitious call to scale the Global Cities Fund and calls on others to invest in its transformative potential ahead of the 2023 United Nations Global Refugee Forum.”
In successfully delivering their projects, city grantees are building their case for more direct funding to continue or expand their projects. To date, 90 percent of cities who benefited from the GCF have already used this seed funding as proof of concept to independently unlock additional investments.
“What came as a small grant from the Mayors Migration Council’s Global Cities Fund has become a nine-million-dollar fundraising effort that has directly impacted people’s lives,” said Jaime Pumarejo, Mayor of Barranquilla Colombia. “By identifying and providing jobs for migrants, we bolstered economic growth and supported local businesses.”
Barranquilla is not alone in using the Global Cities Fund to address urgent needs while building the case for future investments. Examples spotlighted in the Progress Report include:
- Medellín, Colombia, used its GCF grant to provide emergency shelter for more than 300 migrant and refugee families at risk of homelessness. The city coupled this emergency intervention with complementary programs to register migrants, get kids into local schools, and secure formal jobs for parents. With this comprehensive support, more than 75 percent of participating families found permanent housing in the city. Medellín used this success to independently secure over $1 million to keep this project going.
- Freetown, Sierra Leone, used its GCF grant to create a waste management program that loans tricycles to micro-enterprises run by youth living in informal settlements — many of whom are rural migrants. Two years later, these enterprises are still active and have paid back 50 percent of the cost of each tricycle, which the city is using to establish additional youth enterprises and expand the project’s impact. Freetown secured over $1 million in funding from a multilateral development bank to expand the project.
- Beirut, Lebanon, used its GCF grant to purchase and operate the first ever Municipal Mobile Health Clinic, which provides free and accessible healthcare services to residents, regardless of origin. After vaccinating over 3,500 Lebanese, Syrian, Palestinian, and Iraqi residents of Beirut during the project’s timeframe, the clinic is now a permanent fixture of the city’s healthcare system supported by Beirut’s own budget.
A Paris Peace Forum Scale Up Project and a Fast Company World Changing Idea, the GCF is supported by the Bernard van Leer Foundation, the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, the IKEA Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and the Robert Bosch Stiftung. It is led by the MMC in partnership with six key Strategic Partners: the C40 Cities Leadership Group (C40 Cities) the International Organization for Migration (IOM), Metropolis, United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN Habitat), and UNHCR.
“The Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees helps fill the unmet needs of migrants and displaced people and can help turn the Global Compact for Migration into reality,” said Amy Pope, Director General of the International Organization for Migration. “As the new Director General of IOM, I remain committed to continue strategic support to the Global Cities Fund.”
Visit www.mayorsmigrationcouncil.org/gcf and follow #GlobalCitiesFund on social media for more information. For general background and inquiries, visit www.mayorsmigrationcouncil.org.
For press inquiries, contact Cynthia Nahhas, Communications Associate at the Mayors Migration Council, at cnahhas@mayorsmigrationcouncil.org (cc: Maddy Troha, maddy.troha@berlinrosen.com).
Quotes
“With half of all projects addressing the impact of the climate crisis on migrants and displaced people in cities, the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees is an important mechanism for unlocking greater finance for cities on climate migration,” said Mark Watts, Executive Director of C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group. “C40 is proud to join forces with the Mayors Migration Council and support our partners in bringing the Global Cities Fund to $50 million.”
“Mayors, city leaders, and local governments stand on the frontline, actively responding to the global challenges of our time. Their resourceful approaches and unwavering dedication to inclusive city planning and management are a constant inspiration. UN-Habitat is committed to continuing our support of the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees as it grows in its scope and impact,” said Maimunah Mohd Sharif, Executive Director of UN-Habitat.
“Just last year, less than 1.2 percent of international humanitarian funding reached local actors despite cities receiving most migrants and displaced people. Coupled with UCLG’s ongoing efforts to bolster municipal financing, the Mayors Migration Council’s Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees has proven that investing in city governments is investing in a more inclusive urban future,” said Emilia Saiz, Secretary General of United Cities and Local Governments. “We need to double down on this progress and bring the fund to $50 million.”
“While migration is a global issue, only action at the local level can ensure that both migrants and host societies realize its full positive potential. As the global network of major cities and metropolitan areas, Metropolis is proud to partner with the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees to support its current city grantees and joins the Mayors Migration Council in calling to bring the fund to US$50 million so that more major cities may benefit from this model,” said Jordi Vaquer, Secretary General of Metropolis.
Background
About the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees
The MMC’s Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees (GCF) responds to the unmet needs of cities as they support migrants, refugees, and internally displaced people (IDPs) in the face of pressing challenges, from global pandemics to the climate crisis.
By directly funding cities to implement inclusive programs of their own design, the GCF builds precedents of fiscal feasibility in city governments that are often disregarded by donors with low risk tolerance.
The GCF is supported by the Bernard van Leer Foundation, the Conrad N. Hilton Foundation, the IKEA Foundation, Open Society Foundations, and the Robert Bosch Stiftung. It is led by the MMC in partnership with six key Strategic Partners: the C40 Cities Leadership Group (C40 Cities), the UN Migration Agency (IOM), Metropolis, United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
To learn more, visit www.mayorsmigrationcouncil.org/gcf and follow #GlobalCitiesFund on social media.
About the Mayors Migration Council
The Mayors Migration Council (MMC) is a mayor-led coalition that accelerates ambitious global action on migration and displacement. With most of the world’s migrants and displaced people living in cities, our mission is to use the power of city-led diplomacy and action to create a world where urban migrants, displaced people, and receiving communities can thrive.
To achieve our mission, we provide mayors with advocacy, coordination, and communications support to influence policy decisions at the national and international level, and connect city governments to the knowledge, technical, and financial resources they need to accelerate and scale local solutions.
Created by mayors for mayors, we are a nimble team of political advisors and urban practitioners guided by a Leadership Board of global city leaders, including the Mayors of Amman, Bristol, Dhaka North, Freetown, Kampala, Milan, Montevideo, Montréal, and Zürich. As a Sponsored Project of Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, our work is made possible by philanthropic and government funders.
To learn more visit www.mayorsmigrationcouncil.org or follow us on X, Facebook and LinkedIn.
