This has been a difficult year for humanitarian relief. Huge events have left indelible images. From a dead Syrian child washed up on a Turkish beach, to villagers trapped under rubble after earthquakes in Nepal, and grieving families of Ebola victims in West Africa.
The tragic stories have tumbled in, transmitted around the world by 24-hour news channels and social media. Natural disasters and man-made conflicts have combined to produce a staccato rhythm of drama and horror packaged as one-off events—no matter how often they may re-occur. And so, our responses are piecemeal: When our awareness is pricked there are spikes in relief funding, donations, and volunteer efforts.
The job of compiling the detailed quantitative data falls to OCHA, the United Nations Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, which undertakes this effort on an annual basis. And its latest report makes sobering reading.
Counting the Cost
Overall, a staggering 200.5 million people have been affected by natural disasters or displaced by conflicts in 2015—an increase of more than 50 million from the previous year. These figures include those who escaped disasters and crises from previous years but for whom humanitarian assistance is still essential. But immediate, conflict-driven emergencies displaced 59.5 million people—the equivalent of 30,000 people every day. A further 19.3 million people were displaced by natural weather-related crises.
The costs of responding to these crises have increased six-fold, from $3.4 billion just a decade ago to more than $20 billion today. The funding gap between the sums required to provide basic humanitarian needs and the amount raised through international appeals is also rapidly growing, and the shortfall currently is a staggering 40 percent (about $7 billion). According to OCHA, the full economic cost of lost income and growth from global conflict is estimated to be more than $14 trillion.
