The $90Bn Question: Can We Reach 700 Million People in Response to COVID-19?

As COVID-19 impacts on the health, livelihoods and wellbeing of people around the world, governments and societies are faced with impossible choices. The impacts on the world’s most vulnerable are starting to bite, with an estimated 130 million additional people facing acute food insecurity by the end of 2020, and projections showing that the economic fallout of the pandemic could push up to half a billion people into poverty.

The Emergency Relief Coordinator (ERC) recently called on rich country governments and International Financial Institutions (IFIs) for a $90Bn COVID recovery package targeting 700 million vulnerable people around the globe, and suggested much of this should be delivered through cash transfers as the only way to ensure basic needs are met at scale while kick-starting economic recovery. 

This blog posts discusses issues relating to $90Bn relief package such as; What would cash transfers at this scale look like? How would governments, IFIs, development organisations, humanitarians and private sector actors work together to reach 700 million of the world’s most vulnerable people?