Responding Under Pressure: Lessons from MOPAN Assessments on Organisational Adaptation to Reform and Funding Constraints

In 2026, multilateral organisations (MOs) responding to crises face rapidly rising humanitarian needs, driven by conflict, climate-related shocks, displacement, health emergencies and repeated violations of international humanitarian law, with 239 million people estimated to require humanitarian assistance and 88.7 million people facing the most severe and life-threatening needs (OCHA, 2025[2]). At the same time, the availability and predictability of international finance to respond to crises have deteriorated sharply: preliminary OECD data indicate that official development assistance (ODA) from DAC donors fell by 23.1% in real terms in 2025, while humanitarian funding reached its lowest level since 2016 (OECD, 2026[3]). This widening gap between needs and resources has forced MOs to adopt hyper-prioritisation by concentrating assistance on the most urgent, life-threatening needs. These unprecedented funding cuts have become a key driver of system-wide reform, triggering the Humanitarian Reset and the New Humanitarian Compact, which seek to make the system faster, lighter, more locally led, and more efficient.

The funding and reform pressures experienced since 2025 are exceptional in their breadth and magnitude. However, previous humanitarian reform agendas existed and at least some humanitarian MOs have been exposed to episodes of resource scarcity in the past. Since the mid-2010s, humanitarian financing has increased substantially but it has not kept pace with the faster growth in humanitarian needs and associated funding requirements, resulting in a widening humanitarian funding gap – particularly as large contributions to the humanitarian response to the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine crisis were not sustained (Rieger et al., 2024[4]). Indeed, in previous years, MOs working in crises have repeatedly been asked to respond to changing patterns of need, new policy commitments, shifts in donor financing, and calls for greater efficiency, accountability, and proximity to crisis-affected people (see, for example, the 2012 Transformative Agenda, the 2015 Grand Bargain and 2016 New Way of Working). 

MOPAN assessments show that these pressures have led MOs to revise strategic priorities, restructure operations, change staffing and delivering models, develop new partnerships, and strengthen their performance management and accountability mechanisms. Some adaptations have enabled MOs to become more agile, responsive, and cost-effective. Others have weakened institutional capacity or transferred risks and pressures to country offices or implementing partners. Importantly, reductions in expenditure are not in themselves evidence of greater efficiency or effectiveness. Some measures may generate immediate savings, but their implications for organisational efficiency and effectiveness depend on whether they enable an MO to focus resources and preserve essential capabilities, or instead erode the capacities needed to deliver its mandate. This pattern is particularly relevant today, as the combination of rapid reforms and financial constraints could have lasting effects – positive or negative - on organisational effectiveness in responding to crises. 

This review examines cases through the lens of adaptation by design and adaptation by attrition (Box 2). The distinction is not strictly binary: the same measure can move towards attrition when its implementation is rushed, weakly steered, or under-resourced.

Against this background, this output focuses on the lessons that can be drawn from past MOPAN assessments about how MOs responding to crises have adapted to resource constraints and implemented humanitarian reforms. The review of past MOPAN assessments is the first output of the MOPAN Insight Study on Multilateral Effectiveness in Humanitarian Crises, which aims to generate insights to support a more effective and better-informed adaptation of the multilateral humanitarian system in the context of funding contraction and organised reform processes. This review will be followed by a mapping of the measures that MOs have been taking to adapt to the current funding cuts and reform agendas, as well as by an analysis of the comparative advantage of the main MOs operating in humanitarian crises in delivering core functions within the humanitarian system in the context of reduced resources.

The analysis draws on the most recent MOPAN assessments of 19 multilateral organisations with a role in humanitarian crisis prevention, preparedness, response, or recovery. These include FAO, IOM, OHCHR, OCHA, UNDP, UNICEF, UNHCR, UN-Habitat, UNFPA, UN Women, WFP and WHO; the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC); and six international financial institutions (IFIs): the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the African Development Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the Inter-American Development Bank and the Caribbean Development Bank. The assessments were published between 2021 and 2026 and therefore cover different assessment periods and organisational contexts. The study’s objective is not to rank these organisations, but rather to draw across the MOPAN evidence base to identify recurring patterns and lessons that may be relevant to MOs operating under current conditions.

Evidence was obtained from the assessments’ main reports as well as from their technical annexes and coded manually using MAXQDA. The analysis also draws on relevant MOPAN Insights studies, including Multilateral Effectiveness in a Shifting Landscape (MOPAN, 2025[5]), PSEAH in IFIs: Progress, Gaps and the Road Ahead (MOPAN, 2026[6]), Progress on PSEAH: From Words to Deeds (MOPAN, 2023[7]), Rethinking Humanitarian Effectiveness Organisations (MOPAN, 2022[8]). Additional external documentary public sources have been consulted to provide context or complement existing MOPAN evidence. As a desk-based review, the analysis is grounded solely on the above-mentioned documentary sources and does not draw on interviews or other forms of primary data collection.

Where the evidence allows, the analysis distinguishes between measures that reduce expenditure and those associated with wider efficiency and effectiveness gains. However, it is important to note that MOPAN assessments do not always explicitly attribute an organisational change to a particular funding constraint or reform commitment, especially where several internal and external pressures were operating simultaneously. The assessments also cover different time periods and MOs with varying mandates, governance arrangements, financing structures, and operational models. An adaptation that was appropriate for one MO cannot therefore be assumed to be necessarily adequate for a different organisation. 

As it relies on past evidence, this review is retrospective. It does not aim to make predictions on potential results of the Humanitarian Reset, the New Humanitarian Compact or other ongoing reforms, nor does it attempt to estimate the impact of the funding reductions that began in 2025. Instead, the review aims to support MOs as they seek to remain effective and fit for the future; to inform MOPAN members and other donors in their funding, bilateral, and formal governance engagement with organisations working in crises; and to help partners and interested stakeholders better understand how these MOs respond when resources contract and expectations expand. 

A MOPAN assessment provides a holistic diagnostic of an organisation’s performance taking into account the history, mission, context, trajectory and journey of the organisation. It presents analytical justifications for ratings and provides multidimensional insights on organisations based on the MOPAN indicator framework. 

MOPAN assessments are conducted through an independent, rigorous process and take a collaborative approach to ensure that the findings resonate with an organisation and its stakeholders. MOPAN assessments aim to build organisational learning in an iterative process that makes reporting accessible and leaves an 'audit trail' of findings. 

MOPAN assessments draw on multiple lines of evidence (documentary, survey, and interviews) from sources within and outside an organisation to validate and triangulate findings against the MOPAN indicator framework. The assessment process efficiently builds layers of data by using different streams, which reduces the burden on the organisation being assessed.

The portfolio of organisations to assess is decided every two years by MOPAN’s Steering Committee, who also select two, and sometimes more, member states to act as Institutional Leads, or champions of each assessment. 

MOPAN’s 2022 study Rethinking Effective Humanitarian Organisations concluded that MOPAN needed to adapt its framework for assessing organisations working in crises to better reflect the nature of humanitarian operations, including the policy environment, and the practical requirements of working in crisis situations (MOPAN, 2022[8]).  Four of the MOs considered in this review – IOM, UNHCR, WFP, and ICRC – have been evaluated using the MOPAN Adapted Framework for MOs working in Crises (MOPAN, 2022[9]).