As countries around the planet mark World Refugee Day on June 20, a new report from the NGO Save the Children reveals that fourteen of the top refugee-hosting nations paid more than $23 billion in external debt interest in 2020, enough to provide an education for every child refugee living in the developing world for five years.
The report, entitled “The Price of Hope,” exposed the fact that fourteen developing nations collectively host more than half of the world’s refugees, and many of them pay more on external debt service payments than they do on refugee education, thus depriving an entire generation of displaced children of the education they need to restore their future.
“Some of the poorest countries in the world are hosting the greatest number of refugees, and the economic outlook is bleak, with education systems that are badly underfunded,” said Hollie Warren, the Head of Education at Save the Children. “Debt relief could help ensure that every refugee child has access to an education. But the longer we wait, the worse the situation will get for these children.”
A promise put on hold
In 2018, the United Nations General Assembly affirmed the Global Compact on Refugees, a framework for an equitable and sustainable solution for refugees, which includes the ability of host nations to get the support they need to benefit both the refugees and the communities that host them. The Global Compact on Refugees specifically includes a commitment to get all refugee children in school within a few months of their displacement.
In 2019, during the first Global Refugee Forum, significant funding resources were pledged by UN member nations to support the education of refugees in host countries. Unfortunately, this forward progress was lost in 2020 as schools were closed all over the world, including those providing education for refugees in host nations, and a second Global Refugee Forum was indefinitely postponed.
Today, it is estimated that 76% of the world’s refugees live in low-income and middle-income countries whose educational systems are already struggling to meet the needs of non-refugee children.
Compounding this issue is that rising external debt burdens are eroding host nations’ ability to allocate sufficient resources toward education. According to the Price of Hope report, four out of 14 (28%) of low and middle-income refugee hosting nations are now spending more on servicing external debt than on education.
Although 233 countries, institutions, researchers, organizations, and private sector businesses made generous pledges during the 2019 Global Refugee Forum, only 24% of those have been fulfilled, and many of those are long-term commitments that span many years or even decades.
Source: The Price of Hope
In 2021, the World Bank and the UNHCR estimated the annual cost of educating the refugee population in developing nations to be $4.85 billion a year. Yet the 14 developing nations which host the majority of refugees worldwide were obligated to spend more than $23 billion in interest payments in 2020.
Unprecedented numbers
Currently, there are an estimated 108.4 million people (1 in 74 worldwide) who have been forced from their homes, an all-time record. Amongst that number are 35.3 million refugees who have fled their country due to violence or persecution, including 29.4 million refugees monitored by UNHCR and 5.9 refugees registered with UNRWA. Children under the age of 18 currently represent 40% of the world’s forcibly displaced population.
Yet 76% of refugees are being hosted in low and middle-income countries, where 70% of children are unable to read or understand a simple text by age 10. Indeed, in sub-Saharan Africa, where one-third of the world’s refugee population is being hosted, the rate of child illiteracy is at a staggering 89%.
According to Save the Children, the top 10 nations hosting refugees are:
Source: The Price of Hope
Even in Europe, a survey conducted by Save the Children revealed that one in four refugee children were not enrolled in school during the 2022-2023 academic year. In Poland alone, fewer than 200,000 of the estimated 700,000 refugee children in the country were enrolled in a local school, with many parents citing language and cultural barriers as the reason.
The UNHCR estimates that the average refugee child misses three to four years of schooling due to forced displacement and that only 68% of refugee children are enrolled in school at the primary level. This number drops to just 37% when referring to secondary education for refugees.
The situation is even worse for refugee girls, who are only half as likely as refugee boys to enroll in secondary school as girls face numerous barriers, including gender-based violence going to and from school, a lack of gender-segregated hygiene facilities in school, discriminatory gender norms, and lack of access to menstrual health products.
All in all, the United Nations estimates that 48% of all refugee children are not enrolled in school.
An opportunity to get back on track
For the first time since 2019, representatives from countries around the world will meet in Geneva, Switzerland, from December 13-15, 2023, for the second-ever Global Refugee Forum. The event will give governments and other stakeholders an excellent opportunity to announce new pledges, provide information about progress that has already been made, and take stock of the opportunities and challenges ahead.
Attendees at the 2023 Global Refugee Forum will be called upon to ensure a safe, accessible, inclusive, and child-friendly platform to empower children and to meaningfully participate in the design, implementation, and review of both existing and future pledges.
There will also be strong pressure placed upon developed nations and international institutions to mobilize funding for the estimated $4.85 billion it costs to educate refugees worldwide every year. Additionally, participants will be urged to increase funding for UNHCR (the UN’s refugee agency), which has been forced to cut its budget over the last three years due to a decrease in funds from donor nations.
Lastly, remedies will be sought for low and middle-income nations which are saddled with cripping foreign debt obligations. There will also be strong pressure on donors and international partners to deliver 0.7% of their GNI to official development assistance (ODA), increase education’s share of ODA to 15%, and ensure flexible sources of funding to respond to crises that affect a host nation’s ability to provide an education for refugees and displaced persons.
Conclusion
Despite the United Nations agreeing to the Global Compact on Refugees in 2018, only a small fraction of the pledged support to host nations has been delivered so far. Global economic woes continue to affect developing nations, whose education budgets are under severe strain as more and more funds are redirected toward servicing external debt, which is now five times more than the annual cost of educating every refugee child in the world.
The 2023 Global Refugee Forum is an excellent opportunity to get back on track and for donor countries and international organizations to honor their commitment to provide every refugee child with quality schooling.
Save the Children is a UK-based NGO that operates in more than 100 countries and territories. Founded in 1919, Save the Children has general consultative status in the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) and is one of the most respected non-governmental organizations in the world.
