Rockefeller Foundation backs IRC with $10M to scale AI solutions for crisis communities

The Rockefeller Foundation and the International Rescue Committee (IRC) have announced a new multi-year, $10 million partnership to develop and scale technology-driven solutions for communities living through conflict and crisis, according to an IRC press release. The funding will support the IRC’s Airbel Impact Lab — the organization’s dedicated innovation unit — as part of the Rockefeller Foundation’s Build the Shared Future Initiative. The announcement comes as official development assistance fell 23% between 2024 and 2025, the largest single-year decline in decades, leaving a growing gap in services for the world’s most vulnerable people.

Nearly 90% of people in humanitarian need — some 213 million — live in just 20 countries where fragmented systems consistently fail to deliver essential services. The IRC will use the funding to design, test, and scale innovations specifically built for those environments, including AI-powered tools to reach under-immunized children in conflict zones, low-cost diagnostics for frontline health workers, maternal health interventions targeting postpartum hemorrhage — the leading cause of maternal death in crisis settings — and anticipatory action models that use weather and economic data to deliver aid before disasters strike. IRC President and CEO David Miliband said the goal is to bring “cutting-edge technology, rigorous evidence, and practical delivery to reach those most often left behind.”

A central ambition of the partnership is breaking the cycle where promising innovations stall at the pilot stage and never reach scale. The initiative will explicitly connect innovation to systems change — building pathways for solutions to be adopted at national and global levels through new forms of public and private financing. Rockefeller Foundation President Dr. Rajiv J. Shah said the collaboration will “prove that by harnessing new technology, we can deliver clear, measurable results” at a time of both profound suffering and real technological opportunity.

The Rockefeller Foundation will bring its convening power to the table, working alongside the IRC’s operational expertise to align public and private sector partners around proven solutions. Together, the two organizations are positioning this as a test case for a new model of humanitarian and development action — one that moves beyond fragmented, short-term pilots toward sustainable, evidence-based systems that can serve millions of people in the world’s most difficult operating environments.