The following information was submitted by CARE offices in the countries reviewed in the report to provide additional context and detail.
How Germany Scored on Our Report Card
What Germany Is Doing to Support Women and Girls in Crisis
Over the years, the German humanitarian aid budget has more than tripled, making Germany the world’s second-largest bilateral donor after the USA. In 2020, 2.1 billion euros were spent on humanitarian assistance worldwide.
During its UN security seat in 2019–2020, Germany made the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda, which aims not only to help women play a stronger role in preventing and managing conflicts, but also to better protect against sexual and gender-based violence (GBV) in conflicts. It also declared participation of women and protection against GBV to be core elements of German foreign, security, defense and development policy. The Federal Foreign Office, the budget holder for humanitarian aid, has yet to set a funding target for GBV projects to reflect those commitments.
In 2019, the ministry introduced an “inclusion marker” for all relief projects — including humanitarian assistance — which aims to systematically assess whether and how projects support gender equality and inclusiveness. The result of this review, however, is not a condition for or against a funding decision by the ministry.
In late 2020, the Federal Foreign Office announced the introduction of a new digital project management system which will include standardized markers for GBV- and WPS-related programs. This will provide a more comprehensive overview of how much funding — targeted and mainstreamed — is actually spent on GBV-related projects.
In 2019, the German government provided 80 million euros to implement UN Security Council Resolution 2467 to combat conflict-related sexual violence. This funding was provided primarily for projects focused on healthcare, psychosocial support and other services for survivors of sexual violence, as well as for prevention measures such as information campaigns and dialogue platforms. Germany is a partner in the Call to Action on Protection from Gender-Based Violence in Emergencies.
Germany is the second-largest donor to the Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund, a fund that enables women’s organizations to contribute actively to crisis prevention and peacebuilding worldwide and to strengthen their role and participation in the humanitarian and emergency relief sector.