Sida's work with humanitarian assistance
Sida's humanitarian aid aims to save lives, reduce suffering and protect people affected by armed conflict, natural disasters and other crises. The money is allocated based on people's needs and goes to those who need it most.
Why humanitarian support?
Armed conflict, natural disasters and extreme weather
Millions of people live in difficult conditions in conflict zones. Sexual violence, forced recruitment and other abuses are common. At the same time, extreme weather and natural disasters make situations difficult for people already living in vulnerability. It affects their access to food and clean water and makes it harder to make a living. Never before have so many people suffered from hunger.
The number of people displaced by conflict, natural disasters, persecution and human rights violations has increased dramatically. A large proportion of displaced people are in their own country, and many are children.
Sida's contributions include:
Saving lives and alleviating suffering for the most vulnerable
As the world’s fourth largest bilateral humanitarian donor, Sweden helped reach 116 million people in the world’s worst humanitarian crises in 2024. Humanitarian work is about saving lives and alleviating suffering by ensuring access to food, water, shelter, health care and medicines.
It is also about the safety and protection of the most vulnerable, such as evacuating people from war zones and supporting children and women who are victims of sexual and gender-based violence.
Sida works with humanitarian organisations in 30 of the world’s worst humanitarian crises. These are civil society, international and multilateral organisations. Sida also supports organisations that work to improve and strengthen the humanitarian system.
All humanitarian work has a gender perspective and takes into account the different needs and circumstances of vulnerable people. The work follows the humanitarian principles of compassion, impartiality, neutrality and independence.
Here are examples of what Sida supports:
Several of Sida’s humanitarian partners work to protect people affected by conflict and disasters, to reduce the risk of them being exposed to violence, threats and coercion.
Sida supports organisations working in the world’s most difficult crises. This can include evacuating people from dangerous areas, or creating groups for women and girls to work together to address sexual and gender-based violence and find strategies to protect themselves from abuse.
The most common risks reported by humanitarian organisations are sexual and gender-based violence, attacks on civilians, and the dangers and risks people face when forced to flee. The need for protection due to discrimination, forced recruitment into armed groups and forced marriages has increased in recent years.
In conflicts such as Ukraine, Sudan, DR Congo, Myanmar and Palestine, attacks on health clinics, hospitals, schools and other civilian infrastructure are regular occurrences.
The humanitarian system is a network of organisations and institutions working in crisis-affected countries and regions.
Every year, they analyse people’s humanitarian needs and plan humanitarian assistance. They determine how many people need help, the severity of the crisis and how the system should be coordinated to meet people’s needs.
Sida supports partner organisations working in this area to ensure that humanitarian aid reaches the people most affected by conflicts and disasters.
In order to respond quickly to acute crises, annual humanitarian aid is complemented by flexible funding through Sida’s Rapid Response Mechanism (RRM).
This is money that can be quickly disbursed and distributed to help the most vulnerable in emergencies or when people’s situation rapidly deteriorates. Most of Sida’s humanitarian partner organisations have access to the RRM.
Sida’s total allocation for humanitarian aid in 2025 is SEK 4.6 billion. Of this, around 95 per cent is allocated to the work of humanitarian organisations to meet people’s urgent needs in 30 crises. Crises that are deemed to be particularly serious. This includes flexible funding of SEK 497 million for unforeseen events.
- Humanity: Human suffering must be alleviated wherever it exists. The dignity and rights of those affected must be respected and protected.
- Neutrality: Humanitarian actors must not participate in conflicts or take sides in political, religious or ideological controversies.
- Impartiality: Humanitarian work should be independent of factors such as ethnicity, gender, nationality, religion or political affiliation. The most urgent needs should always be prioritised.
- Independence: Humanitarian action should be independent of the political, economic or military interests of other actors.
Sida’s humanitarian work is guided by the government’s strategy. Based on the strategy, Sida designs and allocates humanitarian aid in an annual allocation process.
How the money is allocated is based on a global analysis of people’s needs and the situation in crisis-affected countries. Sida also considers how much other humanitarian donors are giving and the capacity of the country in crisis to help people in need. The analyses are impartial and guided by humanitarian principles.
This means that countries where a large proportion of the world’s people with serious humanitarian needs live and where humanitarian organisations don’t have the money they need to help people, receive more funding.
For each humanitarian crisis, Sida identifies which organisations are best placed to carry out the humanitarian work. The money usually goes to the organisations already active in the area. The money is flexible and can be used where it is most needed. This makes it possible to adapt quickly to changes.
Sida’s humanitarian support is governed by the Swedish government strategy.
Updated: April 8, 2025