In-donor refugee costs in ODA

ODA in-donor refugee costs amount for a non-negligible share of total ODA (7% in 2019; 6% in 2020). To preserve ODA integrity and promote comparability among members, the DAC High Level Meeting on 30-31 October 2017 endorsed five clarifications to the reporting directives on in-donor refugee costs.

• Clarification 1 addresses the rationale for counting in-donor refugee costs in ODA;
• Clarification 2  defines the meaning of the term “refugee” and the categories of refugees;
• Clarification 3 specifies the twelve months rule to ensure that costs are counted exclusively for refugees who have stayed in the donor country for less than twelve months; 
• Clarification 4 sets out the eligibility of specific cost items;
• Clarification 5 provides the methodology for assessing costs, including actual data points and detailed calculations.

In line with the explicit request in Clarification 5, methods used by members for calculating in-donor refugee costs were collected by the Secretariat, and published online at https://www.oecd.org/dac/financing-sustainable-development/refugee-costs-oda.htm. 24 members so far have agreed to publish it.

This tool was developed to help compare countries’ methodologies for reporting in-donor refugee costs in ODA . It builds upon the complete methodologies of members, and the different topics defined by the clarifications on the reporting of such costs.

To select only topics and countries of interest, different filters are available to create a table:

1. A clarification filter: you can decide to display only topics related to one or several clarification(s);
2. A subtopic filter: to choose specific items from the selected clarification(s);
3. A members filter: to select the relevant countries to compare.

Please note that : 

• Some members do not report in-donor refugee costs in ODA. If such is the case, the country row cells will only display “not reported”;
• Some members do include these costs in ODA, but have not yet shared/agreed to publish their methodologies. In that case, row cells will indicate “not disclosed”

Take 2 minutes to know how to use this online database :