HNPW 2026: Leveraging existing resources: Scaling anticipatory action through smarter finance

Registration and participation: This hybrid session is organized as part of Humanitarian Networks and Partnerships Week (HNPW) 2026, taking place in Geneva and online. Participation is open to individuals registered for HNPW, either attending in person or virtually. If you plan to attend in person in Geneva, you must register through the HNPW event portal in order to receive your official e-badge, which is required for access to the venue. If you plan to attend online, please register via the HNPW event portal or via the dedicated online registration form.

Background

Despite its proven benefits — from protecting vulnerable communities and their livelihoods from predictable shocks to reducing humanitarian needs and assistance costs — Anticipatory Action (AA) remains significantly underfunded and underutilized. At present, AA receives only a small fraction of overall crisis financing and relies heavily on humanitarian grants from a relatively limited donor base. This funding model constrains scale, sustainability, and national ownership.

At the same time, global momentum is building. AA is increasingly recognized across humanitarian, development, and climate policy processes, including the Humanitarian Reset, the Grand Bargain, the Belem Declaration, the Geneva Call for Disaster Risk Reduction, and regional roadmaps developed by intergovernmental organizations. Governments are beginning to explore domestic budgeting for AA, humanitarian actors are testing innovative and blended finance approaches, and international financial institutions are embedding AA within resilience and climate programming.

Expanding and better combining financing sources is essential to unlock the full potential of AA and to ensure long-term sustainability and impact.

About the session

This interactive session will explore how to leverage a broader spectrum of financing instruments and better align existing humanitarian, climate, and development funding to scale AA.

Through a World Café-style dialogue, participants will engage in dynamic peer exchange to identify practical tools and collaborative opportunities across three critical pathways:

• National ownership and domestic financing – Institutionalizing AA through public budgets and national systems
• Climate and development financing – Aligning and leveraging climate adaptation and resilience funding streams
• Innovative and market-based mechanisms – Exploring blended finance, risk transfer, and other emerging instruments

Participants will work together to identify how to stretch every dollar — regardless of its source — and generate actionable ideas to accelerate investment, improve value for money, and scale impact at both country and global levels.

Key discussion areas

The session will focus on:

• Institutionalizing AA through domestic finance
• Innovative financing mechanisms for AA — existing and new sources
• Tracking and aligning humanitarian, climate, and development funding for AA
• Identifying concrete collaboration opportunities on anticipatory finance at country and global levels

Target audience

This session is intended for professionals working on AA and disaster risk financing, including:

• Humanitarian and development actors
• Disaster risk management and civil protection authorities
• Financing institutions and development banks
• Climate adaptation and resilience practitioners
• Academics and researchers
• Technical experts and implementing partners