As of May 2022, more than 100 million people around the world were forcibly displaced. Many refugees usually remain in countries neighbouring their place of origin, which are mostly low- and middle-income areas. The governments of these countries have the responsibility to provide humanitarian support and to promote development programmes in view of their long-term needs and to increase their self-reliance. However, these countries often lack the resources and/or capacity to do so, which makes the contributions of international actors, as well as civil society organisations, of paramount importance.

In this context, four EMN Member States, including Belgium, have a dedicated strategy or policy that primarily aims to enhance the prospects of displaced persons in non-EU first reception and transit countries. Other EMN Member Countries cover the enhancement of prospects of displaced persons under their broader national development and/or migration strategies or policies. Several EMN Member Countries however, do not specifically refer to the enhancement of prospects of displaced populations in any of their national strategies or policies. 

While there are strong commonalties among the strategies and policies reported, those primarily dedicated to enhancing the prospects of displaced populations generally aim to prevent onward movement, protect and promote human rights, and enhance the resilience of displaced people.

More than half of the reporting EMN Member Countries have also implemented and/or financed specific initiatives to improve the prospects of displaced persons. These activities range from supporting education, vocational training, employment opportunities and livelihood support, to providing psychosocial support.

Implementing these strategies and initiatives can be challenging at times, especially when confronted with difficult socio-economic conditions in non-EU first reception and transit countries, legal restrictions, and conflicts of interest between host governments and donors, all of which can be further aggravated by the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, several success factors were identified that contributed to the effectiveness of approaches to enhance the prospects of displaced populations. The most often reported included adopting a humanitarian-development-peace nexus approach, providing multi-annual, flexible and predictable funding and including host populations in the scope of the initiatives.

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