COVID-19 data published to IATI: what do we know and what’s next?
The global COVID-19 pandemic risks undoing hard-won development gains by undermining the ability to achieve national development plans and the 2030 Agenda. In this time of unprecedented crisis, the development community is prioritising support to response and recovery; however, to ensure that countries can respond effectively and build back sustainably, it is critical that development partners target resources to specific country needs and priorities, coordinating their efforts to avoid duplication and maximise funding.
By publishing timely and comprehensive data on resources directed to the global COVID-19 response, the IATI community is providing partners across the globe with critical information needed to plan, coordinate and evaluate the response to the pandemic.
By publishing timely and comprehensive data on resources directed to the global COVID-19 response, the IATI community is providing partners across the globe with critical information needed to plan, coordinate and evaluate the response to the pandemic.
The following analysis evaluates the progress made in publishing data on COVID-related activities to IATI and outlines upcoming work intended to increase the quality and quantity of this information.
Analysis on COVID-19 data published to IATI
Shortly after the COVID-19 pandemic began to unfold, IATI developed publishing guidance to enable publishers to identify their COVID-19-related activities within IATI datasets in a standardised way. When organisations follow the guidance, data users can identify which activities within IATI data are COVID-19-related, allowing them to more easily access, analyse, and use this data (detailed guidance on how to access and use IATI’s COVID-related data can be found here).
Since the guidance was released in March, 53 organisations have published data on 1376 COVID-related activities (as of 17 June). The IATI Secretariat has since analysed the quality and content of this data, and findings from this analysis are currently being used by the Secretariat to conduct outreach to key publishers to address data quality issues and to guide decisions on potential changes to the publishing guidance. An overview of the issues identified and their implications for data use will be featured in an upcoming post on the IATI website.
Key findings
Key findings from the initial Secretariat assessment of COVID-19 data published to IATI include the following [1]:
- 1376 COVID-19-related activities have been published.
- 53% of COVID-19-related activities were published by multilateral organisations.
- 87% of COVID-19-related activities were published by 10 organisations, with the largest number of activities from UNDP and the European Commission.
- 405 organisations have been identified as implementing COVID-19-related activities.
- 138 countries are recipients of COVID-19-related funding from activities published to IATI.
- Commitments published to IATI cover USD $297 million allocated to the COVID-19 response; while USD $166 million has been disbursed to address COVID-19.
- Information on recipient countries and implementing organisations is often missing from data published on COVID-19-related activities. Ongoing outreach to publishers, specifically members, by the IATI Secretariat will seek to address these and other data quality issues.
- Currently only nine publishers are identifying COVID-19-related transactions, which limits the possibility to identify resource flows specifically allocated to COVID-19. Ongoing consultations with the IATI community will attempt to identify potential options to address this challenge.
[1] The methodology for conducting this analysis, including definitions for COVID-19-related activity and COVID-19-related transaction, can be found at the end of this post, but it should be noted that this is likely still a partial picture of COVID-19-related activities being funded and implemented by IATI’s publishing organisations. Some organisations are yet to publish COVID-19-specific values within their activities and some organisations are yet to publish updated data that includes their COVID-19 activities due to their publishing timelines. It is expected that the number of activities and the quality of the data will continue to improve and the Secretariat will periodically share updates with the IATI community on this progress. text.
Organisations publishing COVID-19-related activities
Table 1. Number of COVID-19-related activities, by organisation type
| Organisation Type | Number of Organisations | Number of Activities |
|---|---|---|
| Multilateral | 17 | 728 |
| Other Public Sector | 4 | 339 |
| Government | 13 | 229 |
| International NGO | 14 | 67 |
| Other | 1 | 6 |
| Private Sector | 2 | 2 |
| National NGO | 1 | 2 |
| Public Private Partnership | 1 | 1 |
| Foundation | 1 | 1 |
Table 2. Number of COVID-19-related activities (top 10 publishers)
Note: each organisation defines an ‘activity’ differently, which can in some cases result in the activity count being higher than anticipated (e.g. UNDP reports both ‘projects’ and ‘outputs’ as activities).
| Publisher | Number of Activities |
|---|---|
| UNDP | 378 |
| European Commission – ECHO | 329 |
| World Bank | 138 |
| USAID | 109 |
| UNHCR | 66 |
| WHO | 59 |
| Oxfam Novib | 34 |
| Germany | 32 |
| UNICEF | 30 |
| DfID | 26 |
Organisations Implementing COVID-19-related Activities
There are 405 organisations implementing COVID-19-related activities, with many organisations (e.g. UNDP, UNICEF) indicating that they are the implementers of their own activities. UNDP is most commonly reported as an implementing organisation, followed by UNHCR and WHO. About 9% (125) of activities do not include an implementing organisation name.
Table 3. Organisations implementing COVID-19-related activities (top 10)
| Implementing Organisation | Number of Activities |
|---|---|
| UNDP | 336 |
| Unspecified* | 125 |
| UNHCR | 66 |
| WHO | 66 |
| UNICEF | 49 |
| Danish Refugee Council (Dansk Flygtningehjaelp) | 19 |
| Norwegian Refugee Council (NOR) | 18 |
| International Rescue Committee IRC Deutschland gGmbH | 15 |
| Action Against Hunger (Acción Contra El Hambre (ES) | 12 |
| WFP | 12 |
*Activity did not include an implementing organisation name.
Recipient countries for COVID-19-related funding
COVID-19-related activities published to IATI list more than 138 recipient countries, with Uganda and Bangladesh listed most frequently (in 35 activities each). About 11% of activities do not include a recipient country.
Table 4. Number of COVID-19-related activities by recipient country* (top 10)
| Recipient Country | Number of Activities |
|---|---|
| Unspecified** | 156 |
| Uganda | 35 |
| Bangladesh | 35 |
| Syria | 33 |
| Pakistan | 32 |
| Somalia | 30 |
| Ethiopia | 28 |
| India | 26 |
| Philippines | 26 |
| Palestine | 26 |
*Excludes activities with multiple recipient countries.
**Activity did not include a recipient country.
Resources supporting the Response to COVID-19
When an activity is identified as COVID-19-related, it cannot be assumed that all resources under that activity are COVID-19-related. In order to positively assess that a transaction is responding to COVID-19, the publishing guidance recommends that it is categorised as COVID-19-related at the transaction level, with the inclusion of ‘COVID-19’ in the transaction description. However, currently, only nine publishers are identifying transactions as COVID-19-related in this way.
While USD $14.4 billion in outgoing commitments are recorded in activities that are COVID-19-related, only USD $297 million (2%) are recorded in transactions identified as COVID-19-related. Similarly, while USD $6.3 billion in disbursements are recorded in activities that are COVID-19-related, only USD $167 million (3%) are recorded in transactions identified as COVID-19-related. This means that only a small portion of resources in COVID-19-related activities can be definitively identified as addressing COVID-19.
There are consultations underway to discuss the best way to tackle the challenge of ensuring that data published to IATI enables the identification of resource flows that are exclusively focused on COVID-19.
This limits the analysis that is possible of the resource flows related to COVID-19, and there are consultations underway to discuss the best way to tackle the challenge of ensuring that data published to IATI enables the identification of resource flows that are exclusively focused on COVID-19. The availability of this precise financial data is critical for enabling data users, particularly partner country governments, to know the amount of resources flowing into their countries to address the pandemic, allowing them to make the best possible national resource allocation decisions.
For the resources that can be definitively identified as COVID-19-related, the data shows that Outgoing Commitments between 1 January 2020 and 17 June 2020 totaled almost USD $297 million, with a considerable increase from Q1 to Q2. Disbursements totaled almost USD $167 million, with a similarly large increase from Q1 to Q2.
The table below shows the resources in COVID-19-related transactions published so far in 2020 categorised by transaction type, and the organisation that has published this data.
Table 5. COVID-19-related resource flows (USD) in COVID-19-related transactions
| Transaction Type |
Publishing Organisation |
Q1 2020: Jan 1 - Mar 31 |
Q2 2020: Apr 1 - Jun 17 |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total |
||||
| Incoming Funds (USD) |
Danish Church Aid |
0 |
1,059,800 |
1,059,800 |
| European Commission - ECHO |
284,484,648 |
55,574,364 |
340,059,012 |
|
| ZOA |
0 |
784,350 |
784,350 |
|
| Total |
284,484,648 |
57,418,514 |
341,903,162 |
|
| Outgoing Commitment (USD) |
ActionAid UK |
0 |
46,589 |
46,589 |
| European Commission - ECHO |
42,139,163 |
53,242,050 |
95,381,213 |
|
| USAID |
40,102,441 |
161,236,076 |
201,338,517 |
|
| Total |
82,241,604 |
214,524,715 |
296,766,320 |
|
| Disbursement (USD) |
European Commission - ECHO |
36,780,471 |
51,577,625 |
88,358,096 |
| Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Republic of Slovenia |
0 |
111,602 |
111,602 |
|
| USAID |
2,974,503 |
9,431,901 |
12,406,403 |
|
| Unitaid |
0 |
172,532 |
172,532 |
|
| UNOCHA – CERF |
0 |
65,850,023 |
65,850,023 |
|
| Total |
39,754,974 |
127,143,682 |
166,898,656 |
|
| Incoming Commitment (USD) |
UNHCR |
23,896,000 |
142,138,040 |
166,034,040 |
| Total |
23,896,000 |
142,138,040 |
166,034,040 |
Of the almost USD $297 million in outgoing commitments, almost 23% did not include a recipient country.
Table 6. Outgoing commitments (USD) by recipient country in COVID-19-related transactions* (top 10; 1 January 2020 – 17 June 2020)
| Recipient Country | Commitments (USD) |
|---|---|
| Unspecified** | 66,875,143 |
| Italy | 20,000,000 |
| Iran | 17,367,750 |
| Pakistan | 12,602,500 |
| Iraq | 11,258,725 |
| South Africa | 8,420,000 |
| India | 6,350,000 |
| Palestine | 5,000,000 |
| Myanmar | 4,625,480 |
| Nigeria | 4,553,267 |
*Excludes activities with multiple recipient countries.
**Activity did not include a recipient country.
Of the almost USD $167 million in disbursements, almost 60% did not include a recipient country, and the largest disbursement so far is to Iraq.
Table 7. Disbursements (USD) by recipient country in COVID-19-related transactions* (top 10; 1 January 2020 – 17 June 2020)
| Recipient Country | Disbursements (USD) |
|---|---|
| Unspecified** | 99,884,950 |
| Iraq | 7,602,593 |
| Iran | 6,723,000 |
| Yemen | 6,162,750 |
| Afghanistan | 5,752,780 |
| Pakistan | 5,284,278 |
| Syria | 4,349,085 |
| Myanmar | 4,145,548 |
| Somalia | 2,617,488 |
| Uganda | 2,050,062 |
*Excludes activities with multiple recipient countries.
**Activity did not include a recipient country
What’s next?
These efforts show promising progress in making resources on the COVID-19 pandemic widely available for development partners and partner countries. However, more needs to be done to ensure that comprehensive and reliable data is available to coordinate efforts, avoid duplication and maximise funding. In this context, the IATI Secretariat is undertaking a series of activities to support publishers and the IATI community to meet these aims:
IATI COVID-19 webinar 30 June
The IATI Secretariat is delivering the third IATI COVID-19 webinar on 30 June at 3:30pm (UK time) to present the above data analysis and provide an opportunity to hear more about stakeholders data needs. Register now.
In late June, the IATI Secretariat will be sharing additional analysis and guidance for publishers to improve the quality of their COVID-19 data. A forthcoming news post will assess:
- Ways in which publishers are identifying activities as COVID-19-related within their IATI data.
- The kinds of data quality issues that have been identified and addressed.
- The kinds of improvements needed from publishing organisations to make the COVID-19 data more useful to data users.
Get support
If you have any specific questions on using or publishing IATI data on activities related to COVID-19, please do get in touch by emailing the IATI Helpdesk: [email protected].
Additional information: Methodology for analysis of COVID-19 IATI data
The data was retrieved from the IATI Registry on 17 June 2020 as the IATI Datastore was still in a pre-launch phase. The criteria for inclusion of activities or transactions in the analysis was based on the guidance on Publishing data on COVID-19 using the IATI Standard. The following definitions were used:
COVID-19-related activity = activity in which the activity title, activity description, or transaction description include "COVID-19", the humanitarian scope code is "EP-2020-000012-001" or "HCOVD20," or the tag code is “COVID-19.”
COVID-19-related transaction = transaction in which the transaction description includes "COVID-19"
The financial data was converted to USD using an annual average exchange rate derived by dividing GDP in National currency unit by GDP in US Dollar (Source: IMF WEO). And non-traditional currencies contained in the IATI data (Special Drawing Rights, Bitcoin, etc.) are appended to the exchange rate list.