Pre-Financing Anticipatory Action: Lessons Learned from the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society

Since 2015, the Bangladesh Red Crescent Society (BDRCS) has been at the forefront of anticipatory action, developing trigger models and testing early action activities for cyclones, floods, and heatwaves. By 2024, BDRCS had validated three Early Action Protocols (EAPs), targeting over 200,000 people, with an estimated activation cost of 940,000 CHF. Between 2019 and 2024, each protocol has been activated at least once, making Bangladesh the country with the greatest number of EAP activations in the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement to date.

This case study focuses on BDRCS’s use of pre-financing solutions for a tropical cyclone. Donor pipelines, by default or design, are often not able to make funds instantly available to National Societies (NS), especially in sudden onset hazards with short lead times. Pre-financing refers to an NS arranging its own temporary funding to carry out early actions before donor funds arrive in their account. Cyclones have one of the shortest or smallest windows of time (often less than 72 hours) to conduct early actions. Funding must be available within hours of the trigger activation to achieve all the early actions. This case study shows how BDRCS has overcome challenges to successfully move funds to coastal branch units for early actions ahead of a cyclone.

Related: Pre-Financing Anticipatory Action: A Practical Guide for National Societies