Forced displacement has reached unprecedented levels, with more than 122 million people affected worldwide as of mid-2025. As natural disasters and geopolitical pressures intensify this trend, the growing scale and complexity of forced displacement underscores the need for new financial and operational approaches.
How can the way we approach this challenge be changed to build more effective systems that respect human lives?
At Davos 2026, leaders from the IRC, IOM, IFRC and Aon argued that migration is being mismanaged as a perpetual emergency rather than a predictable feature of modern economies and a test of governance. Amy Pope warned that failing to distinguish among people on the move “is loading into the refugee convention…a wide range of people who shouldn’t necessarily be there,” undermining public support for protecting those fleeing persecution. Jagan Chapagain reframed the issue: “80%…did not want to move,” but lack “a livelihood opportunity,” exposing a development model that builds infrastructure without enough jobs. Greg Case described migration as a symptom of “volatility” driven by interconnected megatrends—trade, technology, weather and workforce—and proposed scaling risk-financing tools to reduce forced displacement by getting capital to communities faster. Parametric insurance and new investment platforms can deliver rapid payouts—“within a week…money is dropping into the economy”—to rebuild after shocks and stabilize lives. Panelists stressed shifting resources upstream: identify pressures (desertification, flooding, conflict recurrence) earlier, invest locally, and expand legal pathways to reduce chaotic, irregular flows that fuel polarization. The core agenda: prevent “the need to move,” while protecting space for refugees who truly have no choice.
Everyone, welcome to this discussion of migration a new approach. My name is David Miliband. I'm the president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee. That's a global humanitarian charity. We were founded by Albert Einstein to help people whose lives are shattered by conflict and disaster to survive, recover and gain control of their futures. And we're going to discuss today one of the most contentious issues in global politics, one of the biggest issues in global economics. And we have a stellar panel who are going to inform and entertain you for the next 25 minutes. And then there's 15 minutes for the people in this room to make comments or ask questions. If you're sitting in front of me, please make eyes at me so that I can know to call you if you're sitting behind me. Please move to another seat so that you can you can more effectively make eyes at me. And welcome to the people who are watching around the world. We've got Greg Case, the CEO of Aon, leading insurance provider, but a provider of much, much more. And secondly, Amy Pope, the director general of the International Organization of Migration. We couldn't have this session without you being here. And also Jagan Chapagain, the secretary general of the International Federation of the Red cross and Red Crescent Societies. As I intimated, we're going to talk for about 20, 25 minutes and then hopefully provide enough material for you to all chime in and rather than me introduce them, I'm going to let them introduce themselves by answering the question, what drew you to this subject and this panel? And we're just going to go around with the three of them. Just to start off, Greg, tell us what brings you to this topic.
Well, first of all, David, thank you very much for the invitation. It's an absolute privilege to be here.
A fee that.
Has been, I.
Assure you of that.
It's all good. But the moderator fee, that's excellent. Especially privileged to be here with all three of you, if I may say what you do on behalf of of the world and humanity is is a beacon for all of us. So it's a privilege for us to be here. We're here with a little bit different angle. Our angle is literally how can we support. And in a world that's changing and continue to evolve, how can we support and play a role in helping you do what you do? Which iron's role is to reduce volatility in the world on behalf of our clients? These are companies. True. They're countries though as well their regions, their communities. And to the extent we can do that and bring private capital into that world in a different way, for us that is that's that's absolutely top of the food chain in terms of our mission. Our colleagues absolutely, truly find it a privilege to to support. And so look at me. I'm here to try to to try to make a difference to your missions. If we can do that in the current environment, we'll talk more about it than it's really a good day for us.
Just do a double underline on the volatility. Just give us your take because that's an interesting way of thinking.
About it. Well listen you know every every firm that's here at Davos this week. Every company that's here at Davos this week is encountering a set of a set of forces that are not conceptual. You can define them. And we have defined them. You can model them and we have modeled them. And then to the extent you understand them and you can model them, you might be able to actually bring solutions to reduce the volatility around those. So for example we would highlight four megatrends that we talked about in 2020 for 2024 a trade. That's right trade before trade intensified. This is in 2024. Technology weather and workforce. These four megatrends in essence are creating levels of volatility David, that have never been seen before. And the rate of change against these four megatrends is increasing. We updated this analytics from 24 and early 25. Every single pillar stood as tall, in fact more intensity and became more complicated because they're connected. So, for example, think about a commercial company who's a builder trying to decide not not how to not how to insure themselves, how to think about their global strategy. And what do they want to invest their capital. And we're having a conversation around literally weather. And you can't put a worker on the field greater than 120°F. Therefore, they're changing their capital allocation strategy on how to build. This is literally this is literally, you know, weather interacting with talent, interacting, how do you solve it with technology, etc.. So, David, from our standpoint, your question world's becoming more volatile, the volatility is more interconnected. And we together need better solutions. We need better facts to give you better solutions. That's the.
Great start. Amy, what brings you to this topic?
Well, clearly I get bored easily. Right? So migration is not for the faint of heart, right. And and ultimately though, it is what underpins human civilization, right? None of us would be here without migration of some sort. The evidence is overwhelming that migration actually leads to development. It drives innovation, it drives solutions. And certainly with demographic changes in the world today, migration will be a necessity. But at the same time, we're seeing people move often, chaotically, often irregularly, often through informal or criminal networks. And that actually undermines confidence in governments. It undermines public support for protections for migrants. And it's ultimately driving politics. I mean, we're here at Davos at a moment in time where migration is at the center of every single country's conversation, internal conversation. It doesn't have to be this way. I believe that there are ways for us to better understand why people will move when they need to move, and come up with systems so that they can move not only with dignity, but that they can move in a more strategic way, so they can move in ways that benefit economies and move in ways that benefit, the country of origin. But it does require some forward thinking, and it does require new policy approaches.
Great. Again, what brings you to this topic?
A bit similar to how Amy started. I think, you know, throughout history, we know the migration has been a very powerful driver for development. And, and I think, if we look at the political discussions now around the world, their fathers or grandfathers or great grandfathers were migrants and basically most of them. Something like this now has become so polarized. And the plight of the people is not seen as the plight of the people anymore because of the intensity of the polarization. And for us, of course, we are not a migration organization like Amy is, but we are humanitarian organization, and we have seen the multiple consequences of the way the migration has happened now. And we are also being a membership organization, being present literally in every country in our members are expected to provide humanitarian support, during transit, during the turn, in the countries of destination or in the, in the countries of origin. So that's the first part, that something so fundamental has become so polarized. And the humanitarian needs of the people are so trivialized. The second part of my motivation to be here is something, you know, we did with the UN around finding an innovative way to support people, to support people. We did it through an emergency fund, and it was a great success. And now we are going to the second phase of that. So while I think that may not be enough to solve all the problems, but we did find an approach which actually, I mean, last year we managed to solve 1.6 million more people because of the the insurance scheme. We had worked together with them on. And it can be scaled up. So challenge at the same time an opportunity to find a different way of working together. So that's why I'm here.
Great. Well, that's a really good start. Maybe I should say why I'm here. When I applied for my job to be the CEO of the International Rescue Committee, I said, I like big problems. B I thought that the, as one of the few organizations that was both an international humanitarian aid agency and a refugee resettlement agency, we had a special responsibility to be the thought leaders as well as the impact leaders. And third, both my parents were refugees. And so that brings me to this topic. Let me start. Start by just framing this a bit. 300 million people or so on the move this year, more or less 120 million or so, what we would call forcibly displaced. In other words, they're moving because of war, disaster in smaller numbers, direct persecution. So the majority of of that 300 million moving for economic reasons, sometimes called economic migrants, although that carries a connotation that's not not always helpful. And a lot of mixed migration people moving from countries because they are they forced to leave, others moving for economic reasons, sometimes because of both. And the whole question of climate as a driver of people movement fits into that. Personally, I don't speak about climate refugees because most of the people who are moving for climate reasons are staying within their own country. They're not actually moving to another country. But we can discuss that. But I think it's worth situating. We're talking 4% of the world's population. So a hell of a lot of people, some of the countries that are, if you like, exporting the largest number of people, Venezuela, 8 million people fled as, quote unquote, refugees from Venezuela, Sudan, 3 to 4 million people. Syria, million people have gone back. But there's still 5 million Syrians outside the country. As you three look at this landscape, I want to ask you, what do you think is the biggest problem to be solved? I think all of us would say people who move can be contributors. But what's the biggest problem to be solved? Who wants to? Amy, why don't you kick off?
I'll start with the fact that we treat everybody on the move as an emergency. Right. So let's take let's look at the people who around the world who are moving, and let's separate those who are moving with a visa, with a job opportunity through a traditional regular pathway. And that is the majority of people on the move. But for everyone else, we don't distinguish right now whether they're moving because of a climate shock, whether they're moving because of a war, whether they're moving because of extreme poverty. And that is an enormous problem, because that means we are loading into the refugee convention, the convention that guarantees support and protection for people fleeing persecution, a wide range of people who shouldn't necessarily be there. And the result of that is that it's undermining public support for the refugee convention. So if my partner is at UNHCR were here, they would say, and we know that we want to protect the space for people who have no choice but to flee their country because they are being persecuted for who they are. But right now, the system does not allow for differences in a response. And that's a major problem we're going to have to solve, because we are seeing more people than ever on the move, and we know that more people are moving as a result of things like climate shocks.
So just to double click on that, my experience in politics was that it's important to distinguish between an immigrant and a refugee. Not that one is good and the other is bad, but that they're different. And if you don't have a coherent immigration policy, it's impossible to have a coherent refugee policy. So let's just double click on that. What what others do you think is the biggest problem to be solved?
You know, David, I've always tried to refrain to use problem when you talk about migration because that sort of hits to the negative problem. Yeah, exactly. Because it sort of hits to that, that, that negativity, that actually migration can be a great thing too. And it has been great if you look at the history of, of, of different countries. But but the challenge we, we have here is. And this is from my personal experience, you know, spending a lot of time, particularly in Africa and spending time with the especially the younger migrants who have been moving and and listening to them. For me, it was a bit of an eye opener that 80% of those people actually did not want to move somehow. Now we have this perception, especially in Europe, that everybody there is trying to move. 80% of the people actually do not want to move. And especially in the cultural context of Africa and things like this, you know, they are deeply rooted in their communities and, you know, tribal things and things like that. But when I talk to those young people, what they said was, if we only had a livelihood opportunity, it was as simple as that, nothing complicated. And for me, somehow, fundamentally, today's development model, let me put more on the development side than on the humanitarian side has not been good enough. Let me put it, quote unquote, to create jobs and livelihood opportunities for people. It might have built cities and dams and highways, pansy airport, but is not creating sufficient livelihood and job opportunities. And if we cannot find a way to invest on those issues, the pressure on people to move will only grow. You know, it's it looks too simplistic. But if we can help 80% of the people who do not want to move to leave where they are, the 20% probably could fit in the legal pathways. The problem is over. So that's why I think it's really for me, that's the biggest problem, that how do we invest? How do we change our development model that addresses a very, very fundamental basics of people needs and aspirations?
Great answer. Greg.
Listen, I again, you all take a and have very strategic pattern recognition. You see this live this every day. This is what you do. I have we at Aon have massive respect for the missions and strategies you have. We are literally looking at very specific pieces in which we might be able to. In fact, I'll be blunt, we have changed the game on doing something around forced migration. And by the way, doing something in a world of constrained resources which we know we have, how do you take the resources we've got and add additional resources in the form of private capital? Think about if we can bring private capital into this game. And, and I think the problem or the challenge might be is my colleagues describe it to me at Aon is how do we remove the need to move. And so if you if forced migration is no longer necessary, you don't have why do you move? I don't have access to water. I don't have access to infrastructure. I don't have a place to live. You know, this is a hurricane. This is an earthquake, or there's a war. It's a problem. It's a challenge. I lost my job. I'm at risk. I'm going to give you two examples, two very specific, concrete examples. Not in this world, but in exactly analogous to jargon. You've already lived it. But take, take Ukraine. We have been able and by the way, we're not anything special. But if you have the analytics that is compelling enough to move private capital again, think about whether you would take your retirement and you would do that. What I'm about to describe, that's the conversation we're having. That's how level of edge this is. Would you invest, by the way, in a platform which is going to help draw capital into Ukraine during time of war for rebuilding Ukraine? Anybody ready to do that? Well, we, we, we have we have convinced private capital to do that. The analytics suggest that Ukraine is not all at war. There are pieces that will provide economic return. And in fact, with the support of the DFC on this platform right now, there is a platform right now in Ukraine which is expanding, drawing private capital into Ukraine, private capital. People are voting with their balance sheet, with the analytics to create the facilities to do that. That's like and everyone. And by the way, we had more people on the ground than anybody in our industry. We moved most of them to, you know, to to Krakow and gave them got schools and daycare, etc. but we also have, you know, year end, I talked to 100, 100 or so who are actually in Kyiv. They want to be there. The job stayed, the jobs stayed. They didn't have to move. So can we can we reduce forced migration? The second is Jamaica. So literally we went to Jamaica and said, we think we can actually execute an instrument for you that if there is a category hurricane above a certain level, that we might be able to actually get a payout for you. Why is that different than just classic insurance? That means within a week, money is dropping into the economy to rebuild roads, schools, hospitals. Why do you leave Jamaica? Something happened. I have to leave. If you take that away with economic capital, this can be very, very powerful. Challenge is how do you convince the capital? And it turns out we've been doing this for years and years and years with insurance companies. Can we do it for commercial companies? Yes, we now do it. Then. Can we do it for countries? Yes. Can we do it for organizations? Yes. All we need to do is move capital and we have proven we can do that. The real question is can we scale and if we can scale, this is a potential, I'm humbly suggesting game changer in terms of additional capital in. And it will be very, very dynamic. By the way, the access pools for us is 200 and 200 trillion. Right. These are the pension funds. These are, you know, private private equity, sovereign sovereign funds, etc.. So the opportunity is there if we can kind of create the conditions to draw the capital in, to drive it and even, even DFC, if you talk to Ben Black and the team there, they can be they can be a real force of adaptation around supplying a layer that also entices the capital. Come in. So what I'm trying to highlight is, you know, what's the biggest opportunity as you described or a problem? It is taking the conditions away for forced migration. And the rethink of how private capital comes in may be one big contributor. And together and it will be it together. It will take it will take a village here we might be able to draw on substantially more private capital in this game, and we are convinced you all will put it to work in the most advantageous way possible.
Do you want to just give your perspective on this partnership that you've had? Because explain that it's not just free money. I mean, there's got to be money raised to pay the premiums every year to deliver the payout.
No, absolutely. I think, you know, it was during the Covid 19 time. And then that was the time, of course, we everybody was going to the private sector for money. And and actually, that was the first time actually in ifSc, we raised more money from the private sector than from the government, actually, in our history. That was the Covid 19. But that made us think that why why private sector was contributing at a scale which they were not doing before. And it came to a very simple thing to say that actually the problem was so defined and it was impacting everybody. But then that led to further discussion that how do we then keep the private sector with us moving forward? And then then that became much more complicated. And that's when we understood, and then that was the point. We came in touch with our own colleagues and we started discussing. And what I understood was constantly asking for more checks with the private sector is not going to work, right? Of course, certain time they will cut the checks, but constantly asking for more checks and more check is not going to work. So then we needed to develop a product which sort of resonates with the private sector business model, but then also brings capital to us as an organization. And that's when we came together. I mean, we had sort of an idea that what we could do, but we didn't have expertise. And that's when the Aaron offered their expertise pro bono, actually, almost three years, we have had incredible, incredible expertise. And we I mean, they did really nothing except approving it. They came up with the model where we could have, an insurance model. And we started with the indemnity based insurance model to our emergency fund. And I understand this is one of the rare model of, of of of of of insurance. So we insured offhand which is an emergency fund. But we did need, of course, the capital to put as a to, to buy as to premium. But it's the product seems solid actually. We got other private sector companies, including insurance companies through their, you know, grants to actually help us buy the premium. I did put a million in the first time just to, just to start. Then we didn't have to actually use our own money because we had others to, to, to, to put to, to buy the premium. And, and last year, actually, we multiplied the return by five times, and we could reach 1.6 million people.
Let's just move the conversation on. Here's a fact that's important that we hold on to for those who are forcibly displaced. So that's probably across a border as a refugee, probably, let's say, for the sake of argument, 50 million people, approximately 70 million internally displaced on a forcible basis, 50 million refugees. Of those 50 million refugees, three quarters are in poor or lower middle income countries, not in rich countries. For all the debate about political crisis as a result of migration in Europe as well, for those who are refugees from war and conflict and disaster, they're predominantly in poorer parts of the world rather than in richer parts of the world. So the emphasis that you've all put in different ways on livelihoods, on integration, on durable and sustainable solutions applies very much and is part of a massive development challenge, if you like. Let's speak a bit about what you've seen that really works. We've heard something about the financing. What about on the ground in terms of not just migration but integration? I look towards you, Amy, because it's your area of specialism.
So a couple of things. One is, to this question of how do we understand risk and what can we do to mitigate it? When we look at communities who are forced to move? Right. And we use that phrase because that person feels like I have no other option. Oftentimes we can see if we look back over a period of years what pressures were coming down on them that ultimately led to their decision to move. And that's the piece that we think we can actually mitigate with partners like Aon. Right? Instead of waiting until people have been displaced and then reacting, oh my God, they've been displaced, what do we do? And it's billions of dollars. In response, we start to understand what's happening within that community. And we can see, for example, with desertification trends, with flooding, with, lack of job opportunities for agricultural communities especially, we can see those drivers, those pressures on people to migrate building. So our goal here is to intervene well before those pressures turn into a forcible quote unquote, displacement. Now, when I say that I want to distinguish because there will be a category of people who really have no choice, war breaks out, they're on the wrong side of the ethnic divide. They're ultimately their life is at stake. They need to flee. Right? So that is a category of people that this may not be the right answer for. But there's a whole wealth of people who you can see those pressures and there are opportunities to mitigate and engage. Now, sometimes it's engaging in another part of the country where they could find safety, where they could find shelter. In other cases, it's engaging just across the border, because what we do know is people first move. They try to stay as close to home as possible, right? They first move within their country. They then move to a neighboring country. So the more we can engage in solutions before someone says, look, I'm now going to go five, six, seven countries. I'm going to take a boat across the Mediterranean. The better outcomes we have ultimately in stabilizing this movement to people.
Yeah. In about five minutes, I'm going to come to the, audience. So. So please prepare for this. Climate is not a very popular topic at Davos this year. So I think we should defy convention and talk about it. Thank you for bringing in, desertification. As President Macron said, the climate crisis hasn't gone away just because we're not talking about it. So let's do it justice. How does the changing climate you mentioned weather earlier. How does that fit into your thinking about the issues that we're talking about?
Literally, it's another source of volatility. Literally. We've been modeling weather forever. Wind blows earthquakes, wildfires. That's what we do. But again industrial strength modeling that moves markets. And we model the impact not by country, not by region, not by block by by building globally. And so in essence, we, we get a good understanding of that. You see how that evolves over time. And that's out there. So you know, to us the weather piece is absolutely understandable.
It's the case isn't it? The science tells us that the rise in the average global temperature is also associated with more extreme weather events.
It does although the the the the the volatility has been there. And it isn't just that. It's also where people build and how they build and how they think about it and how they're protected from building. There's lots of things we can do to actually mitigate that which we would suggest. But to your point, David, the weather piece of this, we can get our arms around. We can understand, by the way, we can tell you literally the economics of, of valuing that instrument for Jamaica at a category four hurricane or a category five hurricane. We can do all that. And then the question is, what else are the factors that one would want to think about protecting against political risk, geopolitical turmoil, whatever. All these things are sort of on the table. But then I think your question you're getting into before is so penetrating is how do you make that enticement? Because this is not a feel good story. This is a great feel good story and an economic story. We're actually creating economic viability in making a difference in the humanitarian agenda. And we know there's economic viability, but it's like hard dollar return. And so we're talking about these risk pools that you create, that will draw in private capital. These are non-correlated, whatever that means. People smarter than me figure all that stuff out. Literally, these non-correlated risk pools mean that pension funds and others will invest in them. So this is bringing economic viability to the humanitarian challenge in a way we haven't before. And this is what I think you're really getting to. And that's and that'll, that'll, that'll we can do that against any risk, any source of volatility because we do it in the private sector.
And when we spoke last week, I pointed out that actually the most likely predictor of a civil war is a previous civil war. Yeah. So and the most likely product of a civil war is renewed fighting. So that can be modeled as well.
And I would make one other point, which is you were talking about different economic status of countries. Listen, the beauty of this is if you had the network right, can you imagine certain countries would want to actually buy this protection for other countries so that there wasn't forced migration in which impacted their economy? The answer is probably yes. And so what we're talking about is potentially creating a market that can be kind of a force multiplier, if you will, on what this could look like.
I can say a little bit on the innovation front, where are the exciting ideas in my own organization? Climate resilience through seed strengthening in conflict situation. Farmer information systems are a big, part of this. Tell us about how you're seeing some of this innovative, practice. And then we'll go to. Yes. Many people making eyes at me. Okay.
No, very similar to what you described, David. And maybe just to add 1 or 2 things, what the few things have been, particularly in Africa and some parts of Asia, the working with the women's group or the local community led group seems to be extremely, extremely successful. You know, helping them, helping invest a little bit on those type of groups. They seem to produce a lot, a lot in return, but also some of the innovation we are trying to bring. And, you know, as Greg said before, we have to scale up some of the work we have started in East Africa with Ian again around the, you know, the, the, the drought risk and drought risk modeling in the countries, and actually trying to get, you talk about between the countries, but also trying to get between municipalities, you know, the one municipality actually helping to buy the premium for the neighboring, municipality, because if something happens there, they will be the one receiving it. So these are few things we are trying and actually at a small scale, they work very well. But to make a real impact now we have to scale up, and to scale up, we all need to join forces together, because individually we will not be able to scale up at the level to make a difference.
We'll take 2 or 3 questions, come back to the panel, and then we'll try and take another 2 or 3 questions. So let's start with the lady at the back. She's closest to the microphone. Very good positioning strategic.
Not that I arrived later. Anything. Thank you so much for a very interesting discussion. I lead the Lancet countdown on Health and Climate Change, which is a research collaboration that looks at the intersection between health and climate change. So I'm glad that that topic got brought up. And, how we see the issue of migration led by climate is oftentimes, forced migration due to climate hazards, but also as the best available adaptation option when conditions at home have become unlivable. And I was delighted, I think it was you that said that most people or you, David, most people, don't actually want to leave. They're forced to leave, and they very much rather stay at home if conditions are safe. So my question to you is in that balance between migration being the best available option or displacement being the best available option, versus investing in in situ adaptation. How have you worked with other organizations to support people on the ground to make conditions at home safe, and how does that play into the books of managing migration globally?
Great. Hold on to that. Pass this to the gentleman here who had his hand up. Pass the phone, and then we'll pass it to the young man here. Philippe.
Thank you. The the Hebrew Bible has 36 times love the migrant. The word in Hebrew gare could mean migrant, refugee or asylum seeker. It's a big bucket. The commandment to love your neighbor is once. It means the obvious. The migrant was demonized in antiquity. The migrant is being demonized every single minute today, particularly by populist leaders, a few of whom will be speaking at the Davos conference. My question is you're all operating against all these natural forces, all these human ailments of hatred. The success of creating multiracial, multi-faith, multi-ethnic societies is ultimately a key piece. So if there's a fourth seat, how do we actually, once these migrations happen and they're happening all the time, how do we ensure that when we have a blending together of so many different differences, that we don't have to yell at people to love the one who's different? It becomes part of who we are.
Beautiful. Thank you. And then, Philippe.
Thank you so much, Philippe. I'm the executive director of Human Rights Watch, which is one of the two big global human rights organizations. I have just a quick remark and a question for the group. The remark is one of the key factors of forced displacement is actually human rights violations in many countries. And, David, the countries you mentioned are prime examples. Sudan for for many, many years, Venezuela many others. So for countries that are, you know, eager to control migrations at the global level, there is a very strong argument to be made that by addressing human rights violations in the countries in which they occur, is a great way to prevent this forced displacement. My question is a bit to name the elephant in the room. You know, we have a US administration that has been very hostile to migrants domestically who has sent, for example, Venezuelan migrants to be tortured in El Salvador as demonized, you know, migrant populations and is now arguably really undermining the rules based world order and the institutions on which the human rights movement certainly has relied for many years to advance rights. But but also the, you know, the architecture of organizations and advocates who advance the rights of migrants and refugees. So in this very specific moment here in Davos, you know, in this specific moment in history, how big a challenge is that, in your view, for the issues on which you advocate?
Okay, I'm going to go round our panel. They can answer any or all of those questions. Any ones that are not answered I will answer. So, Greg, start with you and then we'll try and come back for another round.
Serious questions. Thank you for all of them. I think if I remember what is happening on the ground, what are we doing? A whole two questions around sort of the overall parameters on what's going on in the world and on the ground. Again, this is back to the idea of why can we break down barriers to make it easier to stay, to make it actually advantageous to stay? And the answer is yes, and we have done it. And by the way, that's also rebuilding infrastructure immediately. There was no money to do that. You went to the world after the fact, as Amy said, and asked the world, the world Bank, others. You asked for money. It takes it takes many years and it eventually comes in and then you build. What we're talking about is actually a construct which exists in which literally within a week now, two weeks, Jamaica had $150 million on the ground, which you could multiply, borrow against and actually build an infrastructure. Bam! That means you're not leaving because you can't get water. This is doable. And this is scalable. So, you know, can't really speak to all the geopolitical turmoil. Well, you can't speak to action that can happen. And there's a massive amount of resources, you know, 200 trillion, 250 trillion that would actually look at this. I'm not saying they would do it, but look at it. But if you had, you know, some small fraction of that, it could change the game. So the first one for me is listen, let's take action where we can take action. So from our standpoint, that's all we can do. If we can support this mission, we're going for it. And in the end, the other pieces, back to kind of the idea of if, if, if those are concerned about migration, you know, this is a way to contribute. As I said, the DFC in the US, Ben Black, there's a lot of resources there, the opportunity to actually force multiply this idea and sponsor it means there's going to be less migration. And by the way, people are going to stay because 80% want to stay. Why not go solve the problem we can solve?
So maybe I'll answer it, a bit indirectly, but say that the reason that we come to Davos is because I think the issue of global stability, regional stability goes beyond the responsibility of governments in a world where we have multinational companies that actually look to. They're trying to measure risk. They're trying to identify where investments are needed. They're trying to figure out whether they should expand into different countries, which ultimately will lead to further development and job opportunities and everything else. This is no longer about just one government and one government that has driven the humanitarian system, by and large. So coming here, having partnerships with folks like Aon and others is about creating a greater level of responsibility for a more stable and peaceful world. And what we're seeing right now is with the pulling back of humanitarian investment, we are at a kind of a pivot point. We either let the world devolve into chaos, more mass movements, greater instability, lack of predictability, etcetera, etcetera, or people need to step up and contribute with a wide range of solutions in order to address that volatility. So I think it's an interesting moment in time for all of us. But I think some of the answers, and I don't want to see multinationals to step in, should step in and play the role of government. There are important roles for governments, civil society and others, but it shouldn't just be the responsibility of governments or a handful of governments to ensure stability.
Maybe trying to come to your questions, of course it's it's it's a very, very, very, very, very big question that how do we actually create an inclusive environment where actually people feel, part of, you know, as people. And this will probably require, of course, a very complex, type of issues coming, coming together. Having said that, I think the last few years, I think probably it was 2014, 2015 wave of migration that's probably changed the narrative, to a negative, negative of this level. So what happened during that time was the migration happened at a scale and at a speed where there was a generosity in the beginning. But then slowly, slowly, slowly, people felt a bit overwhelmed. And somehow how how do we work together to hopefully avoid that type of overwhelming situation when sort of the people's reaction sort of becomes the become the negative reaction? And that's where I think the few things we need to do, and that's what we really need to have a very comprehensive approach of migration. And including my organization, we we were really focusing on root based migration, you know, people moving from one direction. Now we have completely changed that strategy to actually focusing much more on the countries of origin, where we actually try to help address the root causes. Of course, we don't have capacity to address everything, but we can role model on some of these issues and basically help people to stay when they don't want to move. And then the second parallel path is really about widening the legal pathways, you know, being in Geneva. And if you look at the countries in Europe, I don't want to be political. They desperately need migrants. Yeah. You know, sometimes in the airport, pilot announces saying that, listen, I'm delayed by 45 minutes because I don't have enough loaders to load the the luggage in the plane. I mean, it's that obvious. So if we can find a way for the governments to widen the legal pathways, and then when people come legally, some of the, the negativity sort of goes down. And then the third aspect is really finding a capital. I mean, you mentioned 200 trillion available there, 200 trillion of the private capital available here. How can we find, I think the government, the civil society organizations and the private sector to come together to get at least, you know, a small fraction of, of of that capital to be invested on these issues. I think we can we can make progress.
We're going to have to be super disciplined. We have five minutes and 14 seconds. Precisely. So both the questions and the answers, let's try and get two questions behind my head. Great. Okay. So two questions quick.
Hi, I'm Alyssa, I a journalist from dove. And my question is similar to my colleagues here. Really kind of talking. I want to go back to what Amy said about having the topic of conversation in many different countries be migration. And I just want to put a finer point on that, like, what are you hearing right now from world leaders when you come to the table with these types of discussions, like, for example, the one you just raised about a lack of workers, are are you hearing receptivity to this or are you hearing it more hostile or. I'm just curious, kind of like for a pulse check in the leadership room of what people are saying.
And then the lady behind me. Very good. Baton relay here.
Thank you. Hi, I am Debbie, and I'm one of the global shapers. Joining the forum from West. And my question is I have two questions in one. So the first one is, is it possible to have a set of benchmarks or standards of how countries that have capacity to take in migrants, depending on what the situation is, can follow. So it doesn't feel like, oh, you know, when there's a crisis or there's a situation, we don't know what to do, or we have to feel like there's an imbalance or burden placed on these countries to address that. And just following what you were talking about, about narrative, how can we reposition migration in a positive light? Because most times, for example, I was born in the US, raised in Nigeria, and now I live in Hong Kong. So I know the benefit of migration depending on the situation. But then there's always the rhetoric in the US where it's like, oh, you know, the immigrants are here to take our jobs, which is debatable, and we can debate that somewhere else. But how do we redefine that where it's no longer this kind of rhetoric? But then there is a positive impact of here's what migration can bring to these countries that make room for these migrants.
Great. Let's do it in reverse order. We've got three minutes. So there's an old British radio program called just a minute where you're allowed to speak for one minute without hesitation, repetition or deviation. So you have one minute each to pick any of those questions.
No, I think maybe I would pick on, on on your your question, you started I think this is here the public perception how to change the negative negativity. And that's why I was mentioning earlier that I don't want to use the word problem to describe migration, because it's just sort of just fits to pitch to that negativity. But but to change that, we do need to have this comprehensive approach, because if the countries get overwhelmed or they feel overwhelmed, somehow it will be very hard to maintain that that positivity. So I think investing much more and the countries taking more responsibility to to look after their own citizens when they can, when they can not every country can, but many countries can. And I have always said and I think, Amy, you have heard me saying this before, that when a migrant ship sinks in the Mediterranean, there is more outrage in Europe than in the countries where those migrants came from. So we also need to change that, that the countries taking their own responsibility are much more. And if that happens, we can also address some of these negativity. And then ideally having that full course, I know I talk too long, so you should not have given me the first.
So what I hear regularly is we know we need migration, but the perception of irregular migration of people crossing the Mediterranean or the channel or deserts, etc., and our inability to manage that is eroding the space to create pathways for regular migration. And by the way, can you also help us think through things like housing, access to social services and integration of migrants when they come?
Great.
And David, my colleagues, I think, answered this very, very well. You need a minute and 18 seconds to close. As you.
Know, you're you're you've got the last minute.
So I'll be briefer than that. Listen, I think you both have captured it very well. Of course, we need to understand, and by the way, not all countries are created equal. They're not. You know, we can't treat them that way within country. Can't treat them that way. We have to have a very. There is no macro story here. This is a series of micro stories. You've you all three have taught us that at a very, very well. Now one size fits all. So, you know, in the end that's why the dialogue is necessary. But ultimately action to outcome. Let's go, let's go run our place and they are there to be run. And then we can modify them as needed.
We've met our major performance target which is to finish on time. And so I want you to in a moment, thank the panel for being so disciplined. What I would say to you, those of you who are not working in this field, there is so much that is actually positive that explains different countries, different communities, finding different ways to recognize humanity, to embrace difference. And in the words of an old, now late rabbi, to build their house together, the big insight is you build the house together, then you learn to live in it together. So thank you very much, everyone.
Thank you.