 Good afternoon everyone and welcome to this press conference from the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum 2016 here in Davos as the subtle branding in the back has given away already probably You're joining the press conference that is dedicated to the launch of the humanitarian impact bond and I'm particularly pleased for the World Economic Forum to be joined by two wonderful experts and Important voices in this in this conversation. Let me quickly introduce the panel to you We're joined by Peter Maurer the president of the International Committee of the Red Cross ICRC and By Alexander DeGrohe the deputy prime minister of Belgium and also minister for development Thank you for being here and without further due Peter Maurer over to you. What is the humanitarian impact bond and what are you trying to achieve with it? Thank you very much and thanks for your your interest. Let me just Broadly make only two introductory point one to contextualize and one to describe What it is as you as you ask to contextualize? Let me say that you have followed the development of Enormous needs due to conflict and violence Worldwide and the huge gap that we Humanitarian organizations are witnessing between What we can do because we have the money to do it and what we should do because there are enormous needs May I also recall that a couple of days ago? the high-level panel on the financing of humanitarian Assistance presided over by the vice president of the European Commission Kristalina Georgieva has published its report and recommendation on how to close that gap between Needs and possibilities as we witnessed today this report has been launched with recommendations to invest into fragility to bridge the gap between humanitarian and development agencies but also to foster much more prominently The private sector and channel private sector money into those needs So this is the landscape with which we are confronted today Let me also say when I'm a traveling into fragile context into violent stricken countries and regions One thing strikes me has struck me for the last couple of years disabled people are those Triple which experience triple disadvantage. They are very often in the poorest context. They are experiencing violence Have experienced violence which has destroyed part of their physical ability to work and They are often excluded from society So the humanitarian impact bond is basically a special fund which we through which we try to raise money by social investors against a obligation and promise To for ICRC as an executing agencies Within five years to use that money to create centers for disabilities in fragile in fragile context. We want to raise 35 million Swiss francs in order to create Somehow between eight or ten disability center which would considerably scale up our ability to service populations in need and We do measure over five years The impact of this money and after five years a Outcome funder most of the time Governments would pay back the social investors and of course we would hope that the social investor would then again reinvest into another loop of Social investment of those centers. Why is it so important to create that loop and to scale up today? We have 90 million people with disabilities Worldwide in fragile context only 10 percent of those people get help and amongst those 10 percent ICRC is the largest provider of prosthesis and Physical disability services reintegration training courses through disability center We think we should close that gap between the 10 percent who receive Services and the 90 million who are still waiting for important Social services disability services to create what would we do with the money exactly? We would the first two years create centers train most of the time people who have experienced who are experiencing physical disabilities to Be employed in those centers to run those Centers and then also to attend to populations in need and hopefully after five years We can have a clear indicator and indication of those who have been Recycled into the work into Productive work into the into the economy many countries lose as much as 0.75 percent BDP because of the unproductivity of Disabled people who are not able anymore to do any Any work and not to be part of a normal Work life. So this is what the concept is. We are launching it today the Belgian government Alexander de Croix is the first government who has been ready to jump on board and both of us Alexander and myself we will over the next couple of weeks and month try to have Come social investors and outcome funders together the preparations for launching the centers are well-advanced If we do get the money together within the next couple of weeks, we can immediately start to build three Three centers who are which are shovel ready and four or five others Which are far advanced in the planning and which would come on board Thank you deputy prime minister. So your your government is showing leadership and joining this initiative. Tell us why Well, first of all, if you I think Peter explained very well the huge humanitarian needs that we have that we have today Belgian development policy last year the budget for humanitarian aid was the highest we have ever had This year we will increase it even even further By far this is not this is not enough and and we are convinced that Capital exists especially in Western Europe the capital is there and people are willing to invest in Things which have a social social outcome. So our first objective is to attract other types of financing The second objective is to make sure that the humanitarian interventions We do that we maximize the quality that we maximize the impact And I think this is the balance of the of the new of this innovation that we have here You attract another type of of financing and in exchange for that the operator being the ICRC here Commits to achieving a certain level of quality and of having having an impact I think that is the reason why we're We're investing in in this because it's it's a new way of structuring things and it's It's much more committal than it used to be in the past Now we don't say that because we're not happy with what the ICRC was doing up to now I think we've had a great relationship over the last over the last years, but I think that's the direction that Funding for a humanitarian Interventions should go and we're really very very proud and grateful that the ICRC is Jumping on this and it's taking leadership role in this Can I maybe just make a last point because rightly so Alexander has mentioned the impact as The critical issue here part of this launch of a humanitarian impact bond Is also that we have organized for an independent evaluator so the criteria that we propose to use as numbers of Of proteases and or thesis delivered and number of people recycled into productive economy that all these Numbers will be measured independently by independent evaluators and of course to give credibility to this important issue politically that we We have investment for impact Which is delivered and measured independently? Thank you very much Let me let me ask you so you have the first commitment here from from the public sector We have about 1500 business leaders here in Davos What's your sense? Is the awareness high enough for the issue there or should we should we maybe? Sound a call for action here for our 1500 business leaders in Davos Well, we all hope this press conference is going to be the start of a lot of conversations with the private sector on this What we've understood is that Investors are interested in this first of all because it's a combination of a social impact But also a financial return But also because there is definitely a certain risk for the private investor in this but this risk is actually For example for insurance firms. It's an interesting risk in the sense that this risk is completely Uncorrelated with the risk for example on the capital markets So it's a very good way of diversifying the risk in the financial in the financial sector And that is definitely one advantage beside the fact that of course we've understood over the last days That the business community is completely aware of the fact that they have a role to play and that the role to play is also To our societal impact. I have been rather encouraged by the first reactions that we have Already seen informally and I hope that more reactions will Will coming forward to from from the business sector. I think There is one critical issue. I wanted to highlight here I think there is and will remain a general expectation from the private sector that with regard to Urgent crisis response in natural disaster or conflict governments will remain in the lead of Supporting humanitarian organizations We have taken out of this part the urgent immediate part. We have taken out the more structural long-term almost systemic aspect of a humanitarian assistance program which is assisting the disabled people who have been disabled through violent and conflict and we build a financial product around a Specific area of work, which is much more long-term than short immediate response, which will remain a dependent on Funding by the public sector by the public sector in the future. So I Wanted just to offer this as an additional explanation Thank you very much So it looks like much work is to be done But we do have the the model in place and we do have the tools to do this Maybe just to add this is it's a premiere. I mean, it's the first time that a multi-country humanitarian impact bond is created and we're very proud to be both pioneers in in this and If if we get this interaction, I'm convinced that this this is going to work This is really changing the way humanitarian interventions will be financed and and I hope one day we can look back on today We have a question here from the floor. Let's open up We have a microphone if you could state your name and organization for the sake of our online audience, please Thank you. Hello, but I can work for the Belgian business daily the date Could you explain how this will work this new system who will emit the bond? How will it be repaid and under what conditions? Well, of course the details of the Manager of the bond and the repayment has to be negotiated with though with the social investors What we have created is now the outline the the structure and As soon as we have social investors and a company we Have possibilities then to decide about the fund manager we will decide on the fund manager and But at the present moment, this is too premature Yet to say who will manage and under what exactly conditions we have an idea on what the Impact baseline is for ICRC what we can reasonably achieve as an ambitious impact over five years because we have been in disability for 30 years and because we are Have seen all all continents and all situations. We have a relatively good idea What a realistic impact Impact is and we have formulated the sort of average of last 10 years That with achievable and we have added some Additional ambitious features in that because of we hope that we get better and faster as we As we move forward. So this is the baseline and and then we will see about the fund manager and the exact conditions of repayment Thank you very much. And we have a question from the gentleman in the back there But I'm a stringer courier de la sera newspaper in Italy. I just didn't get one point. Sorry You said that you are going to repay the bond in five years With what money you get the money from the government you are invest in within whose country you're investing in is that right? So the how it works is is at the start the intervention is financed by the private sector If the objectives are achieved There is a repayment to the private sector with a certain premium And that is coming from the donor countries and Belgium is one of the donor countries Right. This is this is how it functions now. You could say why as a donor country Why would you step in such such such a construction? Well a few reasons first of all as Peter indicated the Level of quality and of impact of the intervention is higher than it than it than it used to be that is because we count on a lot of innovation and creativity in achieving the goals that are actually much stricter than in a regular situation second element for a donor country is spreading the risk because if the goals are not achieved then as a donor country the payout is actually lower and This is a way of spreading the risk between the private sector and a government owner The investments of the fund are going to be made in which country We will certainly the donor countries or in other no no no not in Belgium not in Belgium The investments will be made in the fragile context to give you an example. I mean we as I mentioned beforehand we have planned to be able to start as soon as first social investments are coming in and that's the reason why in countries like Central African Republic or Or Afghanistan Yemen we have already shovel ready new Disabilities center which we can start immediately as soon as Social investment is coming forward and as soon as we have the matching outcome funding from from governments. So This will the preparations is all Conflict and fragile societies and is in basically in the logic of ICRC's Priorities and once again the importance here is again to To have for a part a specific part of humanitarian work Offering it to the private sector to fund while other parts will be will have Be taken over still by public finance Thank you very much. We have time for one last question here in the middle, please There is this Matt from the Belgian newspaper the standard a question This is not something you invent out of the blue. So where did the ID originally came from? well Social impact bonds of course are not new. There's examples for example in In reintegration of people who are in prison in the in the UK even in Belgium There's been a social social impact bond of course in those impact bonds the return is basically coming from a Lowering of the expenses in the social security for example That's in the in the fragile states where we work is is not a form of payouts that is that is possible So we had to Elaborate another another system and the system here is that actually a donor is in that is put in that in that situation? the impact bond offers itself as Quite an attractive idea to respond to what I would consider and ICRC has experienced as a big transformation in Private donor activity if I look back ten years Private donor activity would have been Hand out handouts or additions to public money to a program which was defined and Negotiate it with the government Today, I think There is a lot of private money Ready to be invested, but the private sector wants to see an impact Wants to have a stake In this project, and I think this is the whole difference that here we are proposing We are proposing a format of finance which Gives the satisfaction of impact and the transparency of impact measurement to the social investor, and I think Because you asked me how we had the idea it was basically our experience of a of a transformation of the private donor landscape together with Mechanics of social Bonds which have been developed in certain European countries the UK Belgium as you mentioned Alexander Which have on which we have modeled around This idea of a humanitarian impact bond Thank you very much. I'm afraid we're out of time. Thank you very much for being here today for watching and special Thank you to our panel. Thank you. Thank you