Risk sharing between international and local partners
What risk sharing means in a funding chain, why risk often flows down to local partners, and how to start an honest risk conversation with your partner.
Short answer
Risk sharing means partners in a funding chain agree together on which risks exist and share both the cost of preventing them and the responsibility if they happen. The 2023 Risk Sharing Framework defines it as reasonable sharing of the burden of preventive measures and of responsibility for risks that materialise. Local partners should ask for this conversation before signing, not after an incident.
Key points
- Risk sharing is a joint agreement, not a transfer of every risk to the organisation closest to the field.
- The Risk Sharing Framework (2023) defines it as sharing preventive burden and responsibility if risks materialise.
- Shared does not have to mean equal; the framework talks about more equitable sharing across the delivery chain.
- List risks together: security, fiduciary, legal, reputational, and the risk of not delivering.
- Write down who pays for mitigation and who bears the loss in each case.
What is risk sharing?
Every humanitarian and development project carries risk: staff safety, loss of funds, delays, reputational damage, legal problems. In a chain of donor, intermediary and local implementer, each organisation passes obligations down to the next. Too often the risk goes down with them, while the money to manage it does not.
Risk sharing is the attempt to fix this. The Risk Sharing Platform was set up in 2021 under the Grand Bargain, co-led by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the ICRC and InterAction. It produced the Risk Sharing Framework in 2023. In their statement, the co-leads define risk sharing as a reasonable sharing of the burden of preventive measures, and a reasonable sharing of the responsibility for risks should they materialise.
The framework covers the delivery chain "from and including back donors until and including local, in-country implementing organisations". So you are inside it.
Why does this matter to local organisations?
Local organisations are usually closest to the danger. They work in the affected area, hold the relationships with communities and carry the legal responsibility in their own country. If the agreement says "the partner bears all risk", a single incident can end the organisation.
The 2017 operational guidance on limited access programming lists "Ensure Duty of Care and avoid Risk Transfer to partners and staff" among its top ten good practices. The same idea runs through the Risk Sharing Framework: avoid "unilateral and asymmetric" approaches, and look for collective ones where residual risk is shared "not equally, but more equitably" across the chain.
That last point is practical. Nobody expects a local partner and a large donor to carry exactly the same share. The question is whether the split is discussed, written and fair.
What are the main types of risk?
Use a simple list to start the conversation. Each partner may fear different things.
| Risk type | Example in a partnership | Question to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Security | Staff or volunteers face danger when travelling to a site | Who pays for safety measures and incident support? |
| Fiduciary | Funds are lost, diverted or poorly documented | What controls are agreed, and who bears a loss that happens despite them? |
| Legal and compliance | A registration or banking problem blocks transfers | Who covers the delay, and can activities adjust? |
| Reputational | A complaint or rumour harms a partner's name | Who responds, and with what support? |
| Programme | The project cannot deliver as planned | Is a change of plan accepted without penalty? |
| Not acting | The cost of waiting until risk is zero | Who is willing to accept some risk to reach people? |
How can you start a risk conversation with a partner?
The framework is built on dialogue. You can use a simple version even if your partner has not heard of it.
- Ask for a joint risk discussion early. Raise it at proposal stage, when budgets can still change.
- List the risks together. Let each side add its own. Local staff often see risks that headquarters misses.
- Agree on who does what. For each major risk, record who takes preventive action, who monitors it and who decides if conditions change.
- Cost the mitigation. Security training, insurance, audit support and safe transport all cost money. Ask for them in the budget instead of absorbing them.
- Decide in advance what happens if it goes wrong. Write a simple rule: who is informed, within what time, and who covers the loss if it was not caused by negligence.
- Review regularly. Risks change. Add a risk review to your regular partner meetings. See our guide to a risk register for a simple format.
What does good risk sharing look like?
Some signs that a partnership is moving in the right direction:
- The agreement names risks and who manages them, not only the partner's obligations.
- Mitigation costs appear in the budget.
- The partner is told early about problems, and the first response is "how do we manage this together?".
- There is room to adapt activities when security or access changes, without an automatic breach.
- Donor conditions on the intermediary are explained to the local partner in plain language.
The Risk Sharing Framework is not a directive tool. It is a principled approach that organisations can adapt, and the co-leads invite pilots with partners, internal discussions and policy reviews. A local organisation can bring the same ideas to its own partners.
What about Myanmar?
Access limits, remote management and changing conditions mean many partnerships already depend on local decisions made quickly. In this setting, a partner that cannot reach a site on schedule is managing a real risk, not failing at its task. Agreements that allow safe delay, alternative delivery methods and honest early reporting reduce the pressure to hide problems. For more on partnership structure, see what makes an equitable partnership and remote partnership management.
How EMPO can help
EMPO is a trusted training and consultancy provider based in Yangon, and one of Myanmar's leading names in practical NGO training, with 1,200+ people trained and 15 partner organisations. We work in English and Burmese, online and in person across Myanmar. Our organisational development support can help your team build risk registers, policies and clear partner discussions. See our services or contact us.
Sources
- Risk Sharing Framework — Global Interagency Security Forum, 2023
- Risk Sharing Framework (full PDF) — Risk Sharing Platform, 2023
- Limited Access Humanitarian Programming: Operational guidance for managing programme quality — Peta Sandison, 2017
- Statement from the Risk Sharing Co-Leads at the Grand Bargain Annual Meeting — Netherlands, ICRC and InterAction, via ReliefWeb, 2023
Questions people ask
Is the Risk Sharing Framework mandatory?
No. GISF describes it as a principled approach that actors can adapt and use as they see fit. You can still use its questions to structure a conversation with a partner.
Who should start the conversation about risk?
Either side. A local partner can raise it at proposal stage, when budgets and agreements can still change. Waiting until a problem occurs leaves the loss with whoever is closest to it.
What is the difference between risk sharing and risk transfer?
In transfer, one organisation passes a risk down and the receiving organisation carries it alone. In sharing, partners agree who does what to reduce the risk and who is responsible if it happens.