The recent commotion over the reduction in humanitarian aid is likely to affect official development assistance (ODA). The ‘freefall’ experienced by humanitarian funding is anticipated to affect development funding in the coming months and years. The Institute for Economics & Peace expressed that reductions in the United States of America (USA), European Union (EU), and the United Kingdom’s (UK) aid to multilateral agencies such as the United Nations (UN) ‘will have significant impacts on global ODA levels’, as these entities’ contribute to ‘two thirds of all international aid disbursements.’ Under these circumstances, ODA to the Philippines is likely to reduce as the USA, the UN System, and the EU are the country’s top sources of foreign aid.
Internally displaced persons (IDPs) are most vulnerable when shifts in foreign aid occur. Because IDPs often live in countries that remain highly dependent on external support, changes in ODA directly affect national development budgets. These shifts in turn lead to reduced or lost social services and support systems for IDPs. Additionally, IDPs are often least equipped to withstand the impact of weakened local services and support systems. As a result, they experience family stress and coping strains, conditions that make IDP children even more vulnerable, as household spending and state investments benefiting children may decrease. All of these factors can undermine children’s sense of stability and development.
Drawing on longitudinal data on marginalised children in Mindanao, this paper discusses how the potential impacts of reduced foreign aid on internally displaced children can be considerably tracked and assessed by using time as an analytical variable.
What aid cuts could mean for IDP children in Mindanao
The Philippines is considered a lower-middle-income country in Southeast Asia, comprising three primary island groups: Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao. The country is still at risk from climate change and natural disasters, even though it has recently made some progress in reducing poverty, and poor and vulnerable people still have trouble accessing social services and earning money.
Regarding internal displacement, many IDPs displaced by conflict and disasters are in Mindanao. National displacement monitoring and humanitarian reports from the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) report that several provinces, including Maguindanao, Lanao del Sur, and North Cotabato, have experienced prolonged displacement due to cycles of violence and disasters.
The different waves of the Longitudinal Cohort Study on the Filipino Child (LCSFC) showed that Mindanao is more disadvantaged than the islands of Luzon and Visayas. Mindanao registered the largest number of households enrolled in the national cash transfer program, Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (4Ps). The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) runs the 4Ps program, which gives cash to low-income families with conditions to help pay for their children’s health and education needs. This shows that there are still big differences in wealth and income.
Mindanao also faces various threats to its main source of livelihood – agriculture. LCSFC reports a significant drop in the number of barangays (villages) on the island engaging in agricultural activities. A range of factors, including natural disasters, severe climate change, and armed clashes, may have contributed to the decline in households engaged in agriculture. Furthermore, Mindanao recorded the highest levels of programs related to poverty alleviation, social housing, and drug use. A recent national report about children highlighted that regions in the island continue to face the following challenges:
- High child mortality rates
- Low immunization coverage
- High adolescent pregnancy rates
- Stunting
- High child labor rates
- High number of children living in poverty
Given this context, marginalised children and adolescents in Mindanao, including IDPs, face livelihood insecurity and rely heavily on fragile support systems to have material security and ensure the continuity of their basic needs.
In terms of foreign aid, the Philippines received 67 ODA grants in 2024, totaling US$326.70 million. Of this amount, 42 percent were grants for medical and health-related initiatives, and 16 percent supported social-protection programs and projects. By the end of 2024, the Philippines had 313 active grants. The sectors receiving the largest share of grants were the social reform and community development (98 grants), followed by agriculture, agrarian reform, and natural resources (92 grants).
As of December 2024, the UN system and the USA remained the top sources of ODA Grants for the Philippines. Given the current geopolitical landscape and shifts in global ODA, foreign aid for programs and projects supporting social protection, health, and community initiatives is likely to decline. This will, in turn, result in reduced budgets for these critical sectors.
Many children in Mindanao already face inadequate social protection and unstable livelihoods, making continued aid essential to maintaining and improving their access to core services. Reductions in aid will not only worsen existing vulnerabilities for internally displaced children in Mindanao but also risk creating new ones, underscoring the need for sustained support. Despite this, social protection programs in the Philippines commonly work with non-profit development groups and donor-financed projects.
Stakeholders might feel more respected and appreciated for their efforts to bolster program execution and funding for services such as child protection, maternal health, and nutrition when they acknowledge the need for foreign aid.
Longitudinal comparisons: time as an analytical variable in assessing aid cuts’ impact on IDP children
Longitudinal research offers a unique capacity to examine how children’s experiences evolve, capturing the interaction between developmental processes and social or environmental conditions across life stages rather than providing a single snapshot. From a life-course perspective, childhood and adolescence are critical periods during which cognitive, emotional, and social capacities develop, shaping how individuals understand and respond to their environments (Elder, 1998).
When children grow up in contexts marked by displacement and instability, the temporal dimension becomes particularly important, as the broader structures that shape their lives may remain uncertain even as they mature. The Longitudinal Cohort Study of Filipino Children (LCSFC) offers an opportunity to observe these dynamics over an extended period. By comparing children’s responses at around age 10 with those gathered again at around age 16, the analysis treats time itself as an analytical variable.
Persistent fears related to war and insecurity appear across survey waves, with participants increasingly expressing concerns about violence, displacement, and instability. Consistent with existing research, prolonged exposure to conflict and displacement can undermine children’s emotional well-being and sense of safety over time, suggesting that the experiences documented in the LCSFC align with broader conclusions that the impacts of conflict often endure beyond the immediate crisis.
Many also appeared to show a growing sense of agency, particularly in how they voiced their goals, interpreted their family circumstances, and described their responses to community-level challenges. Compared to earlier interviews, adolescents in later survey waves tended to describe their experiences more clearly and nuancedly. Many showed greater ability to discuss family situations, educational goals, and issues facing the community. According to developmental studies, these alterations reflect broader cognitive shifts that occur during adolescence, when people typically become more socially conscious and develop higher reasoning abilities (Blakemore, 2008). In contexts affected by displacement or poverty, this increased awareness may allow young people to interpret their experiences more critically, even when their material circumstances remain difficult.
The longitudinal findings show gradual shifts in structural conditions alongside children’s developmental progression. Over six years, many participants demonstrated more adaptive coping strategies, greater awareness of their environments, and stronger self-expression. These patterns reflect broader resilience research, which highlights the role of ecological supports—such as peer, family, and community networks—in helping children navigate prolonged stress and instability amid displacement and structural constraints.
A particularly relevant scenario relative to potential reductions in foreign aid is the finding that structural problems affecting children’s lives are difficult to change. Concerns about safety, access to services, and institutional support persisted over multiple survey waves. In such contexts, while children may develop stronger personal strategies for navigating adversity, the broader systems surrounding them continue to provide only fragile support. A decrease in foreign aid weakens already fragile social protection systems, risking further undermining children’s access to education, healthcare, and community-based supports essential to their well-being.
Foreign aid helps strengthen public systems that address health, education, protection, and basic needs. The consequences of reduced aid extend beyond money problems; they also include programs that are getting worse at keeping kids safe from further harm. The findings emphasize that changes in aid flows have real effects on children’s stability and prospects, highlighting the significance of bolstering national protection systems for children impacted by displacement and violence from a policy standpoint. To avoid these problems, officials need to ensure that aid flows remain the same or increase. They also need to ensure that assistance for Mindanao’s internally displaced children is focused and consistent.
Conclusion
This paper highlights the critical relationship between development assistance and the stability of children living in displacement-affected contexts in Mindanao. Using data from the LCSFC, the results show that children change significantly over time, becoming more reflective, articulate, and better able to manage tough situations. However, the main factors that affect their lives do not change much. Persistent insecurity, unequal access to vital services, and frail institutional support structures continue to define the daily lives of many children in conflict and disaster-affected areas. Under these circumstances, aid reduction undermines children’s material security and continuity of basic needs – factors that are fundamental to children’s survival and development.
IDPs in the Philippines are still highly dependent on external support. Hence, changes in ODA directly affect the country’s development budget, which in turn could result in a reduction or loss of the provision of social services and support systems for IDPs. This means that Republic Act No. 11188, also known as the Special Protection of Children in Situations of Armed Conflict Act, must be followed and enforced without fail. To improve enforcement, the government needs to establish dedicated oversight units, conduct regular compliance checks, and encourage cooperation between national and local agencies. For this law to work, lawmakers need to be resolute, monitoring systems need to be improved, national and local governments need to work together, and services that protect the welfare of at-risk children need to keep receiving funding.
Ultimately, protecting children who have been forced to leave their homes should be a top priority for both humanitarian and development groups. The stories told by the LCSFC show that children can be strong even when the systems around them are not particularly good. Still, resistance alone cannot replace good social protection. To ensure lasting stability, substantial resources must be dedicated to education, healthcare, psychosocial assistance, and community protection systems. This dedicated investment will help build more stable and equitable societies, prevent setbacks caused by aid reductions, and ensure that displaced children’s needs are consistently met.
Dr Jennefer Lyn L. Bagaporo is a Research Affiliate at the Research Institute for Mindanao Culture (RIMCU), Philippines. She has previously worked in not-for-profit organisations and local research institutions in Afghanistan, Cambodia, the Philippines, and Australia and has an extensive research experience on gender, violent conflicts and forced displacements, health, poverty, and vulnerability due to exclusion and lack of social protection.
Dr Chona R. Echavez is the Director of the Research Institute for Mindanao Culture (RIMCU), Philippines leading interdisciplinary research on inclusive development, displacement, child protection, gender equality, and climate-resilient livelihoods. She has been working in the field of social research for the more than 30 years, specifically in conflict and post-conflict across South and Southeast Asia and the Pacific (including Afghanistan, Bhutan, Philippines, Cambodia, Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Samoa, and Tonga).
This topical paper is part of the special series on ‘Internal Displacement in a Changing World Order’, led by the Internal Displacement Research Programmeat the RLI. The experts contributing to this series assess how rapid shifts in contemporary politics, plummeting levels of humanitarian aid and escalating global crises are impacting displacement-affected communities. The series ties into a recently-launched 45-chapter “Handbook of Internal Displacement” (2006) that comprehensively addresses this issue.
KEYWORDS: Internal displacement, IDPs, children, humanitarian aid, time.
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