In collaboration with ActionAid, the Women’s Humanitarian Leadership Fund (WHLF) in Ukraine is part of Oxfam’s commitment to shift power to local humanitarian actors and to amplify feminist leadership. ActionAid works with women-led and women’s rights organisations (WROs) across Ukraine and neighbouring countries to strengthen their leadership, protection services and crisis response capacities.

As an international organisation, Oxfam believes that effective humanitarian crisis responses must not only be limited to delivering life-saving aid, but must also transfer decision-making and resources to affected communities, most especially women and other marginalised groups. 

In Ukraine, where the full-scale invasion has disproportionately impacted women, girls, and gender minorities, women-led and women’s rights organisations (WROs) are at the forefront providing the specific humanitarian assistance affected populations need. Yet, WROs continue to face chronic underfunding. Many are stretched thin, trying to meet growing needs with shrinking support.  

Despite the international humanitarian sector’s commitment to localisation, WROs are still left out of key decision-making spaces and lack access to flexible, long-term funding they need to lead.

Our Approach

WHLF builds on Oxfam’s experience through its sister fund, the Oxfam GB Women’s Rights Fund. It supports WROs through a flexible funding mechanism that helps strengthen their capacity to respond to immediate needs, while building their resilience and long-term sustainability. This enables them to take on a greater leadership role within the humanitarian system and ensure that the needs and priorities of some of the most marginalised communities are represented in decision-making.

The fund is also a space for learning. By piloting this approach in a humanitarian context, Oxfam aims to gather lessons that can influence broader changes that support feminist leadership within the organisation, and across the sector.

More Than a Funding Initiative

WHLF is a step towards changing how humanitarian action is shaped and who gets to lead it. It’s an opportunity to push for a more inclusive and effective response by supporting feminist leadership. Through WHLF, we are working toward a humanitarian system that listens more, includes more, and ultimately serves people better.