Annual report

170
Annual Report 
2022

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In 2022, the IFRC worked to enhance its 
accountability and integrity mechanisms
with a focus on building National Society integ-
rity systems to address the growing risks of 
fraud, corruption and safeguarding/prevention 
of sexual exploitation, abuse, and harassment.
Fourteen National Societies boosted their fraud 
reporting capacity by deploying the Integrity 
Line whistleblowing system, and 18 National 
Societies received integrity-related training for 
more than 300 staff.
The IFRC’s 
internal audit and investigations
capacity continues to grow and be strengthened. 
At the start of 2022, the IFRC’s Office of Internal 
Audit and Investigations (OIAI) undertook an 
external quality assessment to assess the team’s 
compliance with International Audit Standards. 
OIAI was subsequently awarded the highest 
possible grade of “Generally Compliant” by inde-
pendent reviewers KPMG.
To boost the value of field-based audits, all audit 
teams now provide fraud, audit and risk manage-
ment training to IFRC and National Society staff 
as a standard part of all audit reviews.
The role of the OIAI is to support the IFRC in 
meeting its obligations for good governance, 
accountability, transparency, and probity to 
its stakeholders. Its mission is to protect and 
enhance the value that the IFRC brings to the 
world’s most vulnerable people, by providing 
independent, objective, timely and insightful 
risk-based assurance, investigation, and advi-
sory services.
The OIAI has had regular engagement with 
donors since 2018, when it held its first donor 
group briefing on fraud and misconduct. Four vir-
tual meetings were held with donors, diplomatic 
missions and other partners in 2022, where the 
OIAI openly discussed allegations, investigations, 
and integrity action plans. These conversations 
are to engage our donors and partners in our 
work and demonstrate the IFRC’s transparency 
and commitment to action.
The IFRC reporting concerns system Integrity 
Line went live in April 2021. The system was 
designed to receive all types of complaints. The 
system encourages anyone who experienced, 
witnessed, or suspected misconduct or incidents 
to speak up, including employees, community 
members, partners, volunteers and vendors.
Also in 2022, the OIAI organized and hosted the 
sixth edition of a global conference on “Preventing 
Corruption in Humanitarian Operations”. The 
event gathered experts around three main top-
ics, legal, fraud and sexual exploitation, abuse, 
and harassment and was attended by more than 
600 practitioners from around the globe.
Integrity, transparency and accountability are 
priority areas supported by the IFRC’s Capacity 
Building Fund. In the 17 months since the fund 
was reengineered to provide more flexible sup-
port to National Societies, some 1 million Swiss 
francs of funding was allocated to 19 National 
Societies for initiatives to strengthen their integ-
rity systems and processes.
The IFRC continued work to ensure that its 
accountability also allows the organization to 
act with agility when needed. The