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The group refer to themselves as the "lifeboat crew". After losing their jobs when international support faced cuts in the past months, a team of dedicated workers decided to establish their own rescue package.

Declining to "dwell on sadness", a former economist, along with similarly motivated former agency staff, started actions to preserve some of the vital initiatives that faced closure after the reductions.

At present, close to 80 projects have been preserved by a connector platform operated by Rosenbaum and other former team members, which has found them over $110m in fresh financial support. The collective behind the resource optimization project initiative calculates it will assist forty million people, encompassing many children under five.

Following the agency closure, spending was frozen, thousands of employees were laid off, and global initiatives either stopped abruptly or were struggling toward what the economist calls "drop-dead dates".

He and several team members were approached by a philanthropic organization that "wanted to determine how they could optimize the utilization of their limited resources".

They built a selection from the terminated programmes, identifying those "offering the most critical assistance per dollar" and where a fresh backer could feasibly get involved and maintain operations.

They quickly understood the requirement was broader than that first entity and started to contact further funding sources.

"We referred to ourselves as the emergency squad at the start," explains the leader. "The ship has been failing, and there are too few emergency options for every project to board, and so we're striving to actually protect as many young children as we can, secure spots for these rescue options as attainable, via the projects that are providing support."

Pro, now working as part of a global development thinktank, has obtained financial support for 79 projects on its list in more than 30 regions. Several have had original funding reinstated. Nine were not able to be saved in time.

Financial support has been provided by a mix of non-profit entities and wealthy individuals. The majority prefer to stay unnamed.

"These donors stem from very different backgrounds and opinions, but the common thread that we've encountered from them is, 'I feel appalled by what's going on. I sincerely wish to discover an approach to intervene,'" says the economist.

"I think that there was an 'lightbulb moment' for all of us as we began operating on this, that this created an opportunity to shift from the passive sadness, remaining in the misery of everything that was unfolding around us, to having a constructive endeavor to deeply commit to."

A specific initiative that has obtained funding through Pro is operations by the the medical alliance to provide services encompassing nutritional rehabilitation, prenatal and postnatal support and essential immunizations for kids in the West African nation.

It is crucial to continue these initiatives, explains the economist, not only because restarting operations if they ceased would be hugely expensive but also because of how much reliance would be lost in the war-torn regions if the group pulled out.

"Alima informed us […] 'there is fear that if we walk away, we may be unable to return.'"

Projects with longer-term goals, such as strengthening health systems, or in other fields such as schooling, have not been part of the initiative's scope. It also does not seek to maintain initiatives permanently but to "provide a buffer for the entities and, honestly, the wider community, to figure out a longer-term solution".

After securing funding for each programme on its original roster, the initiative announces it will now prioritize assisting additional individuals with "tested, efficient solutions".