- Oxfam calls for “emergency plans” to get back on track
Rich country aid to the developing world has fallen for the second consecutive year, according to statistics released today. The latest figures represent the clearest sign yet that governments are badly off track for meeting G8 and EU goals for increasing aid spending, and are therefore in serious danger of breaking their promises to the developing world.
The figures released today by the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) show that overall aid totalled $ 103.7 billion in 2007, representing a fall of 8.4 % in real terms. A proportion of the fall in aid can be explained by debt relief deals, which have exaggerated previous figures by being counted as aid. Discounting debt relief in 2007, overall aid was $ 94.9 billion - a slight increase of 2.4 % on last year, but a long way short of the promised increases.
“These figures today leave us in no doubt that the world’s richest countries are failing to meet their promises to the poorest countries, especially in Africa,” said Max Lawson, policy adviser for Oxfam. “They must get back on track immediately and increase aid spending. The human cost of this failure is huge.”
“The credibility of the Gleneagles promises is rapidly crumbling with aid falling in six of the G7 countries in 2007. It is particularly disappointing that Japan, currently chairing the G8, is one of the very worst offenders. France is also failing to make the progress we would hope from a country that is about to take up the presidency of the EU. Lack of leadership on this will cost Africa millions of lives.”
“Emergency plans to rapidly increase aid have to be put in place now if donor countries are to stand any chance of getting back on track and salvaging their crumbling credibility. This issue must be top of the agenda when EU leaders meet in mid-June, as well as at the G8 summit in Japan in July.”
When G8 leaders met in Gleneagles in 2005, they pledged to increase aid annually by $50 billion by 2010, but Oxfam calculates that rich countries are set to miss this target by as much as $ 30 billion - a figure that could save 5 million lives. Meanwhile, only Denmark, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Sweden and Norway have met the promise made by rich countries in 1970 to give 0.7 % of their gross national income (GNI) as aid.
“So far the UK is the only G8 country that has published a long-term plan for fulfilling its G8 pledges and for meeting its commitment to reach the aid spending target of 0.7 % of GNI by 2013,” said Lawson. “Therefore it’s a pity to see the UK in the middle of the pack in terms of aid spending to date. We expect to see them leading from the front.”
“Oxfam’s experience is that quality, long-term aid is making an enormous difference. It has allowed poor country governments across the world to significantly raise spending on education, health and other actions to help the poorest communities lift themselves out of poverty. It is the scale of this success that makes the failure to deliver increases in aid even harder to accept.”
“The ability of poor countries to absorb aid is not in question. At a moment when poor countries are ready and waiting to receive the aid that has been promised to them, rich countries are walking away.”
ENDS
Contact: Dan Timms, +44 (0)1865 472 193, +44 (0)7810 181 514
Tags: Debt and aid
