MSE News: Overseas aid tops the public's chops list

oldtoolie

As someone who has worked in poor countries and for international development charities for 30 years, I'll say that it is disappointing but unsurprising to see the results of this survey.

I would urge anyone interested in international aid and development to read this recent briefing from Oxfam.

21st Century Aid
Recognising success and tackling failure

Summary
Aid plays a role in saving millions of lives, and yet despite its achievements poverty continues to cast a shadow over the lives of some 1.4 billion people worldwide. This has opened up questions over the effectiveness of aid and lately, unleashed a barrage of criticism, with critics using individual examples of failed aid to argue that all aid is bad and should be reduced or phased out altogether. This is both incorrect and irresponsible.

Aid that does not work to alleviate poverty and inequality - aid that is driven by geopolitical interests, which is too often squandered on expensive consultants or which spawns parallel government structures accountable to donors and not citizens - is unlikely to succeed.
This report examines the evidence, and finds that whilst there is much room for improvement, good quality 21st century aid not only saves lives, but is indispensable in unlocking poor countries' and people's ability to work their own way out of poverty.

Aid alone - even 21st century aid - is not enough to ensure that all people living in poverty can lead full and decent lives. But together with the right systemic reforms, aid can and will extricate millions of people from poverty and deprivation.

Key recommendations

• Ensure aid is channelled to help support active citizens, build effective states as a pathway to reducing poverty and inequality, and support diverse forms of financing to contribute to development.
  
• Deliver aid through a mix of models, including increasing budget support wherever possible, and ensure that a percentage of aid flows are channelled to civil society organisations, to enable people to better hold their governments to account.
  
• Dramatically improve the predictability of aid, by increasing the proportion of aid that is general budget support where possible and by sector support where general budget support is not an option, and limit conditions attached to aid to mutually agreed poverty indicators.
  
• Give at least 0.7 per cent of their national income in aid, and set out how this target will be reached, with legally binding timetables.
  
• Reject a culture of corruption, uphold human rights standards, and act in ways which are transparent and open to scrutiny.
  
• Provide legal environments in which civil society organisations monitoring government activities can flourish and respect the independence of non-government bodies like audit offices and the judiciary.

Oxfam International Briefing Paper
Author: Jasmine Burnley
Publication date: 20 May 2010

you can download it here:

http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/policy/debt_aid/21st-century-aid.html

Davewils

digitaltoast wrote: »

We also know that less than half of aid given even gets close to the person or project intended for it (http://www.globalissues.org/article/35/foreign-aid-development-assistance).

Aid should be a matter of personal choice and conscience, not a matter for foul-mouthed self-promoting ageing rockstars.

Interesting that you would quote an article that actually counters your own argument.

It states that aid should NOT be left to private individuals as many countries rely on the steady stream of Internatioanl aid in order to balance their books (Sri Lanka i beleive was the given example).

Private donatations are prone to wild fluctuations depending on the economic state of their own country (ie, people are far less generous in a recession) and floods of private money can appear for specific causes (Tsunami appeal) which then overloads the system and is wasted or goes to the wrong people.

digitaltoast

Davewils wrote: »

It states that aid should NOT be left to private individuals as many countries rely on the steady stream of Internatioanl aid in order to balance their books

Just think about that sentence:
"many countries rely on the steady stream of Internatioanl aid in order to balance their books"

Doesn't that seem deeply flawed to you?

Davewils wrote: »

Private donatations are prone to wild fluctuations depending on the economic state of their own country

That's exactly what happens now - aid is expressed as a percentage of GDP, and is currently around 0.5%

If a country's GDP falls, then so does its aid giveaway, surely?

Haarlem

When charities and voluntary groups are reducing services to the needy and vunerable in the UK because their funding is being cut or taken away completely, public opinion is bound to react to the billions that is going in overseas aid. This was on top of the fuding reductions over the last 3 years from the sector to fund the Olympic Games. I see it everyday in the work I do supporting this sector.

digitaltoast

At 8pm tonight on Radio 4 (or listen again after) there's The Moral Maze, which asks this very question.
It can be tedious sometimes, but worth a listen.

Savvy_Sue

digitaltoast wrote: »

At 8pm tonight on Radio 4 (or listen again after) there's The Moral Maze, which asks this very question.
It can be tedious sometimes, but worth a listen.

Tedious? It usually has me shouting at the radio, but that's because the panel are so appallingly blinkered and bigoted ...