The new donor nations and their aid policies
An interesting tidbit from Vijaya Ramachandran and Julie Walz with the Center for Global Development: South Africa announced last week that it will launch its own development aid agency in 2011 – the South African Development Partnership Agency. This move places South Africa ahead of other emerging donors such as India and China , who ...
An interesting tidbit from Vijaya Ramachandran and Julie Walz with the Center for Global Development:
An interesting tidbit from Vijaya Ramachandran and Julie Walz with the Center for Global Development:
South Africa announced last week that it will launch its own development aid agency in 2011 – the South African Development Partnership Agency. This move places South Africa ahead of other emerging donors such as India and China , who have yet to create separate agencies to dispense aid.
No longer just a recipient of aid, South Africa has quietly ramped up its role as a leader on the African continent, largely via peacekeeping, post-conflict reconstruction, and even analytical work. South Africa’s development assistance program originated in the post-apartheid era, as an attempt to improve South Africa’s international image and win friends at the United Nations. In 2001, South Africa launched the African Renaissance Fund, although the majority of aid continues to be given through various government departments, notably the Departments of Defense and Education.
The phenomenon of the emerging powers and their development strategies is an important theme that bears watching. China’s foreign aid policy, particularly in Africa, has gotten loads of attention and has been the subject of important recent books. The policies of Brazil, India, Russia, South Africa, and Turkey have received less attention.
One small part of the picture that should become visible in the next few weeks is these countries’ contributions to the World Bank’s International Development Association (IDA), the Bank arm devoted to aiding the poorest countries. None of the major emerging economies has made much of a showing yet as an IDA donor, in part because their overall aid numbers are low and perhaps also because they’re reluctant to channel what they do have through the Western-dominated World Bank.
Final numbers on the latest IDA replenishment round should be out in February. Bank officials appeared pleased by the pledges they’ve received but there’s no detail available yet on official national contributions. Through the grapevine, I’ve heard that the United States is set to displace the United Kingdom as the top donor; whether any of the emerging economies contributes substantially may be the much more important question for the program’s long-term health.
David Bosco is a professor at Indiana University’s Hamilton Lugar School of Global and International Studies. He is the author of The Poseidon Project: The Struggle to Govern the World’s Oceans. Twitter: @multilateralist
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