The British Government keeps its promises to the world’s poor

Nov 18th, 2009 7:25 PM EST
By Alexander Woollcombe

Good news but there’s more to do

ONE volunteer Jennifer and staffer Tamar at the door of 10 Downing Street with the petition.

These are stormy times in Westminster - but the commitment to help those who most need it remains. And as the UK general election next year approaches it is more important than ever that our politicians understand they are being watched, and need to keep their promises.

Last week we asked ONE supporters to sign up to our petition to “prioritise legislation that makes the UK’s commitment of 0.7% of Gross National Income (GNI) as development assistance by 2013 legally binding”.

Today ONE supporters Tamar, Jennifer and I delivered our petition to a friendly policeman who opened the black door of Gordon Brown’s house at 10 Downing Street. He promised to pass it on to the Prime Minister “at once”, which was nice of him.

Then the Queen, in her speech to open the new parliamentary session, announced, “draft legislation” to do exactly what we asked. So we won!

It’s a technical thing to ask for, but aid to developing countries is more useful if those receiving it know it is coming and can plan accordingly. It’s also a brave thing for the British Government to announce when the country is still in the grips of recession.

The UK first promised to spend 0.7% GNI on aid nearly 40 years ago. But it hasn’t ever happened. Now all the main political parties have committed to do it by 2013. Gordon Brown announced in September he would propose legislation on this, but it wasn’t a certainty that this promise would make it into the Queen’s Speech.

We didn’t get everything that we wanted however; the Queen announced “draft legislation”, meaning it is very unlikely to become law before the general election, while we want this to happen as soon as possible. But with the help of ONE supporters, and everyone else who cares about Africa and development, we’ll keep the pressure on the Government. There’s a lot of work to do to make aid better but every step in the right direction is a step worth noting. Thanks to everyone who signed the petition.

As Bono said today “the proposal to make the 0.7% pledge legally binding is not just a great announcement, it is transformative of real lives, by a government that has led the world in keeping its promises to the world’s poorest people. The next step is making sure this becomes law as soon as possible, in 2010”.

‘A New Global Order’

Oct 28th, 2009 5:24 PM EST
By Joseph Powell

A panel including UK Secretary of State for International Development Douglas Alexander and Director of the Millennium Development Campaign Salil Shetty assembled at St Paul’s Cathedral in London on Tuesday evening to discuss the hope for ending global poverty in this generation.

Alexander told the audience that the top priority was now to agree a global deal on climate change at Copenhagen in December, suggesting that it could have an even greater impact than the Gleneagles aid commitments of 2005. The UK position is that the developed world must commit to substantial emissions cuts and provide genuinely new and additional sources of finance. He also stressed the need to conclude a Doha trade agreement and talked powerfully about the role that individuals and NGOs can play in pressuring governments to meet their commitments on international development.

“It’s not the banking system that’s too big to fail, but the Millennium Development Goals” Shetty told the audience to applause. 2010 will see the UN General Assembly meet to come up with ideas on how to accelerate progress on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) so that the 2015 target looks more realistic. ONE has committed itself to be part of this push for a new MDG plan of action and it was encouraging to see that so many of the audience members had this on their minds.

Paul Vallely, associate editor of The Independent, looked at what lessons could be learned from the Gleneagles G8 Summit negotiations in 2005 and suggested that closer cooperation between environmental and development NGOs is essential to influencing the political process. This was backed up by Alexander who extolled the benefits of a united NGO front entering Copenhagen. Vallely also offered praise for the way high profile individuals such as Bono and Bob Geldof can raise awareness on development, and play a key role in the lobbying of political figures.

The event concluded with a reminder that change ultimately comes not from government or other leaders, but from the people themselves. It is through millions of individual actions, like the remarkable demonstration of solidarity in the Stand Up Against Poverty day, that the hope of a world free of extreme poverty can be kept alive.

A significant step

Sep 30th, 2009 4:52 PM EST
By Jessica Gomez-Duran

Yesterday was a pretty incredible day. And no it wasn’t because the sun was actually shining in the UK (although that it pretty incredible). The Labour Party Conference is happening in Brighton this week and yesterday the British Prime Minister Gordon Brown made his big 59 minute speech to Labour supporters and the UK population more generally.

During his speech, Gordon Brown announced that the UK’s commitment to spend 0.7 per cent of national income on development assistance will become law under forthcoming legislation.

As the Prime Minister stated, “And let me say what was once an aspiration – 0.7% of national income spent on international development aid, has become with Labour a promise, and will in future become a law. We will pass legislation that the British government is obliged to raise spending on aid to the poorest countries to 0.7% of our national income. Others may break their promises to the poorest, with Labour Britain never will.”

This is a significant step and it will contribute hugely towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. We welcome this great news here at ONE but we will of course be working to ensure that money to help Africa adapt to climate change will be above and beyond the 0.7 per cent and not included within it, as well as making sure that the aid is spent effectively.

To read his full speech, click here

- Jessica Gomez-Duran

Secretary Clinton Testifies

May 20th, 2009 9:22 AM EST
By Chris Scott

Today in her opening statement before the Senate Appropriations Sub-Committee on Foreign Operations, Secretary Clinton made clear once again the critical need for overseas development assistance for our economic and national security. She began her testimony by stating, “When I appeared before the Senate Appropriations Committee a few weeks ago with Secretary Gates, we both emphasized the need for a comprehensive approach to the challenges on our nation’s agenda…urgent development needs ranging from extreme poverty to pandemic disease that have a direct impact on our own security and prosperity.”

The Secretary also reiterated the administration’s commitment to meet our goal of doubling foreign assistance by 2015, and highlighting in this year’s budget: $525 million for maternal and child health, about $1 billion for education, $1.36 billion to address food insecurity, and $4.1 billion for humanitarian assistance. The Secretary stated, “these initiatives build good will, alleviate suffering, and save lives, but they also make our country safer and our partners stronger.”

Members of the Sub-Committee present at the hearing included Senators Patrick Leahy, Judd Gregg, Arlen Specter, Kit Bond, Barbara Mikulski, Robert Bennett, and Sam Brownback.

Senator Bond talked about the need for smart power, Senator Mikulski asked about better partnering NGOs with USAID, Senator Bennett emphasized the Millennium Challenge Corporation as a model for assistance, and microenterprise as a way of helping the poor, and Senator Brownback spoke on delivering better results with food aid and micronutrients.

-Arjun Mody

A Congressional Call for a Global Development Strategy

Apr 30th, 2009 8:21 AM EST
By Larry Nowels

Howard Berman (D-CA), Chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs, and Mark Kirk (R-IL) have introduced a bi-partisan bill requiring the President to draft and implement a comprehensive National Strategy for Global Development. The Strategy requirement is one part of H.R. 2139 – Initiating Foreign Assistance Reform Act of 2009 – legislation that also strengthens monitoring and evaluation of US foreign aid programs and mandates greater transparency of aid resources provided by the United States.

With at least 12 departments, 25 different agencies, and nearly 60 government offices involved in US foreign assistance operations, a key element of the Strategy will be its interagency approach to set out a coherent framework to guide US efforts to reduce global poverty and promote broad-based economic growth in the developing world. Ideally, this will be led by the National Security Council, reaching out across all of government. Importantly, the Strategy will go beyond simply development assistance programs and consider broadly US development policies that affect poverty and economic growth in poor countries, including trade, debt relief, climate change and others. The legislation further requires the creation of a process to improve and strengthen coordination among the various departments and agencies engaged in foreign assistance.

With Development as one of the three pillars of US national security, along with Defense and Diplomacy, a National Strategy on Global Development is long over-due. President Obama has committed to a series of important global development actions, including a doubling of foreign assistance and major agriculture, education, and health initiatives. To avoid the existing fragmentation and conflicting purposes of US foreign aid policies, the implementation of a National Strategy will be a significant first step. But a more comprehensive overhaul of aid programs and apparatus is necessary. Chairman Berman promises that this bill is a “down payment” on a much broader and much more difficult task to re-write the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, an effort he plans for later this year.

-Larry Nowels

European Commission Update

Apr 9th, 2009 12:32 PM EST
By Eloise Todd

On Wednesday April 9th, the European Commission launched its yearly update on how EU donor countries are helping to meet the MDGs. This year President Barroso and Commissioner for Development Louis Michel used the opportunity to make some key announcements on advancing crucial development assistance for African countries. It’s fantastic that the leadership of the Commission is putting development matters so high on his political agenda. Less than a week after the London Summit, the Commission outlined three main ways it would act to help developing countries combat the effects of this economic crash:

1. Pushing EU governments to meet their aid promises and ensuring the highest degree of aid effectiveness possible. Development Commissioner Louis Michel’s message was: “We know what we must do: meet our aid targets, advance our money to have an impact when it is most needed, refocus our existing programmes to tackle the crisis and then make every Euro count”.
2. The EU is proposing spending more cash for the poorest countries to help fill some of the financing gaps created by the economic downturn. The €1billion Food Facility was intended to be spent over 3 years- now the Commission have promised to spend €800m of it by the end of the year to inject much-needed cash into the agricultural sectors of countries most in need of support for farmers. A whopping €3billion will be brought forward for African, Caribbean and Pacific country governments and another €500m for spending on health, education and other vital social spending.
3. Thirdly aid effectiveness is the Commission’s priority. When Louis Michel spoke of ‘making every euro count’ he was alluding to some research he had commissioned which showed that just by working together more effectively, the European Commission and the 27 governments could save a huge €7billion a year which could be freed up to save lives in this downturn. The Commission wants more coordination between donors- it’s common sense that not every donor should work on every sector in one country, and we should be seeing more of donor countries playing to their strengths and taking the lead amongst donors in their specialist areas.

All in all the announcement yesterday was a very positive step- it shows the EU has not just read the G20 communique and agreed- it is doing that rare thing of acting quickly upon agreements. We hope it will convince other G20 countries to do the same, and fast- we’re particularly looking toward the Spring Meetings of the World Bank and IMF to raise more funding for Africa in grant form. Any loans that are given we will argue should be extremely concessional so they don’t spark another debt crisis. There are of course some concerns about the announcements yesterday– Will governments replenish those funds when there’s not enough in the pot next year? Ironically, if the EU alone kept to its 2010 promises, that would mean another €20 billion on overall assistance over the next two years. So the message is simple- we welcome these announcements, on the condition that EU governments stick to their ODA promises.

-Eloise Todd

President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf: Aid is working

Apr 9th, 2009 12:27 PM EST
By Kathy McKiernan

Today the Washington Post is running a great op-ed by President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf of Liberia. In the piece, the President talks about how the financial crisis threatens Africa’s turnaround and she also weighs in on how development assistance – along with stronger African leadership and better governance — has contributed to important progress in Africa over the past ten years.

President Sirleaf’s commentary is directly relevant to the current debate about the value of aid. She makes clear that aid has been an important component in Africa’s recent progress and cutting aid would have negative effects on poverty and stability on the continent. Thus she provides a very different view from that offered in the new book Dead Aid:

While international attention has been understandably focused on events in Darfur, Somalia and Zimbabwe, countries across the continent including Ghana, Tanzania, Mozambique and Liberia have been quietly turning around. Economic growth rates regularly exceed 5 percent in many nations. Since 2000, 34 million more African children are in school. More than 2 million Africans are on lifesaving HIV/AIDS medicines. Malaria deaths have been halved in Rwanda and Ethiopia, and the disease has been virtually eradicated in Zanzibar. Poverty rates are falling fast, from 58 to 51 percent across the continent in just six years, according to the World Bank.

The key to this progress is stronger African leadership and more accountable governance. Today, more than 20 African countries are democracies, up from just three in the 1980s; they have competitive elections and improved human rights, and their news media are much freer. These efforts have been supported by increasingly effective development assistance from the United States and other partners.

The citizens and leaders of donor nations should recognize how important their assistance has been to the new leadership in Africa and how appreciative most Africans are for this partnership. Critics say that African economies are shrinking, that poverty is rising and that failing aid is the culprit. But this argument is at least a decade out of date. Africa’s turnaround is real, the evidence indisputable. Africans themselves have been the key to this reversal, but more effective aid has played an important role. Reducing aid would slow private-sector growth, stall poverty reduction, and undermine peace and stability in countries that are struggling to become part of the global economy.

-Kathy McKiernan

Breaking News: DAC Releases Annual Report

Mar 30th, 2009 12:34 PM EST
By Josh Lozman

Each year in early April, the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) releases preliminary figures for what each large donor country spent on official development assistance the year before. This morning, the DAC released the figures for 2008. There is some good and bad news in there. Though we will post much more analysis later in the day, here is a quick summary of ODA for sub-Saharan Africa.

A few notes for accountants, seasoned advocates and others who follow the DAC and their processes. These are preliminary figures for 2008 ODA. They are net of debt relief, reported in 2008 US dollars, and do impute contributions through multilateral organizations to sub-Saharan Africa. SSA below means sub-Saharan Africa.

• OVERALL DAC donors: ODA to SSA was $36.661 billion, an increase of 11% over 2007
• G7: ODA to SSA was $25.165 billion, an increase of 14% over 2007
• Canada: Significant increases in bilateral ODA (47% over 2007) multilateral ODA (up by 63% over 2007) drove ODA to SSA up to $1.911 billion, up by 52% over 2007
• France: A decline in bilateral ODA to SSA drive decreases in ODA to SSA to $3.54 billion in 2008, down by 15% from 2007
• Germany: Germany’s ODA to SSA was $3.897 billion, up by 15% - $513 million – over 2007
• Italy: ODA to SSA in 2008 is $1.43 billion, down by 4% or $55 million largely due to falls in Italy’s multilateral contribution
• Japan: 2008 ODA to SSA is $2.6 billion, an increase of 56%, up by $938 million including large increases in multilateral (up 89% over 2007) and bilateral (up 31% over 2007) ODA
• United States: Large increases in bilateral ODA sent total ODA to SSA up by 26% over 2007 figures to $7.75 billion in 2008
• United Kingdom: ODA to SSA was $4.02 billion, a increase of 3% - or $100 million – over 2007 figures

More reactions to come shortly.

-Josh Lozman, Deputy Policy Director

ONE in Ghana: Development and Pineapples

Mar 5th, 2009 12:39 PM EST
By Chandler.Smith

As we wrote about yesterday, some ONE staff are currently traveling through Ghana and Nigeria to see firsthand some of the extreme poverty and development issues currently taking place in Africa. Today Chandler Smith brings us this account about the Millennium Challenge Corporation. Click here to read more about this ongoing series on the ONE Blog.

Working in the development community, I’ve heard a lot about the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC). I’ve heard about how it’s a “different kind of program” and how it works with other countries to make sure that U.S funds are used for projects that are country-owned and will be sustainable in the future.

Today, I saw a lot of that talk put to action. We drove east of Accra on Highway 1–the most visible MCC project in Ghana. Basically, the MCC is a U.S. government mechanism that provides large-scale, long-term funding for developing countries who have met a specific set of indicators reflecting good governance, economic investment, and investment in people. Once selected for MCC funding, for example, Ghana had to develop a compact proposal explaining the initiatives they would like funded, and agreeing to transparency and careful accounting during implementation of the projects. The U.S. not only provides the funds for the projects – like the highway – but the MCC helps Ghana establish an on-the-ground group to manage the projects. Compacts run for five years – making funding predictable and allowing longer-term projects – like highway building – to take place.

Highway 1 feeds from the rural areas into Accra and is the major transportation artery in the country. When it is finished, its six-lanes will enable workers to commute to Accra and goods to be transported to the airport for export in a timely manner.

We travelled on Highway 1 to a farm where as many as 50 farmers have been trained by the Millennium Development Authority - the local group that helps implement all of the MCC projects in Ghana. The farmers have learned how to and improve their access to seed and fertilizer, and received other vital training. There, the farmers told us a little bit about how this training has improved production on the farm. For more on that, check out this video:

The highlight of today’s visit was without a doubt the Jei River pineapple farm. Jei River was started with funding from the MCC. With this start-up money, the farm has grown to be one of the largest in Ghana and specializes in four different types of pineapple. My favorite kind was the Sugar Loaf pineapple. It is white both on the inside and outside, and is very sweet (just as the name suggests). This farm was an example of how a small loan and proper training can become a sustainable farm with as many as 400 workers.

These are just a few of the places we visited today, and each time we arrive somewhere new, I am struck by the resourcefulness and diligence of each individual. I’ve also learned how important it is that we listen to people on the ground to make sure that whatever the United States does to provide aid ensures sustainability for the future. The Millennium Challenge Corporation appears to be a pretty good start.

-Chandler Smith

Grant Could Boost Incomes for African Farmers

Mar 2nd, 2009 1:32 PM EST
By Beth Adler

Last week the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation announced two new grants designed to support small cocoa and cashew farmers in Africa. The $48 million in total funding will support public-private partnership projects that aim to boost production for smallholder farmers and expand productivity in the cashew and cocoa sectors in Africa.

The World Cocoa Foundation received $23 million for cocoa initiatives, and one of the German government’s development agencies, Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), was given $25 million for cashew projects in Africa. Both grants awarded will supplement $42 million in cash and in-kind contributions from the private sector, NGOs, and local governments that will provide technical assistance to farmers and the industries.

Smallholder agriculture is a source of income and livelihood for more than half of sub-Saharan Africa’s population. According to the Foundation’s press release, cocoa is a key export from West Africa and accounts for 70% of the world’s supply, while Africa produces one third of the world’s cashew crop. Initiatives that improve the quality and yield for these crops have the potential to increase incomes and improve livelihoods of thousands of farming families.

The cocoa project will focus on farmer training and education, crop diversification, and making the supply chain more efficient, and aims to double the incomes of smallholder cocoa farmers. The five-year project will reach approximately 200,000 cocoa farmers in Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Liberia, and Nigeria. Bill Guyton, president of the World Cocoa Foundation commented on the grant announcement, “Cocoa has the potential to deliver significant improvements in income as well as in family and community well-being across rural West and Central Africa.”

Africa’s cashew market is currently impeded by a lack of cashew processing facilities. The cashew project plans to, build processing capacity, increase farmer productivity, and increase links between farmers and the marketplace. The project aims to help 150,000 smallholder farmers in Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, and Mozambique increase their incomes by 50 percent by 2012. The development or expansion of local factories will also provide new employment opportunities in these countries.

Funding like these grants, that come with technical assistance and partner expertise, and focus on expanding opportunities for agriculture and trade, are an exciting step towards harnessing the power of agriculture to positively impact livelihoods in Africa.

-Beth Adler