SYSTEMS OF AID FOR
DEVELOPMENT
AID EFFECTIVENESS IN LIGHT OF
THE PARIS DECLARATION AND
THE ACCRA AGENDA FOR
CHANGE
What is Development
Human development - a process of ‘enlarging
people’s choices’ emphasizing the freedom to be
healthy, to be educated and to enjoy a decent
standard of living
Aid - an intervention
• Intervention – The action of governments and donors by
providing aid out of the belief that it will achieve a
desired effect and impact
Systems of Aid for Development
• Strong Interventionist – top-down aid: When
governments and donors are sure that they know what is
the precise intervention needed for Development they
tend to set precise terms and conditions for the
beneficiaries. For example: Structural Adjustment
Policies up to the late 1990’s
Systems of Aid for Development
• Interventionist – aid via dialogue and partnership:
Governments and donors provide aid that is more
closely formulated and implemented in coherence with
national development plans, national priorities, and
national planning and implementation. Partner countries
are required for strong leadership of development
interventions and donor coordination. Mainly represented
in The Paris declaration, The Accra Agenda for Action
The Accra Agenda for
Action
•
•
•
•
Greater use of country
systems and program-based
approaches.
Provision of capacity
development that is ‘demand
driven’.
Increased aid predictability
and transparency of aid flows.
Better division of labour and
donor harmonization to reduce
fragmentation of aid.
Uganda 2009/10: project aid represented 40%
of budgeted expenditures in the priority sectors
of health, education, roads, agriculture and
water representing over two thirds of
development expenditure in those sectors.
(Uganda Ministry of Finance Planning and Economic Development, 2010)
The Paris Declaration
• Local “ownership” should be
strengthened by ensuring that
the government of a country
receiving aid sets the agenda.
• Aid donors should align their
thinking and programmes with
the host government’s policies
and management systems.
• Improved harmonisation of
different aid donors’
development programmes
through closer cooperation and
agreed divisions of labour.
• Managing for Results - better
evaluation of development
results
• Mutual accountability so that
both aid recipients and donors
are equally accountable.
Systems of Aid for Development
• Interventionist – bottom-up aid: Governments and
donors recognize their inability to understand accurately
the recipient's needs, therefore, providing aid on the
bases of local needs and problem solving/crises
alleviation. Examples: microfinance banking to help the
poor; aid for disaster relief
Systems of Aid for Development
• Weak interventionist – 'counterfactual aid evaluation':
Governments and donors focus on the degree to which aid
improves the well-being of the poor. These evaluations set
out to answer what they call the counterfactual question of
whether beneficiaries’ well-being would have changed
even if the intervention had not taken place.
Counterfactual aid proposes aid to be randomised and
experimental. European Commission – ‘Evalsed’ the resource for the
evaluation of socio-economic development
Systems of Aid for Development
• Weak interventionist – aid for
self development: Aid for
Development can be verified,
developing countries do not
need a higher GDP, but find
their unique way to develop.
The path for development
differs from one country to the
other by its merits and
weakness. Emphasis should be
given to local and traditional
knowledge, and South-South
knowledge exchange.
Development will result from
strengthening these abilities.
“the correlation between GDP per capita growth and
nonincome [Millennium Development Goals] is practically
zero” François Bourguignon, director of the Paris School of Economics; HDI 2010 pp. 47
The Real Wealth of Nations: Pathways to Human Development, HDRO-UNDP – November 2010
Lack of sustainability is arguably the
greatest challenge to human development
• CO2 emissions have risen 163 percent between 1970
and the mid-2006. Arguably the greatest challenge to
human development lies in unsustainable production and
consumption patterns and above all, the threat of climate
change.
Worsening of key measures of sustainability, 1970-2006/8
The Real Wealth of Nations: Pathways to Human Development, HDRO-UNDP – November 2010