Europese Commissie: EU lidstaten komen beloftes over ontwikkelingshulp niet na (en)
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The EU's development commissioner has lashed out at the bloc's member states for reneging on past aid commitments, accusing them of "cooking up" reasons not to deliver the funds they have promised.
"Developing countries are at a critical stage. The poorest countries are hardest hit by the crisis," commissioner Louis Michel i said following a meeting of European development ministers on Tuesday (19 May), "... but I have noticed a certain trend among some member states."
"They look as if they are lacking political will or cooking up false arguments not to respect the commitments into which they had entered in the past," he told reporters after the meeting.
"I have to say what I feel," he continued. "We've got some good conclusions from this [meeting of development ministers] now, but we'll have to see whether member states actually respect those conclusions in practice."
The ministers were considering a European Commission proposal from April suggesting the EU should speed up the deliver of aid, releasing early around €500 million in reserve funds, in reaction to the impact of the global economic crisis on developing countries,
"It's mobilising existing funding," said the commissioner. "It isn't additional funding. It's just mobilising it more quickly. I got the impression that some member states were a little reluctant even about that."
The development ministers in the end said that they "welcomed" the commission's proposal, but did not endorse it. Instead, they will await a more detailed presentation of the proposal in the autumn.
"I am fully aware of the fact that national budgets are hard hit by the ongoing crisis, but we do have to remember that if we don't do anything, it's going to cost us a lot more than making a determined effort now," he added, saying that increased poverty leads to wider instability and conflict and ultimately further migratory pressures on Europe.
"Governments have a choice. Either they show solidarity and take action or they don't do anything, which I think will cost Europe far more in the future."
He accused governments of wanting to spend the money on themselves instead of needier countries.
"If we're not spending this, certain countries think this is money they can recoup and it's good news for them."
Off track
In 2005 at the G8 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland, the EU committed as a whole to providing annually 0.56 percent of its gross national income in aid by 2010.
Last year, however, Europe only provided 0.40 percent of GNI, according to a report released last week by Concord, an alliance of European development agencies. If the EU is to meet its 2005 pledge by the end of the decade, an additional €20 billion is needed over the next two years. They are well off track from a further commitment of 0.7 percent of GNI by 2015.
Among the 15 old member states, Austria registered the biggest decrease in aid allocations, followed by a small drop from the Netherlands. In the group of the new Member States, Bulgaria and Malta were by far the worst performers, with decreases of 27%. Hot on their heels were Estonia, which dropped by 19%, Poland by 10%, Hungary 9%, and the Czech Republic by 1%.
France and Germany slightly increased their allocations, but these figures conceal the reality of what Concord describes as "inflated aid". Of the roughly €50bn that European governments provided in aid in 2008, almost €5bn was debt cancellation, €2bn was for student costs and close to €1bn was spent on refugee costs.
"When these figures are discounted from the glossy official numbers, European aid for 2008 amounted to only 0.34% of collective GNI, nothing like the officially reported 0.40%."
Commissioner Michel, echoing the NGOs' frustrations, said: "Governments have a choice. either they show solidarity and take action or they don't do anything, which I think will cost Europe far more in the future."
Mr Michel is coming to the end of his mandate as a European Commissioner which may have allowed him to speak more freely than usual.
Aid groups were pleasantly surprised by the commissioner's frank words saying they "struck a chord".
"What the Commissioner did today was to call a spade a spade," said Laura Sullivan, Brussels spokeswoman for Action Aid, a development NGO.
"When you look at the amount of money that has been found to bail out banks, versus that spent on aid, you get a very distorted picture. France, for example, spent 45 times more on bailing out its banks last year, than it did on providing aid for poor countries," she said.
"Europe needs to refocus its efforts on bailing out the poor."