Toespraak Karel de Gucht over de effectiviteit van ontwikkelingshulp (en)

Karel De Gucht i

EU Commissioner for Development and humanitarian aid

Aid effectiveness

Figures and graphics available in PDF and WORD PROCESSED

EU Development Ministers Press Conference , GAERC

Brussels, 17 November 2009

My thanks to Minister Carlsson for this sum-up and for the leadership shown today.

The main message I want to convey today is one of relevance. If we want to make a difference, more, better and faster aid is still as relevant today as it was at the beginning of the Barroso Commission. If not more so!

Take aid effectiveness and the global recession. This year, we hit the grim record of one billion people chronically hungry across the globe. Therefore, it is absolutely unacceptable that we are not getting the maximum development impact from every euro we spend.

We have a responsibility to the world's poor to reverse that. We also have a responsibility to each and every European tax-payer to ensure the best value for money.

It's not a question that our aid efforts are failing. We account for 60% of Official Development Assistance (ODA) worldwide or just under €50 billion euros last year (€49.7 billion). And nine out of ten EU citizens strongly support development aid.

Internationally, we score well on aid effectiveness and have mobilised far-reaching commitments. But scoring well is not necessarily to be doing enough. This is why we turned to independent research to really understand where the gaps are so that we can plug them.

The first version of the study, "Aid Effectiveness Agenda: Benefits of a European Approach" which I first mentioned at European Development Days in Stockholm, shows that a staggering €3 billion euros per year - at least - could be spent more effectively on "Development".

In truth, it is not the financial cost that really bothers me: it's knowing what the real human cost is. With that money we could help the hungry, improve education opportunities and offer better maternal healthcare.

The study has prompted us to take a good look at aid fragmentation.

For example:

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  Over a 3 year period between 2005-7, when you take the 27 Member States and all their partner countries, it ends-up with the EU providing Country Programmable Assistance to more than one thousand countries (1168), in over seven thousand sectors (7629). In one quarter of these countries, EU Country Programmable Assistance was less than one million euros (€680,000) which is, of course, incredibly draining on countries with limited management capacity in the first place. We should be a help not a hindrance.

The study provides other examples of concern

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  The average EU donor is present in 73 countries. Let us decide who can do what best.
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  On average, EU donors are present in close to 8 sectors which is well above the maximum 3 sectors agreed to by Member States in the Code of Conduct. Let us be more focussed.
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  On average, each of our partner countries has to work with 7 EU donors, meaning 7 different administrations with 7 different sets of procedures. Let us cut down the bureaucracy and offer greater ownership to our partners.

So, we are taking action. With the Swedish Presidency we have tabled an Operational Framework which we will revisit every six months at Council level to perform a political systems check on the actual implementation of our aid effectiveness commitments. We will start with division of labour, use of country systems, capacity building and technical assistance. Implementation needs this political oversight if it is to be timely, targeted, coordinated and effective.

I know we all share the same goal. I know that EU donors already do a great deal. The MDG framework has been a real rallying force. However, we must act in the face of such increasingly strong evidence of billions of euros that could be re-invested in more and better development.

And now for the good news, the key solution is absolutely free and it costs nothing. It's called "political will". The problem is that sometimes it seems to be in short supply.

Linked with the relevance of our development activities today is our credibility. The credibility we must maintain from meeting the very aid targets we set several years ago.

The purpose of today's discussion was to ensure we stay on course. We have made a difference with aid and now is not the time to renege on past commitments. If we are short of our targets in 2010, we'll certainly have no excuses in 2015. So, we have agreed to sustain our ODA levels and to remain relevant and credible.

Europe is ultimately about added value. To date, we have achieved some solid results but we could score even better with a resolute dedication to the delivery of more, better and faster aid.