Brussels, 14/04/2016 (Agence Europe) - Providing €68 billion in 2015, the European Union and its member states remain the world's top donor of official development assistance (ODA). This figure also includes aid linked to the refugee crisis.
According to the provisional 2015 figures published by the OECD on Wednesday 13 April, the EU's ODA (the sum of the 28 EU member states' spending on ODA plus the ODA provided by the institutions which is not assigned to individual member states) increased by €9 billion compared with 2014 (€59 billion) - in other words, it was up by 15%.
ODA is up for the third year in a row. The EU's ODA represented 0.47% of its gross national income (GNI) in 2015, and was thus up from the 0.43% rate recorded in 2014. This 0.47% rate is significantly above the average national rate of GNI (0.21%) dedicated to ODA by the non-EU members of the OECD's Development Assistance Committee (DAC).
Although the goal of reaching 0.7% of the EU's GNI in 2015 has not been met due to the economic crisis and strict budget constraints, European Commissioner for International Cooperation and Development Neven Mimica believes that the current performance “clearly shows our strong commitment to financing development and supporting the new sustainable development goals”.
In 2015, five member states nevertheless exceeded the threshold of 0.7% of GNI for ODA. Far ahead of the others, Sweden grants 1.4% of its GNI to ODA. It is followed by Luxembourg (0.93%), Denmark (0.85%), the Netherlands (0.76%) and the UK (0.71%).
Aid for refugees. The OECD data also show a considerable increase in the costs linked to the reception of refugees in the donor countries (accounted for as ODA). The EU has therefore increased both its support to refugees (which rose from €3.3 billion in 2014 to €8.6 billion in 2015), and its development assistance. (Original version in French by Maëlle Didion)