According to the results of a Eurobarometer survey published by the European Commission on Thursday 27 April, 89% of EU citizens believe it is important to help populations in developing countries (a stable figure), and over 70% think that development aid is an effective means of fighting poverty.
This survey, carried out in November and December 2016, aimed to poll EU citizens’ views on development, cooperation and aid, as well as the extent of EU citizens’ involvement in, and knowledge of, the subject.
It is in Sweden (98%), Cyprus and Luxembourg (both 97%) and Ireland, Portugal and Spain (all 96%) that there are the highest levels of citizens seeing aid as an effective means of fighting poverty. Even where they are lower levels, the figures still remain high: Bulgaria (75%), Latvia (77%) and Estonia (78%).
Aid and migration. There are fewer European citizens, however, who think that aid is an effective means of tackling irregular migration (68%, in other words -5% compared with in 2015) – a figure that masks big variations according to country. The percentage thus increased in six countries, particularly Hungary (over 11%), whilst in 21 other countries, this conviction dipped, especially in the Netherlands, Estonia and the Czech Republic.
Around 72% of respondents think that development aid contributes to a more peaceful and more just world, but here too, there are big variations (+9% in Hungary, +8% in Latvia, but -21 points in the Netherlands and -15 points in Germany).
A priority for the EU especially. Around 68% of respondents think that tackling poverty in developing countries should be an EU priority (-1% compared with in 2015) and 51% think that this is only a priority of their government.
Around 54% think that individual action can play a role (+2%), with wide variations (87% in Sweden, compared with 31% in Bulgaria) and 46% state that they are personally involved; this is especially high in Sweden (82%), Luxembourg (81%) and Finland (76%).
Education (38%) and peace and security (38%) are mentioned as priority challenges, ahead of health (33%), water and sanitation (31%).
When it comes to the main obstacles to development, respondents mention corruption (54%) in first position, followed by bad policies in developing countries (43%) and conflicts (41%).
Only 58% state they have heard of the universal sustainable development goals, and 29% acknowledge that they do not exactly know what the goals cover. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)