Standing at USD 161.2 billion in 2020, official development assistance from the 29 richest countries has reached a record high, according to preliminary data from the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC), which was released on 13 April.
This represents an increase of 3.5% in real terms compared to 2019, and has been driven by additional spending to assist developing countries dealing with the Covid-19 crisis.
This amount only represents 0.31% of aggregate GNI, however, which is far from the long-promised 0.7%; the increase in the ratio is partly explained by the fact that GNI has declined in most DAC countries. This is without considering the fact that loans are increasing compared to donations.
Within the framework of official development assistance (ODA), preliminary estimates indicate that DAC countries have spent USD 12 billion on activities linked to Covid-19, of which only a proportion is new money.
Only six countries met or exceeded the 0.7% of GNI target – Sweden (1.14%), Norway (1.11%), Luxembourg (1.02%), Denmark (0.73%), Germany (0.73%) and the UK (0.7%).
Moreover, total ODA from DAC countries only equates to 1% of the total amount ($16 trillion) that countries mobilised in 2020 in the form of economic stimulus measures designed to help their own societies recover from the Covid-19 crisis.
Meanwhile, Covax, the global vaccine delivery system, remains severely underfunded, emphasised the OECD Secretary-General, Angel Gurría, in a video conference.
“The level of ODA is higher than we expected, but the needs are immense. We need to make a much greater effort to help developing countries with vaccine distribution, with hospital services and to support the world’s most vulnerable people’s incomes and livelihoods to build a truly global recovery”, he said.
ODA volumes have increased in 16 DAC countries, some of which have significantly increased their aid budgets in order to help developing countries cope with the pandemic. The largest increases were recorded in Canada, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Norway, Slovakia, Sweden and Switzerland.
Nevertheless, ODA decreased in 13 countries, including Australia, Greece, Italy, South Korea, Luxembourg, Portugal and the UK.
G7 donors provided 76% of total ODA and DAC-EU countries provided 45%. ODA provided by EU institutions jumped by 25.4% in real terms, since they mobilised funds for activities linked to Covid-19 and increased sovereign lending by 136% compared to 2019. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)