10 European Community Development Policy
and Assistance
| (25886)
11855/04
+ ADD1
COM (04) 536
| Commission Annual Report 2004 on EC Development Policy and External Assistance; and
Commission Staff Working Paper
|
| Legal base | — |
| Document originated | 29 July 2004
|
| Deposited in Parliament | 17 August 2004
|
| Department | International Development
|
| Basis of consideration | EM of 9 September 2004
|
| Previous Committee Report | None
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| To be discussed in Council | November GAERC
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| Committee's assessment | Politically important
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| Committee's decision | Cleared, but further information requested
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Background
10.1 The EU as a whole is the world's largest donor, providing
more than half of all global development assistance: over €30
billion in 2003. Over 20% is managed by the Commission on behalf
of the European Community, from both the Community budget and
the European Development Fund (EDF). The geographical span is
global — from the EU's immediate neighbours to small Pacific
islands. This report — the European Commission's fourth
Annual Report on development policy and external assistance —
accounts for the €7.8 billion committed and the €5.8
billion disbursed in 2003 (both record levels). It sets out the
objectives agreed for 2003 and highlights progress against these.
10.2 The EC's strategic goals are based on the UN
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs),[16]
whose overarching objective is halving world poverty by 2015.
The EC objective is "to foster sustainable development designed
to eradicate poverty in partner countries and to integrate them
into the world economy. This can only be achieved by pursuing
policies that promote the consolidation of democracy, the rule
of law, good governance and the respect for Human Rights".[17]
The EC aims to contribute to the achievement of the MDGs by focusing
its assistance on six key areas where it judges it can add particular
value. The promotion of human rights, gender equality, environmental
sustainability and conflict prevention are regarded as cross-cutting
issues to be integrated at every stage and within all of the Community's
assistance programmes.
The Commission's report
10.3 For 2003, the Commission reports that it also
set out to improve the global partnership between North and South,
notably by delivering on commitments made in the 2002 UN conferences
on Financing for Development in Monterrey and Sustainable Development
in Johannesburg and by taking forward the Cotonou Agreement.[18]
The EU's relations with its near neighbours were also given what
is described as new impetus and clearer definition, with the December
European Council's agreement on the principles of a new policy
framework offering these countries "a partnership aimed at
sharing everything but institutions"[19]
and aimed at ensuring that EU enlargement does not produce new
dividing lines between the "haves" and the "have
nots". 2003 also brought "an innovative leap forward
in the Community's contribution to peace building in Africa":[20]
a €250 million contribution to an African Peace Facility
based on reinforcing African capacity to deal with African conflicts
and the shared recognition that peace and stability in Africa
are fundamental to development there.
10.4 In terms of process, the Commission says that
it has pursued its reform of how it prioritises, organises and
implements its programmes, and that this has begun to deliver
concrete results. Devolution of day-to-day decision-making to
delegations ("deconcentration"; to be largely complete
by mid-2004) is said to have made the Union's external assistance
programmes more responsive to partner countries, with other donors
reporting markedly improved co-ordination. The quality of strategy
documents, which serve to analyse the situation in a partner country
and select the sectors on which aid should be concentrated, are
also said to be much improved.
10.5 The helpful and comprehensive 9 September Explanatory
Memorandum from the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at
the Department for International Development (Mr Gareth Thomas)
summarises each chapter:
"The Report starts with a chapter on strategic
goals and the EC approach. It points towards the complex global
context of EC external actions and the many strategic objectives
and demands they are seeking to address. An assessment is made
of the EC's contributions towards the Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs) through its six focus areas — trade, regional co
operation, macroeconomic policies and equitable access to social
services, transport, rural development and food security, and
institutional capacity building. It also provides information
about delivering on international commitments, in particular following
from the World Summit on Sustainable Development, the Doha Development
Agenda and Financing for Development, and about the implications
of EU enlargement.
"Chapter 2 addresses issues of efficiency and
effectiveness. It informs about progress with 'Relex management'
reform, focusing on deconcentration and quality improvement. Progress
with advancing the concept of the 'Three Cs' in the EC —
co-ordination, complementarity and coherence — is also described.
Examples of EC initiatives to promote coherence between different
policy areas and development are presented covering areas such
as migration, agriculture and fisheries policy, and foreign and
security policy issues. Cooperation with the UN system, the International
Financial Institutions and non-state actors is featured as well.
The chapter ends with an account of activities funded under
key cross-cutting areas of EC development cooperation: human rights,
gender, conflict prevention and crisis management, and environment.
"Evaluation and results-orientation have been
given a specific chapter also in this year's Report. It presents
findings and lessons from several major evaluations of sectors
and themes and describes the methodology used. It also outlines
the results-oriented monitoring system (ROM) for appreciating
project and programme's [sic] performance, now operational in
104 countries. An analysis of performance per regional programme
and main sector of focus is provided.
"These first strategic chapters are followed
by short summaries of the EC's activities in the each of the geographical
programmes: the Balkans; Eastern Europe and Central Asia; Southern
Mediterranean and the Middle East; Africa, Caribbean and the Pacific;
Asia and Latin America. Chapter 5 features the Commission's approach
in the emerging area of security and development. Chapter 6 presents
the Millennium Development Goals and ways to measure progress
towards meeting these. It also accounts for progress with administrative
and financial management and reform. Chapter 7 covers financial
data."
The Government's view
10.6 The Minister continues:
"We welcome the publication of an Annual Report
and see it as an important tool for sharing information and analysing
the impact and policy aims of EC aid. It is the only document
providing a global overview of the EC's efforts in external actions
and the only instrument regularly monitoring progress against
EC Development Policy.
"Since its first appearance, we have pressed
to give the Annual Report more importance amongst the Union's
management tools. We would like it to relate to the Council's
and Commission's planning instruments and the annual budgetary
process, which establish yearly objectives for the EC's external
programmes. However, the 2004 Report, again, does not present
any clear link between earlier agreed objectives and 2003 performance.
This makes it difficult to assess the extent to which the EC has
actually met the objectives it has set itself, nonetheless recognising
that it has achieved, a lot during the reporting period.
"Following criticism of earlier Reports, the
2004 Report seeks to put a stronger emphasis on impact and results
assessment and on the strategic objective of achieving the Millennium
Development Goals. It is also substantially shorter with 255 pages,
100 less than last year. It provides financial information in
line with Development Assistance Committee classifications, making
comparisons easier.
"Despite efforts to make the report more analytical
and strategic, it is still hard to detect any clear corporate
direction or universal goals for EC's development cooperation.
Whilst the MDGs are stated as such, they do compete with many
other priorities portrayed through the numerous areas and initiatives
covered by the EC's external assistance across the globe. This
broad and flexible agenda does put into question the actual application
and coverage of the EC's Development Policy.
"Like its predecessors, the 2004 Report gives
prominence to inputs and actions rather than evidence-based results
or real impact assessments. To its credit, the Report shows the
extent of measures put in place to improve EC effectiveness and
to install a results-based culture. In this context, we particularly
welcome the information on portfolio monitoring and note the improvement
in overall performance of operations since last year, no doubt
a result of the ongoing reform process. Full-scale introduction
of the new monitoring system should help foster a stronger focus
on impact and results over time.
"As stated earlier, we believe the ongoing reform
process will improve the effectiveness of EC aid. Information
on progress has so far focused on quantitative achievements, including
in the 2004 Annual Report. Some three years into the programme,
we would have welcomed a more qualitative assessment. Council
Conclusions related to last year's Report, invited the Commission
to present more analytical and qualitative results of the reform
in this year's Report, and also to identify needs for any further
or deeper reforms. The 2004 Report fails to do so.
"We welcome the assessment of the EC's contribution
towards achieving the MDGs within its main focal areas. We would
have appreciated a similar analysis under the more in-depth discussion
about the MDGs in chapter 6 and under the various geographical
programmes, pointing towards relations between the EC's interventions
and progress made by developing countries towards the MDGs.
"We see the Annual Report as an important management
tool and a key measure of the impact and quality focus of EC aid.
We want to see further improvements. We will again voice our concerns
with the Report in the preparations for the November 2004 General
Affairs and External Relations Council but also stress improvements
made. With the arrival of a new Commission in November 2004, we
see this Council as an important opportunity to press the new
leadership for a more analytical, less descriptive report focusing
on results, impacts and on the EC's most strategic development
objectives."
Conclusion
10.7 The numbers speak for themselves: €7.8
billion committed and €5.8 billion disbursed in 2003 —
both record levels. The Minister notes a number of positive developments.
But there are still too many concerns, at the heart of which
is the question of effectiveness.
10.8 The report is aimed at a widespread audience:
the European institutions, Member State administrations and parliaments,
other agencies active in the development and external assistance
fields, partner countries and Europe's citizens. It is this last
constituency, as taxpayers, who make this important effort possible.
Yet, though now reduced to 255 pages, the report is still far
too detailed for all but the most dedicated and persevering, and
is thereby ineffective. We would hope to see a major effort on
the part of the new Commission to produce, if not a report, then
at least a digest that will explain clearly what it is that they
have funded and how effectively their money has been spent in
pursuit of the objectives.
10.9 Then there is the question of the effectiveness
of all this activity. Its very diversity — active in over
160 countries, territories and agencies — would challenge
any multi-national enterprise. To quote the Minister, the report
"again, does not present any clear link between earlier agreed
objectives and 2003 performance". He notes that "it
is still hard to detect any clear corporate direction or universal
goals for EC's development cooperation". The Millennium Development
Goals "compete with many other priorities portrayed through
the numerous areas and initiatives covered by the EC's external
assistance across the globe. This broad and flexible agenda does
put into question the actual application and coverage of the EC's
Development Policy". We agree. Yet the Minister goes on
to say that "we believe the ongoing reform process will improve
the effectiveness of EC aid". It is hard to see why he is
so sanguine, given that assessment also continues to focus on
quantitative achievements, whereas the Council Conclusions following
last year's report "invited the Commission to present more
analytical and qualitative results of the reform in this year's
report, and also to identify needs for any further or deeper reforms".
As he says, "the 2004 report fails to do so".
10.10 The Minister intends at the November Council
meeting "to press the new leadership for a more analytical,
less descriptive report focusing on results, impacts and on the
EC's most strategic development objectives". We encourage
him to go further, and instead insist that the new Commission
addresses not simply the nature of the report but also those underlying
considerations — all revolving around ensuring the effectiveness
of the expenditure of several billion euros, which at present
remains open to the real doubts that he himself has identified,
and which we share. Although there are indications of progress,
the over-riding impression continues to be of the need for a much
more rigorous, focussed and energetic endeavour, especially to
make outputs achieved the driving force (we were much impressed
by the references to the new output-based aid approach in the
recent Commission Communication and accompanying Explanatory Memorandum
on Public Private Partnerships in developing and transition countries,
which we considered on 9 September).[21]
We hope that the November Council Conclusions will not only address
these issues robustly but also commit the new Commission to do
better than its predecessor in addressing them in the year ahead.
We would accordingly appreciate a further report from the Minister,
after the Council has reached its Conclusions. In the meantime,
we clear the report.
16 The eight goals that, in 2000, the UN set itself
to achieve, most by 2015: eradicate extreme poverty and hunger;
achieve universal primary education; promote gender equality;
reduce child mortality; improve maternal health; combat HIV/Aids,
malaria and other diseases; ensure environmental sustainability;
develop a partnership for development. Back
17
Foreword to the report by the five responsible Commissioners (page
3) Back
18
A multilateral agreement covering trade, development cooperation
and political dialogue between the EU and 78 countries in Sub-Saharan
Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific signed in 2000. Back
19
Foreword to the report by the five responsible Commissioners (page
3). Back
20
Foreword to the report by the five responsible Commissioners (page
4).
Back
21
(25871) 11856/04; see HC 42-xxx (2003-04), para 9 (9 September
2004). Back
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