Select Committee on International Development Minutes of Evidence


Examination of Witnesses (Questions 34-39)

MR JOHN GORDON, MR RICHARD CODRINGTON AND MR PETER HOLLAND

13 DECEMBER 2005

  Q34 John Battle: Thank you very much for coming along this morning. May I start by giving apologies for our Chairman, Malcolm Bruce, who is in Hong Kong along with other members of the Committee. We are a little bit depleted, but while they are there our intention as a committee is to keep a focus on Afghanistan. We have done previous reports. Our last report was in January 2003, and two of us, Joan Ruddock and myself, have visited Afghanistan since then, so we hope to keep our attention on Afghanistan and get regular updates, if we can, see where we are now, get a snapshot and take things forward in our recommendations as well. Thank you for coming this morning. I wonder if I could start the conversation by asking you in particular, do you see any challenges coming, particularly from the role of our involvement as DFID, because DFID has certain priorities focusing particularly on poverty, but at the same time in the context of the real issue of security that I experienced when I visited Afghanistan, which would perhaps be a Foreign Office and Commonwealth Office/MoD priority. Are we still able to keep a focus on poverty reduction within the whole issue of stability (stability, security and, indeed, reconstruction) or are reconstruction and development really falling behind the efforts to just try and maintain security?

  Mr Gordon: The two things are inextricably linked together. The whole debate about how development works in insecure environments has shifted in the last five years. Our objective will continue to be poverty reduction, but we have to recognise the constraints that apply in situations like Afghanistan. These require us to look very closely at security as a constraint to achieving those objectives, which means we have to do two things: reflect that in our own planning about how we work and what we do and then relate very closely to others. In Whitehall, with some of my colleagues in the Foreign Office and the MoD, we have to be in constant dialogue about how we can work together to overcome the constraints that are in place to achieving DFID's objectives, as well as other objectives within Whitehall.

  Q35  John Battle: DFID's objectives, which generally in development refer to the Millennium Development Goals, are they even on the agenda in Afghanistan? Even before the present circumstances and before the Taliban, it was the poorest country in the world; so presumably Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) should apply there more than anywhere else. Are we even able to think in that kind of framework?

  Mr Gordon: I think there is a two-phased process. One is creating the conditions for sustainable development, which we are in now, but the long-term objective will continue to be how we help Afghanistan to achieve the MDGs. In situations like Afghanistan there is a two-step process. One is that you create the security which you need to enable development to happen and then you start working towards the MDGs more specifically; and our strategy, as defined in our Interim Strategy document[14] which we produced about six months ago, states that our objective now is to create those conditions, but our objective five years hence is to try and work very closely with the Afghan government to achieve those MDGs. You will have seen that the government produced its own MDG report a few months ago for the Millennium Review Summit, and that recognised that the MDGs in Afghanistan's case were further away than most other countries, so they have set a series of targets of their own for 2020, rather than 2015.


  Q36 John Battle: So you have put them all back five years?

  Mr Gordon: They have put them back and they have nuanced them and added a couple to reflect security as an example of something which other countries might not have in their particular MDG construct. Yes, we are working towards the MDGs, but we recognise that there are a couple of things we need to put in place before we can get there, and that requires issues like security to be addressed, because if in very insecure provinces development agencies cannot operate, it is very difficult to work towards those MDGs.

  Q37  Mr Singh: I was not on the Committee when they made their last report on Afghanistan in 2003, but in their wisdom, I assume, because I was not here, they did debate with DFID about the issue of how DFID aid should be distributed, and the Committee recommended that more of it go through the Afghan administration, temporary or transitional though that was at the time, and DFID made a robust defence against that position. Yet three years on, I think, is it, 70% of the DFID budget is now being distributed through the Afghan government. What has happened to change the DFID position there? Are you accepting the wisdom that was given by the Committee then or have you had a genuine change of heart from some other direction?

  Mr Gordon: We would be fools not to accept advice from the Committee! And that is probably very much part of it, but what we have seen is recognition that without the Afghan government having available the resources to sustain itself, then development cannot happen. We have made the choice that investing in government systems and procedures and processes is a prerequisite for effective development to happen; so we have channelled much of our resources, as you say, through the government system. Seventy per cent at the last count, but that partly reflects the fact that other donors are not particularly keen to do that, and, as one of the handful of donors who are, we are effectively sustaining the government and, without that, anything that anybody does would have less impact. I cannot speak for the people who appeared in 2002, but our position as of now reflects the position in Afghanistan as of now, which is that we believe the government needs more direct support than might have been the case then.

  Q38  Mr Singh: Is that because it is now an elected government?

  Mr Gordon: There are a number of reasons. There is greater legitimacy, for sure, in the Afghan government which we can support, there is a much stronger sense of ownership from the government. President Karzai continually offers what may be seen to be directives but are often quite helpful in how he thinks we should be doing our business, and if we genuinely believe in sovereignty and ownership and authority, then we should be responsive to that and, therefore, that is one of the main choices we have made in the last couple of years, that we should be doing more of that and less of the bilateral activity that may have been the case in 2002. It was a very different position then. As your report talked about the move from a humanitarian to a development programme, I think we have now almost lost the humanitarian tag, we are in a more stable development process, and with the government producing its own national development strategy over the next 18 months that gives us something which we can buy into and work with other donors to implement effectively.

  Q39  Mr Singh: DFID is also spending a considerable amount of money, £240 million, I believe, and giving that to the Afghan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF). This is a considerable amount of money to give to a multi-donor body without earmarking those funds for any specific purpose. Is there a precedent for that? If there is not, why are we doing this? Is it a good thing to do? If it is a good thing to do, have DFID any plans for doing it elsewhere?

  Mr Gordon: I think there are precedents in other countries. I cannot really speak for them honestly, but I know of examples in Eastern Africa, where DFID does direct budget support, which is one step further than we are doing here. What we have here is a mechanism managed by the World Bank to provide fiduciary risk protection. In Tanzania and Uganda DFID is paying money directly into the budget unearmarked; so there are precedents for this, but we believe that without doing that the basic functions of the state will not be able to take place and by doing so we are actually empowering the government to become responsible and accountable for its own actions and it will, we pre-suppose, shorten the time through which development assistance is required in Afghanistan, whether that be 40 or 50 years. It will be less if we allow the government to build its own capacity by supporting its own processes and mechanisms.


14   DFID Interim Strategy for Afghanistan 2005-06, www.dfid.gov.uk/pubs/files/afghanistan-interim-strategy.pdf Back


 
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