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15 Sep 2008 : Column 2165W—continued
Namibia: Territorial Waters
John Battle:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what representations his Department has made on visits to Namibia about illegal
fishing by other states in Namibian waters; and if he will make a statement. [220763]
Mr. Thomas: I visited Namibia on 9 July, immediately after Namibia hosted a Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) Ministerial Conference on illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing (IUU) from 2 to 4 July. This conference was funded by the Department for International Development (DFID) with strong support from DEFRA and the FCO. The conference generated a Statement of Commitment to be passed to SADC Heads of State later this year, calling for regional action to improve fisheries governance and trade, and in particular to combat illegal fishing. The lack of capacity within the region to deal effectively with illegal fishing was highlighted during a meeting I had with the Chief Executive Officer of Hangana Seafoods, the first Namibian seafood producer to receive British Retail Consortium certification.
DFID’s programme with Namibia through SADC has been instrumental in influencing southern African regional policy development for sustainable fisheries. DFID has now approved further funds to help build on this commitment and extend it to other parts of sub-Saharan Africa. Namibia represents a relatively positive model for African fisheries and effort will continue to support Namibian interests in promoting best practice. Nambia has operated effective monitoring, control and surveillance of its fishing activities since Independence. Recent and relatively modest infractions during late 2007, involving Nambian flagged, foreign operated vessels in the horse mackerel fishery, have been effectively dealt with by the authorities.
Overseas Aid
Mr. Hoyle: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what progress has been made towards meeting the Gleneagles pledge to double development assistance, from G8 countries by $15 billion by 2010. [213643]
Mr. Thomas: The Gleneagles summit communiqué estimated that annual official development assistance (ODA) from all donors would increase by $50 billion, and ODA to Africa would increase by $25 billion, between 2004 and 2010. So far, according to preliminary data for 2007, from the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC), ODA from DAC members only has increased from $79 billion in 2004 to $104 billion in 2007, and ODA to Africa has increased from $19 billion in 2004 to $24 billion in 2007.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what steps his Department has taken with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Ministry of Defence with the objective of increasing the timeliness and effectiveness of aid from international institutions to conflict-affected areas. [220375]
Gillian Merron:
Improving the effectiveness of aid from international institutions to conflict-affected countries is a UK Government priority. The Department for International Development (DFID) has taken a leading role in supporting reform of the international response to humanitarian crises led by the United Nations. This
has led to an increase in the timeliness and effectiveness of humanitarian aid through the UN Central Emergency Response Fund and the country-level Emergency Response and Common Humanitarian Funds.
DFID is also supporting improvements to the effectiveness of international institutions’ development assistance to conflict-affected countries. UK funding through the joint DFID-FCO-MOD Conflict Prevention Pool and DFID funding to the United Nations funds, agencies and programmes, including UNDP’s Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery and the UN Peace building Fund, is subject to improved timeliness and effectiveness. For the World Bank, DFID secured commitments on financing for fragile states during the fifteenth replenishment negotiations of the International Development Association (IDA 15) in 2007, including extending the period of extra assistance for post-conflict states.
Recently, the UK has launched a new initiative on improving the international community’s support for post-conflict stabilisation and early recovery. We are working with the UN, the World Bank, regional organisations such as the European Union and the African Union, and other countries to address the lack of timely and effective development aid during the immediate post-conflict period.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what his Department’s objectives are for the outcome of the Accra High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness to be held in September. [220383]
Mr. Malik: The High Level Forum (HLF) is an important opportunity to achieve further progress in the quality of aid. The Department for International Development’s (DFID) objectives for Accra are to:
Internationally identify and agree on concrete actions to accelerate progress and unblock obstacles towards our 2010 Paris targets and commitments on aid effectiveness under the five broad principles of Ownership, Harmonisation, Alignment, Mutual Accountability and Managing for Development Results.
To ensure partner country ownership and that partner country priorities are addressed and civil society perspectives are inputted into the Accra Agenda for Action outcome document that will be endorsed internationally.
And particularly to:
Improve medium term predictability of aid so that governments can plan expenditures better and meet recurring costs, for example wages of nurses and teachers.
Improve the governance of aid so that there is better accountability of donors to partner countries as well as partner countries to donors to drive better performance and results.
Improve the transparency of aid delivery for better planning and accountability.
Rationalise aid delivery to reduce costs increase coherence and improve the efficiency of aid.
Improve incentives for agency effectiveness to really secure practical behavioural change in donor organisations.
To ensure more aid is untied to free up more resources for poor people.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what programmes were funded by the £89 million contributed by his Department to the Partnership Programme Agreement; and what the administrative costs associated with each programme were. [220450]
Gillian Merron: Partnership Programme Arrangements (PPAs) provide unrestricted funding to non-governmental organisations in support of objectives they share with the Department for International Development (DFID). It is therefore not possible to provide figures for specific programmes or administrative costs.
The 26 organisations which receive PPA contributions and the objectives against which they are held to account are detailed on the Department for International Development’s external website at:
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what private sector contracts are funded through the £86 million that his Department spends through its country programmes. [220452]
Mr. Thomas: Details of all contracts awarded centrally by the Department for International Development (DFID) are available on our website:
for the period January 2005 to March 2008. This includes the project/programme title, name of supplier, the related sector and contract award value. Low value contracts issued by our overseas offices are not recorded centrally and would incur disproportionate cost to collate.
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what programmes his Department operates to increase awareness of (a) black and minority ethnic groups, (b) faith groups and (c) young people on assistance to developing countries; and how much was spent on such programmes in 2007-08. [220453]
Gillian Merron: The Department for International Development (DFID) runs a comprehensive package of development awareness programmes aimed at reaching diverse audiences, including black and minority ethnic groups, faith groups and young people. The total budget for development awareness for 2007-08 was £14.4 million.
Information on the main programmes for the audiences mentioned is as follows:
Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) Groups:
A partnership arrangement with the BME network organisation, Connections for Development—approximately £250,000 in 2007-08 to support the engagement of more BME organisations in international development. A volunteering programme to support volunteering in developing countries by the UK’s diaspora communities was launched on 17 July 2008. The budget for this is £3 million over three years. Special workshops have been run in order to make BME groups aware of funding streams that are available to support greater development awareness among their communities and to increase the number of good quality applications from these groups.
DFID supports a number of faith groups, or projects which target faith groups, through the competitive Development Awareness Fund. Ministers have been undertaking outreach visits to faith groups, including a multi-faith gathering of leaders hosted in Glasgow on
7 March and a seminar hosted by the DFID Minister, (Shahid Malik), with Muslim groups to discuss DFID’s my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury work.
DFID gives funding to faith based NGOs such as CAFOD, Aga Khan Foundation, Islamic Relief and Christian Aid some of which is allocated by them to development awareness activities.
In 2007-08 DFID funded around £8 million of activities that targeted young people in schools through the formal education sector, working with colleagues in DCSF, the curriculum authorities and the devolved Administrations. In addition DFID launched a new Youth Volunteering Scheme that aims to fund 2,500 young volunteers to work in developing countries. The budget for this scheme is £10 million over three years. DFID also reaches out to young people through sponsorship of youth festivals, such as the recent Global Students’ Forum, and through innovative tools such as the Race Against Poverty Game which is available at the DFID website (www.dfid.gov.uk).
John Battle: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what proportion of new development aid committed at the G8 summit is planned to go to (a) Africa, (b) South America, (c) South East Asia, (d) the Middle East and (e) Eastern Europe; and if he will make a statement. [220757]
Gillian Merron: G8 leaders at the 2008 summit in Tokyo reaffirmed their commitment made at Gleneagles, to work towards an increase in global Official Development Assistance (ODA) of $50 billion per year by 2010, of which half, i.e. $25 billion, additional funding should go to Africa.
There are no specific G8 planning targets for other regions.
The UK Government believe it is important that this commitment to Africa should be met and we will work with our partners to ensure that it is.
Overseas Aid: International Cooperation
Mr. Moore: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what the outcomes were of the Accra conference on aid effectiveness; and if he will make a statement. [223581]
Mr. Douglas Alexander: The third High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Accra reached a groundbreaking agreement—the Accra Agenda for Action—to improve the quality of global aid and help ensure that every pound or dollar of global aid delivers the maximum benefit for poor people.
In adopting the Accra Agenda for Action donors and developing countries agreed a number of concrete, monitorable actions, including the following:
Donors committed to make greater use of country’s own financial systems to deliver aid, helping to strengthen those systems and improve accountability to Parliaments and citizens;
Donors and developing countries agreed to develop stronger mechanisms to hold each other accountable for meeting their commitments, at both country and global level;
Donors committed to respect and support partner country-led efforts to agree a better division of labour between donors in-country and to start a dialogue on international division of labour between
countries. This will help to reduce the burden on governments of dealing with multiple donors and address the issue of countries that receive insufficient aid;
Donors will better communicate with partner governments about the aid they can expect over the next three-five years, helping governments to plan more effectively.
Donors will improve the way they deliver aid in ‘fragile states’, including those suffering from conflict. They agreed ways to use aid better to support state-building and peace building.
The full text of the Accra Agenda for Action is available through:
Also at Accra, 14 donors endorsed the new UK-led International Aid Transparency Initiative to help ensure that information on aid flows is available to everyone. It will enable partner Governments and their citizens—those who ultimately benefit from aid—to plan for and make the best use of aid. It will also help citizens hold donors and governments to account for their promises.
Renewable Energy: Finance
Mr. Peter Ainsworth: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what contribution his Department has made to the (a) Clean Technology Fund, (b) Strategic Climate Fund and (c) the DfID/Defra Environmental Transformation Fund to date; and what projects and initiatives have had allocations from each of those funds to date. [223558]
Mr. Thomas: In the 2007 Budget, HM Treasury allocated £800 million to the Environment Transformation Fund International Window (ETF-IW), which is shared equally between the Department for International Development (DFID) and the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). The full £800 million will be used to capitalise the new Climate Investment Funds administered by the World Bank—the UK contribution will be made via the Strategic Climate Fund. Ministers have agreed that roughly two thirds will be allocated to mitigation (forestry and clean technology) and one third to adaptation.
To date, £50 million has been committed to the Congo Basin Fund and £15 million to the Forest Carbon Partnership Fund. These allocations will be made via the Strategic Climate Fund. A £50 million allocation to China will be made via the Clean Technology Fund.
United Nations Development Fund for Women
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what support his Department provides to the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNDFW); at what cost in 2008-09; and what UNDFW programmes his Department's staff have been working on. [220377]
Gillian Merron: Since 2004-05 the Department for International Development (DFID) has provided financial support to UNDFW (or UNIFEM as it is also known) amounting to £14 million. During 2008-09 we will provide £3 million given as core funding and £725,000 to supporting women’s engagement in peace building and preventing sexual violence in conflicts in six countries. Core funding supports the delivery of UNIFEM’s overall strategic plan and, hence, the full range of UNIFEM’s activities.
United Nations: Overseas Aid
Mrs. Curtis-Thomas:
To ask the Secretary of State for International Development how the £307 million provided by his Department through central
contributions to the UN agencies was distributed in (a) 2002-03 and (b) 2003 to 2007. [217040]
Mr. Thomas: During the period 2002-03 to 2006-07, the Department for International Development provided the following central contributions to UN agencies.
| £000 | |||||
| UN agency | 2002-03 | 2003-04 | 2004-05 | 2005-06 | 2006-07 |
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