10 EC Development Assistance in 2008
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11863/09
+ ADD 1
COM(09) 296
| Commission Annual Report 2009 on the European Community's Development and External Assistance Policies and their Implementation in 2008
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| Legal base | —
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| Department | International Development
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| Basis of consideration |
Minister's letter of 2 November 2009
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| Previous Committee Report
| HC 19-xxvii (20098-09), chapter 18 (14 October 2009); also see (30918) 13232/09: HC 19-xxxi (2008-09), chapter 11 (11 November 2009) and (30978) 13732/09 HC 19-xxvii (2008-09), chapter 2 (21 October 2009)
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| To be discussed in Council
| 16-17 November 2009 General Affairs and External Relations Council (GAERC)
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| Committee's assessment |
Politically important |
| Committee's decision |
Cleared (decision reported 14 October 2009); further information requested
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Background
10.1 The overall objectives of European Community development
policy and external assistance are set out in Art 177 EC. Each
year, the Commission produces an annual report on the activities
carried out there under.
The Annual Report
10.2 This report covers the activities under the European Community's
external assistance programme in 2008. It consists of a ten-page
summary report and a detailed 219-page annex in the form of a
Commission Staff Working Document.
10.3 The report's summary looks at activity in 2008
under five main headings:
— A
truly global dimension;
— Getting the policies right;
— More and better aid;
— Focus on results;
— Working together.
10.4 Soaring food and energy prices and the global
financial crisis posed new challenges. The Commission sees itself
as having responded swiftly, highlighting in particular the €1
billion EU Food Facility: "Responding in a flexible and effective
way to the situation as it unfolds will remain a key objective
for 2009".
10.5 In 2008, the EU was again the biggest international
donor, providing almost 60% of global aid. The Report states that
the value of funds committed during 2008 reached €9.33 billion
(£7.95 billion), an increase of more than 90% in the rate
of annual commitments since 2001. Africa continues to receive
most new commitments with €5.2 billion in 2008 compared to
€3.6 billion (£3.06 billion) in 2007. For Asia the corresponding
totals are €1.9 billion (£1.61 billion) in 2008 and
€1.7 billion (£1.44 billion) in 2007. Total disbursements
also increased in 2008 to €9.1 billion (£7.75 billion)
from €8.4 billion (£7.15 billion) in 2007.
10.6 The importance of maintaining commitments to
the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) despite the difficult
economic context is emphasised repeatedly. Under More and better
aid, the Commission notes that the EU "has been the driving
force behind efforts to make aid more effective". In 2008,
the Commission "worked intensively to reform its technical
cooperation and project implementation units", with the focus
on developing local capacity and ownership and "a strong
result-orientation". The Commission sees all this and continuing
discussions with Member States on how to carry the effectiveness
agenda forward as "a question of value for money —
for the beneficiary countries and the European taxpayer".
10.7 Budget support is the "preferred delivery
vehicle when conditions allow", and amounted to 39%, or €3.86
billion, of all EC budget and EDF commitments in 2008. Beneficiary
countries must demonstrate their ability to manage public finances.
Effective public finance management (PFM) "is essential to
ensure that governments are accountable for European taxpayers'
money entrusted to them for the benefit of their population."
The Commission has committed itself to make budget support "more
effective and transparent by strengthening PFM assessments, improving
the structure and formulation of financial agreements, refining
further the eligibility criteria for budget support and risk assessments,
and improving reporting systems."
10.8 The report includes a synthesis of the main
lessons of the Commission's Results Oriented Monitoring (ROM)
system — a "transparent, rapid and comprehensive review
of how a project is progressing at a given point in time ….
carried out in all regions of external cooperation by independent
experts [and using a] well-structured and robust methodology"
and concludes with a reiteration of the need for EU external assistance
policy to focus "on achieving concrete results, enhancing
the flexibility of its aid instruments and fostering action on
regional integration."
10.9 This is the ninth such report, which the Committee
considered at its meeting on 14 October 2009 (and in the report
of which all of the above is set out in greater detail).[28]
10.10 In his Explanatory Memorandum of 20 July 2009,
the Minister of State at the Department for International Development
(Mr Gareth Thomas) said that a consistent focus of UK attention
had been that the reports demonstrate a clear link between EC
development policy and meeting the MDGs, and noted that the report
did indeed "stress the MDGs more strongly than in the past";
at the UN MDG Review Summit in September 2010, the UK would be
"pushing for the 2010 Annual Report to include a focus on
EU performance against its aid commitments."
10.11 The Minister went on to say that "a key
concern" in 2008 was that this year's annual report "should
be more results-focused". He professed himself pleased to
note that the Commission had made "a substantial effort to
demonstrate real impact on the ground", and noted that the
report introduced "some useful text on specific sectors,
country/region specific Success Stories and, in some cases, the
approximate numbers of beneficiaries." He saw this as "a
good start and mirrors DFID practice in the use of Case Studies",
and said that he would "urge the Commission to consolidate
this approach for the 2010 Annual Report."
10.12 Less positively, the Minister noted that the
report did not contain gender disaggregated data, and that he
would "need to continue pushing for this as part of the Commission's
Gender Equality Action Plan."
10.13 The Minister then noted that the report made
"a persuasive case for the EC as a leading driver of more
effective aid, highlighting initiatives for: improving policy
coherence; increased predictability of aid through the innovation
of 'MDG Contracts'; and in ensuring a strong outcome from the
Third High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness (the Accra Agenda
for Action).[29]"
The report did not, however, assess EC performance against the
various Paris Declaration[30]
indicators, and he would press for this in the next report.
10.14 The Minister also noted that the report had
more detail than previously on the breakdown of new budget support
commitments, including by country and instrument, drawing attention
not only to budget support now being "the EC's 'preferred
delivery vehicle'" but also to "the important caveat
of 'when conditions allow'."
10.15 Overall, the Minister supported the report,
"particularly the new focus on demonstrating impact",
and saw the messages in it as "also largely in line with
UK external assistance objectives."
10.16 The Minister concluded by noting that the report
was to be considered by the 27 July 2009 GAERC.
Our assessment
10.17 When we considered last year's report, we noted
that the then Minister had laid out clearly what he would be looking
for in this year's report:
— clear
links with the MDGs and the trends defined by the European Consensus
on Development;
— a more results based focus, including
a sound Results Oriented Monitoring system;
— the systematic drawing of lessons from
those results in order to respond more effectively to any deficiencies;
— further information about the implementation
of EC General Budgetary Support in all the beneficiary countries
concerned;
— wherever possible, disaggregation of
data, particularly by gender. [31]
10.18 Thus, with the exception of the last tiret,
the focus of the report continues to move in the right direction.
10.19 This year, the Minister had similarly laid
out the areas upon which he would be focussing in the coming year.
So, as well as clearing the Commission Communication, we asked
to report progress against his "benchmarks" in his Explanatory
Memorandum on the 2010 report.
10.20 We also noted that there appears to be no reference
to the document in the official report of the 27 July GAERC, and
asked the Minister to clarify if and when the Council is to consider
it, and what Conclusions he expected the Council to adopt.
The Minister's letter of 2 November 2009
10.21 In his response, the Minister explains that
the Council Conclusions were initially scheduled for consideration
by the GAERC on 27 July but that, owing to the number of other
dossiers, the Conclusions were rescheduled for the 16-17 November
"development" GAERC.
10.22 He professes himself pleased to report that
the draft Conclusions welcome:
- the improved focus throughout
the report on the MDGs and poverty reduction;
- the stress placed on Policy Coherence for Development;
- the feature articles on the EU-Africa Partnership
and peacekeepers;
- greater detail on budgetary assistance; and
- the Commission's enhanced focus on results, monitoring
and evaluation.
10.23 He goes on to explain that the draft Conclusions
also ask the Commission to:
- continue to work on its reporting
of impact and results, particularly using disaggregated statistical
data;
- in the 2010 report, to set out clearly how it
is working in complex environments and fragile states; and
- to report more fully on the aid effectiveness
targets in the Paris Declaration and Accra Agenda for Action.
10.24 The Minister regards these as "a good
set of Conclusions which address all the major UK points".
Conclusion
10.25 As well as the improved focus throughout
the report on the Millennium Development Goals and poverty reduction,
the Minister also draws attention to the key role of Policy Coherence
for Development (PCD ) and aid effectiveness.
10.26 We consider PCD elsewhere in this Report,
on the basis of a recent Commission/Presidency Joint Paper which
proposes a "Whole-of-the-Union" approach, with "a
policy framework to better harness other policies and non-ODA
financial flows to development objectives " and a focus on
specific global challenges that are important for developing countries
and attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). For
our part, we note that we shall be particularly interested in
seeing if, when the 2011 PCD Report arrives, it does indeed demonstrate
that PCD has been promoted more systematically across the many
Commission Directorate Generals and units as well as between and
within Member States.[32]
10.27 There is then the equally important, and
closely related issue, of aid effectiveness, upon which we considered
a Commission Staff Working Document at our meeting on 21 October,
which we recommended for debate in the European Committee. That
debate took place on 9 November 2009.[33]
10.28 Given the challenges that the EU and the
developing world face, separately and jointly, and the countdown
towards the various MDG deadlines, 2009 and 2010 will be all the
more important years of reckoning for the EU's development policy
and practice. We accordingly hope, more than ever, to see concrete
progress in the next annual report, and in the meantime are reporting
this further information to the House (and again forwarding it
to the International Development Committee) because of the widespread
interest in these matters.
28 See headnote: HC 19-xxvii (20098-09), chapter 18
(14 October 2009). Back
29
Text available at http://www.adb.org/Documents/Aid-Effectiveness/consultative-draft.pdf.
Back
30 The Paris Declaration, endorsed on 2 March
2005, is an international agreement to which over one
hundred Ministers, Heads of Agencies and other Senior Officials adhered
and committed their countries and organisations to continue to
increase efforts in harmonisation, alignment and managing aid
for results with a set of monitorable actions and indicators.
See http://www.oecd.org/document/18/0,3343,en_2649_3236398_35401554_1_1_1_1,00.html
for further information on the Declaration and on aid effectiveness
in general. Back
31
(29779) 11137/08: see HC 16-xxxvi (2007-8), chapter 12 (26 November
2008). Back
32
See headnote: (30918) 13232/09: HC 19-xxi (2008-09) chapter 11
(11 November 2009). Back
33
See Gen Co Deb European Committee B, 9 November 2009, cols.
1-24. Back
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