UK prioritising foreign aid that helps fight threats to international cooperation, minister says
The UK will prioritize overseas aid to multilateral organizations such as the World Bank or the UN to counter growing threats to international cooperation, the Minister for International Development and Africa has said.
During a hearing of Parliament’s Select Committee on International Development, Jenny Chapman was asked for more details on exactly where the UK’s previously announced 40 per cent cut in overseas aid would land.
Baroness Chapman said the UK would prioritize multilateral aid in coordination with other countries, rather than bilateral aid flowing directly to a partner country, because “the multilateral system is under threat” and the UK intends to counter this.
Baroness Chapman’s comments come a year after US President Donald Trump’s public criticism and funding cuts to institutions such as the UN. They also come as experts warn that transatlantic alliance NATO faces an existential threat from Trump’s stance on the need for Denmark to own the semi-autonomous territory of Greenland.
“The multilateral system is coming under threat and we could have a very long discussion about why that might be, but we think there are some organizations that we really want to support,” Baroness Chapman said, adding that the UK’s £850 million commitment to the Global Fund – a 15 per cent cut on the previous commitment. represented this mentality.
“If we didn’t join [in the refinancing] So how feasible is this? he added. “If big donors don’t support them, then that becomes the question.”
The minister added that supporting multilateral institutions such as the World Bank allows the UK to make “major changes” to its aid program that would not be possible operating alone. Multilateral programs also allow the UK to tap into networks on the ground that it would not otherwise have access to; In particular, Baroness Chapman says the African Development Bank’s network in war-torn Sudan is crucial to the UK’s aid efforts in that country.
The minister added that the UK has also been able to use its influence at the World Bank to continue to push for areas of aid that other countries may no longer prioritize.
“Two [areas] Those who have been most threatened recently [to] gender[based programmes] and climate [programmes] Where we can express very clearly what we think and what we expect and play a balancing role against some of the other pressures on the bank [in these areas]he said.
The development sector is eagerly awaiting news on exactly where the UK’s aid cuts will fall after the government’s initial deadline for announcing aid program allocations passed last year.
Asked about news on aid allocations on Tuesday, Baroness Chapman said allocations for the UK’s next three years of aid spending would come “as soon as possible”.
The minister added that the latest delay was due to changes made following findings from a recent impact assessment of the cuts.
An impact assessment conducted in July last year suggested that the government should reduce foreign investment. aid spending We will likely see global deaths increase as confirmed blackouts will fall disproportionately women and girls Training and projects across Africa.
This article was produced as part of The Independent. Rethinking Global Aid project
