MORE AND BETTER AID

Poverty will not be eradicated without an immediate and major increase in international aid. Rich countries have promised to provide the extra money needed to meet internationally agreed poverty reduction targets. This amounts to at least £28 billion per year, according to the United Nations, and must be delivered now. As industrialised countries have grown richer over recent decades, the proportion of their wealth that they spend on helping people in poorer countries has decreased. In 1970, most industrialised countries promised to spend 0.7% of their national income on international aid. 35 years on, most are spending only a fraction of what they promised. The UK does not plan to spend 0.7% of its income on aid until 2013. As well as more aid, we need better aid – aid that is targeted at meeting poor people’s basic needs, such as healthcare and education.
Aid should no longer be tied to a requirement to buy goods or services from the donor country. And it should not be conditional on recipients promising economic change like privatising or deregulating their services, cutting health and education spending or opening up their markets to competition. These are unfair practices that have never been proven to reduce poverty.