The EU and aid to developing countries

I am always interested to read about aid to developing countries. This is because for three decades at the United Nations I was in the midst of the aid debate and participated in the development of the institutions that were supposed to make this aid more effective.

During my first years at the UN I was lucky to meet some of the most important personalities who formed part of the intellectual aspect of this debate, including Hans Singer and Tom Vietorisz. The latter was an adviser to Raul Prebisch, the eminent Latin American economist, major exponent of what is known in economic literature as the theory of terms of trade which showed principally that trade between "unequals" tends to be more beneficial to the stronger partner. One could therefore conclude that for trade to be beneficial to the poor countries, such countries had to be helped to reach a stage of development to make them meaningful partners in international trade and, therefore, it was important to level the playing field as soon as possible. International aid, supplemented by bilateral aid, was supposed to give this opportunity to the undeveloped countries to become real partners in international economic relations.

This was easier said than done and aid to developing countries fell much below expectations, both in quantity and quality. Aid, whether from international or bilateral sources, had to be financed by the rich developed countries. International or multilateral aid was preferred because it was supposed to be free from political interference or, to use the correct terminology, "untied". This aspect of aid was always controversial as even international aid through multilateral sources like the UN was never really "untied". There were always strings attached, dictated by some donors.

During my earlier years as a hands-on practitioner of aid to developing countries (it was during those years that it was no longer considered correct to refer to the recipients of aid or technical cooperation as underdeveloped countries) I was encouraged to study and to try to find a reason or reasons for the failure of aid. The UN was showing in its studies that the more aid given, the more the number of least developed countries increased. In other words, poverty in the world was increasing and aid or technical cooperation did not seem to help.

In addition to being able to see the aid projects on the ground in many developing countries I had access to the documentation since the beginning of the UN's technical assistance programme. I spent a little under 10 years analysing the documents and talking to professionals both at headquarters and on the field, in many poor countries.

I presented some of the results in a PhD dissertation in 1978, which concluded that technical cooperation and aid as it was being offered to developing countries was part of the problem of under-development and not part of the solution.

I continued to monitor the effects of aid and technical cooperation as part of my work until I left the UN in 1994 and still continue to follow up developments to the present day hoping to see some encouraging signs.

It therefore comes as no surprise that I was interested in what Joanna Drake (October 24 and December 7) and Klaus Vella Bardon (November 15) had to say on the matter.

I wanted to take issue with Dr Drake's statement (October 24) that Europe will go on proving that it is part of the solution rather than being the problem, since it goes entirely against the conclusions of my study. Granted my study covered all ODA (overseas development assistance) and not only the EU part, but as she aptly points out the EU is the biggest donor and it always had been a major factor in ODA, whether as a group or as individual member countries.

I was glad I did not take issue with her because Dr Vella Bardon did a better job than I would have done. Of course, I do not subscribe to everything he said, particularly to the strong language he used in saying it. But, in general, his position on aid echoes the findings of my study and other empirical evidence which followed.

I think that Dr Drake's second article (December 7) did more damage to the reputation of the EU than if she had not reacted at all to what Dr Vella Bardon had to say.

Unfortunately, the facts she gave did not contradict the bleak picture painted by Dr Vella Bardon. It is true that the EU is doing more than most. But is that enough? Is that its fair share? Does she disagree with the position of the European Commissioner for Development and Humanitarian Affairs and Malta's Foreign Minister (September 14) that the EU "... should do more and better... not as an act of charity but out of enlightened self-interest"?

Dr Drake states that the EU "... will take no lessons from anyone on market access to the developing world". This position seems to be at odds with the numerous number of countries criticising the EU at WTO for not making further cuts to its farm tariffs and subsidies and will certainly not help the Trade Commissioner, who has been saying that the EU is only making limited progress in spite of working hard but not finding the solutions all the time.

Finally, I could not believe Dr Drake's statement that the EU's political leadership was key to the success of the UN summit. The "success" of the UN summit has been universally questioned as it failed to deliver on its two major objectives, namely the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and UN reform.

Some things are better left unsaid.