Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 23 September 2009
8 Deputy John Deasy asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if he will freeze funding of overseas development aid at current levels and give an undertaking that there will be no further cuts in the ODA budget in the lifetime of the Government. [31759/09]
Amharc ar fhreagraIreland has an enviable and impressive record on funding overseas development assistance, ODA. Our progress up the league table of development donors has been realised through a combination of strong economic growth and our desire to move in a planned manner towards the UN target of spending 0.7% of GNP on ODA. This approach has served Ireland's development assistance programme well.
The aid figures clearly demonstrate just how successful our approach has been. In the past six years alone Ireland has contributed well in excess of €4 billion to ODA. The annual development aid budget more than trebled between 2000 and 2008. In the same period, we almost doubled our share of GNP spent on ODA from 0.3% to 0.59%. In 2008, Ireland's total spending on the development assistance programme was €920 million, or approximately 0.59% of GNP. This made Ireland the sixth most generous donor in the world on a per capita basis, an impressive achievement of which we can all be justifiably proud. The total budget for ODA in 2009 is expected to reach €696 million. Based on current projections, this will represent at least 0.48% of GNP. This means that Ireland will remain one of the most generous donors in the world on a per capita basis.
I fully recognise that the reduction in the 2009 ODA budget has been significant. However, this necessary but regrettable decision was made solely in the context of the exceptional economic situation the country currently faces. Our sole objective is to assist in stabilising the public finances to establish a solid platform for renewed economic growth. This is the only secure and sustainable way for Ireland to meet its commitments to ODA.
The Estimates process that will lead to the introduction of the budget in December is under way. No decisions have yet been made in respect of the aid budget for 2010. As the Deputy will be aware, these are difficult times and there are many competing and deserving demands for scarce resources. However, our aid programme must be protected to the maximum possible extent achievable in the current circumstances. I cannot provide an undertaking in respect of the exact figure for development assistance for 2010 in advance of the budget, which is the prerogative of the Minister for Finance and the Government. However, the Deputy may rest assured that the Minister for Foreign Affairs and I will make the strongest possible case for the aid programme as part of the Estimates process.
The Minister of State referred to planning. I have been informed by NGOs that they cannot make plans. They are making people redundant in the programme countries and cannot plan ahead in respect of their programmes. The ambassadors who have come before the sub-committee indicate that they are breaking the commitments they made in these countries.
The other Minister of State present, Deputy Roche, referred earlier to attracting reputational damage by making cuts too severe. The question that arises revolves around the point at which we will incur massive reputational damage in the programme countries by breaking our commitments in respect of aid. I accept that the country is facing into extremely uncertain economic times. However, our ambassadors, their staff and the NGOs that we fund require a degree of certainty so that they might continue the life-and-death work they are doing. There will come a point when the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Power, will be obliged to make a case to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and the Cabinet to the effect that the damage we will do by making further cuts will in turn lead to our incurring major reputational damage in the programme countries.
I accept the Deputy's point that it is difficult for NGOs to plan ahead. It is extremely difficult to plan our budget for 2010 now because we simply do not know the Exchequer returns for October and November. In view of the unpredictable nature of the financial and economic crisis the world faces, we are finding it difficult to make plans across every Department and in respect of the economy as a whole. In January we made a significant, up-front payment of 70% of the entire funding for the MAPS partners — our largest partners — for the year to try to confer on them a degree of certainty in an extremely unpredictable environment.
The targets relating to ODA are expected to be reached over a period of many years. It would be well nigh impossible to reach those targets in a uniform and linear fashion, even in an ideal and predictable economic cycle. We are not in such a cycle at present. Rather, we are in the middle of an unpredictable period. The Government must take a long-term view and state that these targets are expressed over a period of many years. The question we must answer is how we can achieve those targets in a way which will ensure that our programmes remain sustainable. In addition, we must also balance our efforts against the reputational damage that might be incurred by the country. Such damage would be far worse if we allowed the country slide into the type of situation which obtained in the 1980s when we did not confront our difficulties in a timely manner.
