IMF to MDGs summit: Scaling up aid is not a good idea

Monday, 30 August 2010 00:00

by Rick Rowden

A new IMF Working Paper is sending a chilling message to those preparing for the upcoming MDGs Summit at the United Nations in New York this September 2010.  Echoing a long running theme at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the new research finds that it is best for countries to not spend any new increases of foreign aid and instead to just stockpile the aid as reserves. It suggests that until countries can use their aid in the most efficient way, some day, they should put much of it aside as foreign exchange reserves in their central banks. The de facto message to donors is very clear: No need to scale-up aid.

Read more: IMF to MDGs summit: Scaling up aid is not a good idea

Conditionality in world Bank crisis lending to Ghana

Thursday, 12 August 2010 10:07

BetterAid coordinating group member Eurodad released a new report “Conditionality in World Bank crisis-lending to Ghana” on July 29th which finds that conditions for receiving loans are increasingly “being pushed through the side door” instead of being outlined in the loan agreements, keeping Low Income Countries under the influence of the Bank.

The paper points out that “such a development is of concern, as it decreases transparency over the reforms required by the Ghanaian government to be able to access development finance by the World Bank”. The report concludes that the Bank should give countries increased ownership and input into decisions about how to go about economic recovery in order to achieve a more sustainable development pathway.

Read “Conditionality in World Bank crisis-lending to Ghana”

Establishing a standard for aid transparency

Written by Craig Fagan, Transparency international

The creation of a common standard for publishing how much and for what donors are giving countries is one step closer to becoming a reality. The International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI), set up by donors in September 2008 at the Third High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness, has managed to secure agreement from its 18 donor signatories to roll-out the first of three phases of standardised information on their aid flows. The first phase must be implemented by all signatories before the next High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan (Korea) in December 2011. These decisions were taken by signatories on 7 July in Paris ahead of the Working Party on Aid Effectiveness.

Read more: Establishing a standard for aid transparency

Why the World bank is ill fitted for climate finance

Written by Nora Honkaniemi Tuesday, 13 April 2010 23:00

In the context of the Copenhagen Accord and the collective commitment by developed countries to provide resources approaching $30 billion in fast start financing for the period 2010-2012, Eurodad notes with concern, that many contributing countries have expressed support for the World Bank as a channel for climate finance.

Read more: Why the World bank is ill fitted for climate finance