Click to enlarge: Austria's aid at a glance
Source: OECD/DAC Peer Review of „Austrian Development Cooperation“
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The "Equestrian Hall" of the "Oesterreichische Kontrollbank AG" was crowded on the afternoon of July 6th when Eckhard Deutscher, Chairman of the Development Assistance Committee (OECD-DAC) started to present the results of the peer review of the Austrian Development Assistance. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs was represented by the head of the section VII, Ms. Irene Freudenschuss-Reichl, the Austrian Development Agency (ADA) by Ambassador Brigitte Öppinger-Walchshofer and the ÖFSE (Österreichische Forschungsstiftung für Internationale Entwicklung) by Andreas Novy and Michael Obrovsky.
The OECD/DAC peer review takes place every four years and is eagerly awaited by representatives of all different stakeholders within the development cooperation community. It is not only about the peer review results and therefore the evaluation of "one's work" within the entire context but also about fundamental recommendations for the future. The implementation of the recommendations is not binding, and there are no mechanisms of sanctions. Nevertheless the results can be seen as indicators for the quality of the Austrian Development Assistance in comparison to other European countries.
In the following paper we try to outline specific aspects of the report that are important for Development Research in general and for the KEF's tasks in particular.
Of course, as constantly complained, there is too little money to realize efficient investments in development. In the new Austrian budget the Official Development Assistance (ODA) has decreased and will reach no more than 0.42% of the Gross National Income (GNI). The increase in recent years was mainly caused by debt relief - for example up to 52% of the entire ODA in the year 2007. "Excluding dept relief, Austria`s 2007 ODA/GNI ratio would have been 0.24%, lower than the DAC average (0.26%)." (OECD/DAC Peer Review Austria 2009, p.12). Although the federal government has renewed the commitment to meet the EU minimum target of 0.51% of the GNI allocated to ODA in 2010 we are far from reaching this goal. Eckhard Deutscher therefore has criticized the Austrian policy of containing "empty promises".
Click to enlarge: Trends in Austria's ODA, EUR million
Source: OECD/DAC Peer Review der „Österreichischen Entwicklungszusammenarbeit“
Another major problem is that Austria's programmable aid, excluding food, aid, humanitarian aid and NGO core funding - is just about 10% of the total gross ODA (2006) and that "at least" eight ministries are responsible for the distribution of the entire ODA. Beside the demand for more financial resources - Eckhard Deutscher claims between 500 and 800 million (Währung fehlt - euros?) each year - a fundamental deficit regarding clear institutionalized policy coherence for development is also noted. Although an inter-ministerial working group on coherence has been established and informal consultations are held it remains unclear "...which issues of coherence or incoherence are brought before cabinet and how." (OECD/DAC Peer Review Austria 2009, p.11) The capacities of Development Research could help to amend these weaknesses as suggested by the report: "By mandating a policy coherence unit, Austria could both improve analytical and monitoring capacity within the government and outsource policy coherence research to universities and research institutes in Austria, internationally, and in priority countries." (OECD/DAC Peer Review Austria 2009, p.11)
The committee has clearly designated the responsibility of the entire federal government for the area of development cooperation. The government Faymann-Pröll is now required to ensure consistency with other policy areas. Overall, Austria, as previously mentioned, is strongly recommended to implement a comprehensive and consistent strategy for development cooperation and humanitarian assistance. Since decisions in one policy area have an inevitable impact on other policy areas they cannot be isolated. Development policy coherence is therefore only possible if measures in other policy areas such as trade, economic, financial or foreign policy support efforts to promote sustainable development and eradicate poverty and do not thwart them.
Click to enlarge: Austria's Aid System
Source: OECD/DAC Peer Review of „Austrian Development Cooperation“
Development Research should also play a bigger role in monitoring and evaluation processes. Eckhard Deutscher pointed out that evaluation - in particular the evaluation department of Division VII/Ministry for Foreign Affairs - should be strengthened to meet the political responsibility as stated in the Federal Act on Development Co-operation (2002, amended in 2003). Analytical competence is also required to draft a clear profile of Austrian strategic approaches in the future and to prepare a medium-term development policy, including Austria's commitment to implement the Paris Declaration principles. Although public support for helping poor people in developing countries is high (77%), Austrian solidarity does not translate into political support for development.
What is also criticized is the lack of political support for the important concerns of international development cooperation. The OECD notes the debates in parliament. This lack of political discussion is in contrast to the tradition of solidarity in the population.
Including Austrian Development Research in designing strategic concepts and actual evaluation and monitoring processes will also help to find new ways of engaging parliamentarians and a broader public in an informed debate about aid and development issues.
It was interesting to discover that DAC plans a 2-year cycle to review their members' development co-operation activities. This procedure would ensure a continuous feedback-process. It was said that a "new instrument" - a so-called "country assessment" - ought to be implemented, which would be a great thing in the perspective of participatory development co-operation. The "behaviour" and the development policies of "donor countries" could be critically surveyed by teams from the partner countries in the "south". The report mentions positively the reporting system and the processing of statistical data related to development issues: "Austria has made exceptional progress in reporting to DAC`s Creditor Reporting System the aid activities of all ministries involved in development …" (OECD/DAC Peer Review Austria 2009, p.13)
It is a sad fact that the Millennium Development Goals won't be achieved by 2015. The financial crisis and its impact on "real global economies" have destroyed the last optimistic hopes for a worldwide struggle to eliminate the extreme poverty of the so-called "bottom billion" - the poorest of the poor, who will increase by about at least 100 million in the year 2009 as has been predicted by the World Bank's Global Monitoring Report in April this year (http://www.worldbank.org/). The International Monetary Fund has recently published that grants, liquidity and guarantees to rescue the financial institution in the G20 countries had already reached 43.1% of the entire G20 Gross National Income by February this year. In comparison to the actual ODA proportion of 0.30% of the GNI this ratio means that a fictitious development aid for 142 years has been spent, just in a couple of months, by the most powerful national economies to get rid of the threatening effects of the crisis. But -contrary to neo-liberal thinking: "it's not only money that makes the world go round!" It seems anachronistic to us to relate effective development policies only to cash and budgets because it should be and it is much more than that. Development policies touch our concepts of living standards, our lifestyles and attitudes, our way of thinking about the world as a unity and our approach to prosperity and poverty.
The current crisis shows us what tremendous global efforts can be made to avoid the breakdown of complex societal, financial and administrative systems. Since the UN World Conference in Rio '92 it has become obvious that it is not possible to solve the threatening ecological problems without reducing worldwide poverty and its resulting problems - such as migration, violence, destruction of natural resources, wars, etc. So let's turn the pessimistic predictions around and follow a more optimistic path: If the global efforts in managing the current economic crises can be seen as a test run to solve interdependent and interconnected worldwide problems, there might be a chance to get the other most crucial global problems also addressed in a more caring way by politicians, governments and trans-national political regimes. Of course the public pressure and the claims of civil society have to become more visible and powerful.
Click to enlarge: Austrian ODA with Environment and Rio markers (2005-2007)
Source: OECD/DAC Peer Review der „Österreichischen Entwicklungszusammenarbeit“
At the end of his presentation Eckhard Deutscher, chairman of the OECD/Development Assistance Committee, touched these levels of global development discourses. He spoke about six axiomatic, system-related crucial problems that need to get solved during the 21st century to ensure the lives of upcoming generations and to define the framework of a stable, sustainable global development: worldwide financial stability, strong actions against climate change and environmental destructions, the fight against hunger, change of energy supply - from fossil-based economies to economies based on renewable energy systems, the fight against extreme poverty and the prevention of uncontrolled migration movements by making living worthwhile for any inhabitant on our planet. The development research addresses, in particular, these fields of global problems, crisis and transformation processes. The national development co-operation should be seen not only as an aid or ethical commitment to poverty reduction but as a main contributor to raise the awareness of the most important global tasks and as an instrument to provide systematic solutions and effective help for structural weaknesses and injustices. Following this path scientific development research and research for development are definitely indispensable for a more effective development co-operation in the future.
Also the committee requires a stronger link between development cooperation and humanitarian assistance.
Development cooperation has recently docked to more and more humanitarian projects but they are still separate budgetary areas so far. The support by humanitarian assistance is available to all countries whereas that of development cooperation is limited to Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Refugee, famine, disaster and humanitarian assistance is short term. Its aim is to alleviate the impact of natural disasters and wars quickly and to improve the current living conditions. The humanitarian assistance is usually followed by the development cooperation as a so-called reconstruction aid, which is, unlike humanitarian aid, long-term, pursues sustainable goals and intends to produce structural changes.
--> Download of the report: OECD/DAC Peer Review of „Austrian Development Cooperation“ , 2009  1876 kb
--> Link to OECD Development Centre: http://www.oecd.org/dev
--> Link to webportal of Austrian Development Cooperation: http://www.entwicklung.at
--> Link to OEFSE: http://www.oefse.at
--> Download OEZA: Three-Year Programme on Austrian Development Policy 2008–2010 309 kb
--> Download OEZA: OEZA-report 2007, Part 1 7345 kb (German only!)
--> Download OEZA: OEZA-report 2007, Part 2 294 kb (German only!)
--> Download §§§: Austrian federal law on development cooperation, 2002 and 2003 166 kb (German only!)
--> MDG: KEF portal site on the MDGs
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