After months of speculation, the
Australian government finally shed some light and provided details to its
foreign aid cuts — a dreaded and long-awaited clarification for several local
and international NGOs dependent on these funds to continue their development
work.
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| Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop |
The specifics,
announced on Saturday by the country’s foreign affairs and trade ministry,
revealed an almost AU$650 million (about $571 million) slash to the official
development assistance budget, affecting several bilateral and multilateral
development assistance programs — with Africa and the Middle East suffering the
biggest blow with a 39 percent reduction to almost AU$200 million this year,
from AU$329 million the past year.
This move to cut ODA to some of the
poorest nations in the world, according to a local NGO alliance, is a true
disappointment.
“We are disappointed with the
government’s announcement of where the cuts will fall. This is not merely
number crunching in attempt to find a budget surplus. It is the world’s poorest
people — in many of Australia’s neighboring countries — who will feel the
brunt of these decisions,” Joanna Lindner Pradela, acting executive director of
the Australian
Coalition for International Development, told Devex.
Despite Foreign Minister Julie
Bishop’s promise for renewed strategic focus on Asia-Pacific, regional
development assistance earmarked for these nations dropped by 0.3 percent to
$2.24 billion from $2.25 billion. Of the three sub-regions, only East and
Southeast Asian nations got increased funding to $1.03 billion from $977.4
million. Both the Pacific and South and West Asia generally declined to $882.2
million and $332.8 million, respectively.
The overall budget is over $5 billion,
with an increase rate pegged to the country’s Consumer Price Index to ensure
that Australians and the rest of the world will get the most effective outcomes
from the aid coffers, noted Bishop.
The announcement came at the heels of
several drastic changes made by the government in its four-month tenure in
office under Prime Minister Tony Abbott, including the integration of AusAID into the foreign
affairs ministry and the dissolution of the AusAID graduate program, to name a
few — which the opposition Labour party consider another blow to the future of
Australia’s international development commitments.
“I am concerned about these cuts.
First, it highlighted the fact that the Abbott government does not regard
helping the poorest nations as a priority,” MP for Canberra Gai Brodtmann told
Devex. “Not only did it cut the agency responsible for foreign aid and the
AusAID graduate program, preventing dozens of talented young Australians from
beginning their careers on foreign aid, it also cut vital aid to its very own
region.”
She added: “I’m concerned about what
these cuts will mean to Afghanistan which is relying on foreign aid to ensure
stability as it transitions. I’m also concerned what it will mean to women and
children to protect them from violence, to ensure they have access to education
and to provide them with financial independence.”
Budget for humanitarian and emergency
response was also cut by 16 percent to $137.4 million from $163.3 million the
past year. This is amid occurrence of some of the most devastating disasters in
recent memory that requires humanitarian aid including Haiyan in the Philippines.
Aid cut details: Literally a glimpse
Although the details have been
announced, local and international NGOs agree the numbers don’t say much on the
ground level — they are just a glimpse or a single pixel of the whole
Australian aid picture.
Brodtmann said the concern is still
uncertainty, as humanitarian groups are still in the dark whether they will
continue to receive money for the next 12 months or they have to start making
contingency plans and, worse, lay off staff and close shop.
International groups like World Vision,
Oxfam, CARE and Plan
International were unanimous in saying the announcement is a big
setback to Australia’s international development endeavors and lacks several
crucial details that may be detrimental, not only to their operations, but also
to the development of the people they are helping.
“There has been an overall
announcement of the real occasions on the basis of country and sector. That
represents refocusing towards the Asia-Pacific region, predominantly, and some
are refocusing away from multilateral institutions,” Andrew Johnson, World
Vision Australia head of government relations, told Devex. “But there are
plenty of data still needed to emerge on the program level. We certainly have
more details now than the last 3 or 4 months but there are still more things to
clarify.”
CARE Australia spokesperson Tom Perry
added: “While we seek further details on the nature of these cuts to the
2013-2014 funding, we know that will be required to make a number of difficult
and urgent decisions about programs which may be affected by these cuts.”
NGO wounds were cut deeper with the
release of the details, considering the government’s pre-election promise of
not cutting their assistance. The budget to increase the fight against climate
change and environmental programs was sucked dry — from $17 million to
$500,000. Contribution to global environment programs, on the other hand, is
now nothing compared to $74.6 million under the previous administration.
World Vision Australia saw 7 percent
or $3 million of their core funding partnership with the government called the
Australian-NGO Cooperation Program gone. And this is just the start of the long
list of local and international groups under the guillotine.
“Prior to the election, this
government committed reprioritizing aid funding to Australian NGOs, in
recognition of their experience and track record of effectively working to
assist many of the world’s poorest communities tackle extreme poverty head on,”
said Pradela. “Yet in the government’s announcement, many of these agencies
have also been subject to cuts.”
Priorities in the balance
Bishop explained the way the budget is
structured is to ensure it is focused on alleviating poverty, economic growth,
empowering women and girls, better educational outcomes and better health
outcomes which will make Australians proud — an idea NGOs are not quite
convinced about.
Given the announcement, Johnson
stressed the government’s clear priority is strategic economic development at
the expense of Australia’s responsibility to be a leading figure in
international development.
“We’ve been particularly concerned
about the priorities of the Abbott government on foreign aid. The aid budget
had significant reductions over the forward estimates. Many of the savings in
the budget in the past two years have come from aid,” he explained. “We still
think there’s a great need in Africa and we think Australia has a big role to
play in the region in relation to aid, so we still want greater investment in
Africa despite the government has made Asia-Pacific a priority.”
Senator Penny Wong, acting shadow
minister for foreign affairs and international development, concluded in a
statement that the Abbott government’s cuts put at risk both the aid program’s
goal of enhancing global prosperity and Australia’s own security.
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