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The Commitment to Development Index (produced annually
since 2003 by the Washington-based Center
for Global Development) ranks the policies of 21 donor nations
in terms of their compatibility or coherence with the goal of promoting
development in the Global South. In the 2006
CDI, the UK came twelfth out of 21 countries, scoring best on
investment and worst on security. The 2007 Index will be launched
on 10 October.
Aid matters, and is part of the Index, but the scope of the ranking
extends beyond aid to include policies relating to trade, investment,
migration, the environment, security and technology. The Index is
intended to stimulate debate about policies, and ultimately to lead
governments in the developed world to make their policies more coherent
around development objectives. It poses challenging questions for
governments about priorities and the best ways to ensure cross-departmental
working.
This briefing on the day of the launch provided an opportunity to
discuss the 2007 results with the Index designers and key figures
from the UK and international policy arenas.
To read more about the Commitment to Development Index, please visit:
http://www.cgdev.org/section/initiatives/_active/cdi
Meeting Report
John Battle MP, in the chair, introduced the speakers and noted
that the Commitment to Development Index (CDI) has been launched
annually since 2003, by the Washington-based Center for Global Development
(CGD). Its aim is to rank the policies of 21 donor nations in terms
of their compatibility with the goal of promoting development. The
UK was ranked 12th out of 21 in 2006, and scored best on investment
but poorly on security. Today, the UK's 2007 ranking would be revealed
for the first time.
David Roodman, Research Fellow, Center for Global Development
In describing the aims of the CDI, David Roodman explained
that development assistance is usually analysed in terms of ODA
levels as a percentage of GNI, however it is also important to look
also at how aid is spent. In aaddition, rich and poor countries
are linked in many ways, so an assessment of other policy areas
is also necessary.
After describing how each of the indicators is constructed,
Roodman presented the UK's
scores out of ten for each of the seven policy areas covered
by the index:
- Environment: 7.5
- Aid: 4.8
- Trade: 5.5
- Investment: 8.1
- Migration: 3.0
- Security: 5.2
- Technology: 4.3
- Overall: 5.5
Overall, the UK is ranked ninth out of 21 countries. The Nordic
countries and the Netherlands came top, due to substantial aid giving,
investment and peacekeeping efforts. With regard to aid giving,
the US and Japan are at the bottom. Focussing on the UK, Roodman
said there was not a lot to note regarding trends over the last
four years, but the UK has improved marginally, mainly due to investment
and its leadership of the extractive industries' transparency initiative,
to combat bribery in the mining industry.
The US ranked poorly overall and Roodman said it was disappointing
that it had not chosen to assume the role of a global leader. It
fared particularly badly in the aid and environment categories.
Roodman also pointed out that five of the G7 countries are in the
bottom half of the table, with the UK and Canada being the exceptions
to this. The UK was exemplary, he said, and other countries should
look to emulate its performance.
Roodman explained that correlating a country's performance in the
CDI with its level of democracy, shows that those who did well in
the CDI also tended to be the 'most democratic' countries. This
was definitely the case for Sweden, Denmark, Norway and the Netherlands.
Gareth Thomas MP, Under Secretary of State for International
Development, DFID
Gareth Thomas MP started by stating that launching the UK's
2007 CDI rankings in London provided an opportunity for a wider
and broader discussion amongst the international development community
about the importance of non-aid policies in development. In the
UK, this discussion is more advanced than in many other countries
because of the requirement for DFID to report more rigorously on
non-aid policies.
Thomas highlighted a number of areas covered by the CDI where the
UK is already making progress or taking action. For example, on
climate change, the UK has committed nearly £800m for
the Environmental Transformation Fund and a further £74m to
build developing countries own capacities to understand the effects
of climate change. On trade, as well as pressing for progress
in the Doha round and for pushing for better terms for developing
countries in relation to Economic Partnership Agreements, the government
has also reformed internally to build policy coherence by sharing
trade issues across DFID and the Dept for Business, Enterprise and
Regulatory Reform (BERR), as well as forming a new cabinet committee
which will oversee government work on trade. On security,
Thomas noted that the ranking reflects the security of the state
rather than the security of the individual. He felt that security
is a pre-requisite for development and that when ordinary people
feel threatened, development slowed down or even reversed. The UK
has therefore increased the development budget at DFID and in other,
related departments
Thomas noted in conclusion that the key message of the 2007 CDI
was the need for stronger partnerships between rich and poor countries.
The EU is a key partner to many developing countries, but there
is still a need to strengthen EU development efforts, both centrally,
and at the country-level. There is also a need to bring together
the issues of security and development and to reignite enthusiasm
to make progress on the MDGs. 2008 offers many opportunities to
make this case even more strongly than in 2005.
Faizel Ismail, Head, South African Delegation to the WTO, Geneva
Mr Ismail explained that his presentation would start with his
interpretation of the meaning of 'development'; then place this
in the context of the WTO and trade; and then extend it to the other
areas examined by the CDI.
Drawing his inspiration from Amartya Sen's description of development
as 'the removal of unfreedoms', Ismail observed that there are four
areas where trade policy must be improved in order to promote development:
- Fair trade: This is the provision of developing countries
with opportunities to export to rich countries.
- Capacity building: All parties have the responsibility
to ensure that developing countries have the capacity to produce
and export and to ensure poorest countries benefit from opportunities.
- Balanced rules: The rules of the international trading
system need to be balanced.
- Good Governance: The participation of developing countries
should be ensured so they engage in negotiating rules in a fair
and democratic manner.
Ismail then extended the first concept - fair trade - to three
of the policy areas examined by the CDI: migration, the environment
and security:
a. Fair trade and migration: The temporary movement of people
is on the WTO trade negotiation agenda. Remittances are providing
greater resources than ODA in many cases. Of the 20 countries receiving
substantial remittances, this accounts for up to 10% of GDP, and
in the case of Lesotho, remittances account for 25%. The CDI can
be used as a tool to analyse the broader effects of migration for
many countries.
b. Fair trade and the environment: High levels of trade
which act to distort agricultural subsides degrades the environment
in developed countries. Moreover, high levels of poverty in poor
countries is a major cause of unsustainable livelihoods and degradation
of the environment.. The US, for example, has high tariffs on bio
fuels. Negotiations offer an opportunity to advance the demands
of developing countries for technology transfer rather than continuing
dependence on technologies from rich countries. The CDI could be
used as a tool to raise awareness for the need for greater policy
coherence with regard to this specific issue.
c. Fair trade and security: Ismail observed that increased
opportunities for trading can lead to peace and security between
countries, whereas protectionism can lead to conflict. The post
World War II Marshall Plan was partly instigated to ensure that
Western Europe engaged in multilateral trade rather than protectionism.
The CDI could be used to facilitate further discussions about coherence
between trade, aid and security policies.
On, balanced rules for trading, Ismail stated that the demands
of foreign investors for access to developing country markets should
be mediated by Corporate Social Responsibility standards, technology
transfer and empowerment of local entrepreneurs. These issues were
on the agendas of fora such as World Economic Forum (WEF). This
was another area where the CDI could be used to promote greater
policy coherence.
On good governance Ismail highlighted that the 1944 Bretton Woods
conference, which created the World Bank (WB) and International
Monetary Fund (IMF), and envisaged an International Trade Organisation,
but this never came to fruition. Ironically today after its formation
in 1995, the WTO can boast a greater amount of participation and
inclusiveness from developing countries in decision-making than
either the IMF or WB. This makes developed country demands for better
governance in developing countries sound hollow. The CDI could extend
its current range of policy areas to include commitment to democracy
and good governance, both at home and within international institutions.
Discussion
The discussion covered a wide range of issues, most relating to
the methodology of the index itself. For example, answering a question
about the methodology used to build the CDI, Roodman noted that
most of the indicators that are used are quantitative, and are taken
from standard data sources such as the World Bank and OECD. Very
little data is based on judgement alone. The index was also criticised
for not penalising countries which undertake unilateral military
interventions. Gareth Thomas mentioned that the number of countries
involved in international military and humanitarian interventions
is few and that the US contribution in Afghanistan and Iraq was
crucial to improve security in those areas. In relation to whether
an EU index would be developed, Roodman noted that while it might
make sense in an area like trade in terms of policy coherence, but
on migration, for example, member states formulate their own policies.
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