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Shaping policy for development

An overview of Lagoro IDP camp in Kitgum District, northern Uganda, 20 May 2007. Manoocher Deghati/IRIN
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ODI On... UK Department for International Development (DFID) 2009 White Paper

6 July 2009 00:00 - 23:59



The UK White Paper on International Development has been launched amid global financial crisis and recession. With most eyes on the UK domestic situation, the White Paper set out the Government's stall on global poverty eradication.



Three key themes emerged, all of them of interest to ODI.



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Overview
Outputs

Trade and the White Paper

Opinion - Articles and blogs - 8 July 2009
The new White Paper on international development raises concerns that trade may be slipping through the cracks of UK development policy. The transformation of the old Overseas Development Administration into a Department for International Development was meant to signal that the UK recognised that aid was not the only way to promote development. Promoting good trade policy towards developing countries was an essential part of the new Department.
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Dirk Willem te Velde

Providing the global public goods for crisis-resilient growth: the DFID White Paper

Opinion - Articles and blogs - 7 July 2009
The UK Government White Paper on International Development, published yesterday, is positive about the need for resilient economic growth strategies in developing countries and examines how global public goods -- which everyone enjoys – can support these strategies. These global public goods include, for example, a clean environment, global economic and social governance, and knowledge on economic policies.

The White Paper comes as the world faces the greatest recession since the 1930s.

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Walking the line between morality and pragmatism

Opinion - Articles and blogs - 5 July 2009
The UK Government today launched its latest White Paper on International Development. Set against a crowded domestic and international policy agenda, and released just before the Parliamentary recess, some might say there couldn’t be a worse time for a White Paper on development to make its mark. The other view is that the moment is critical; that with the effects of the financial crisis and recession taking hold, and a public sense that the UK has troubles enough without focusing its attention abroad, this is a time to re-commit boldly to global poverty eradication.
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Overview

The UK White Paper on International Development has been launched, amid global financial crisis and recession. With most eyes on the UK domestic situation, the White Paper set out the Government's stall on global poverty eradication.

Three key themes emerged, all of them of interest to ODI:

  • Interdependence; the acknowledgement that the success and security of others has a profound effect on our own. The global financial crisis has proved this interdependence, with financial turmoil in one part of the world proving a strong catalyst for economic turmoil almost everywhere else.
  • Fragile states. This is the first White Paper since 1997 to prioritise the challenge of development in conflict-affected and fragile contexts. The White Paper stresses that doing development as ‘business as usual’ in these contexts is an exercise in futility, and emphasises security, justice and economic development.
  • Climate change. The White Paper stresses the importance of leadership from rich countries to stop climate change becoming a development disaster for poor countries. The challenge is to ensure that climate commitments made at the UN climate change meeting in Copenhagen later this year are far reaching and binding enough.

The White Paper, launched in the same week as the G-8 meeting in Italy, touches on all of the issues outlined by ODI in its Development Charter for the G-20 earlier this year. This stated that leaders of rich nations cannot deliver development, but they can create the climate that makes lasting development possible. The White Paper makes it clear that the UK sees its responsibility – can it convince other G-8 countries of theirs?