AU fears donors will cut financial aid following global crisis

Kikwete said at a press conference in the Malagasy capital that Africa now urged donor nations not to cut back aid for Africa.

"Our appeal to our development partners is that they should not cut aid to the developing countries" now that America and Europe were experiencing a financial crisis, he said.

He added the AU remained hopeful the crisis would "not impact negatively on development assistance to Africa."

Madagascar's President Marc Ravalomanana, hosting a meeting with Kikwete, at the same occasion added that donors should at least stick to the pledges given until now, despite the expected economic turndown in their countries.

Being realistic, he however urged his fellow Africans to act fast to become more independent from international aid, especially focusing on agricultural development to safeguard food security.

The fear of donors retreating from Africa had been one of the major issues discussed between Presidents Kikwete and Ravalomanana in a meeting that otherwise focused on the preparation on the 2009 AU Summit in Antananarivo.

Tanzania has special reasons to fear a lower donor engagement, being one of the countries worldwide depending most on foreign aid. Aid makes up an estimated 20 percent of Tanzania's budget and 10 percent of its GDP.

The AU chairman's fears are well founded. According to Oxfam's Elizabeth Stuart, during the last globally financial downturn, from 1990 to 1993, "we saw donors cut aid by 25 percent," she told 'VOA'.

Stuart warns if this were to happen again during the upcoming crisis, at a time when poor countries are also being hit by their own food price crisis as well, this could "really spell disaster for developing countries, so this absolutely needs to be the very last thing that they do."

But the trend of cutting in aid to Africa to address urgent problems in donor countries is already established.

The first major donor country to reduce its development aid pledges was Spain; the European country worst hit by the collapse in the property market and now experiencing a spiralling unemployment rate.

Ireland was the second big donor to follow, also following a national economic recession.

These two European countries are headed by governments sincerely dedicated to Africa's development and international solidarity.

Observers fear that other donor countries are set to follow, from the small donor Iceland, which is hardest struck by the financial crisis, to giant donors like the US, the UK and Germany.

These top-three donors do have a tradition of cutting back their aid when times get tough domestically.

Therefore there is little comfort in the fact that medium-sized donor Norway this week announced an increase in its aid budget for 2009, most of it however going to environmental projects in the Amazon.

According to an analysis in the monthly development magazine 'African Future', "there are therefore few signs that Western nations will fulfil their pledges to aid Africa to reach the Millennium Development Goals - pledges that have be postponed several times and were only expected to reach their full size by 2009-10."

Malagasy President Ravalomanana therefore might be right urging African leaders to start looking for alternatives for self-sufficiency rather now than later.

Article published courtesy of BuaNews.