Budget support makes up 17 percent of total aid to the Pacific, double the global average.
The statistic surprised attendees at Thursday’s 2015 Pacific Update conference in Fiji, revealing the staggering reliance the Pacific now has on bilateral and multilateral arrangements as part of their annual revenue.
Matthew Dornan, research fellow at the Australian National University’s Development Policy Center, told the audience that in some parts of the Pacific, this reliance on budget support is more significant than others — budget support accounts for 36 percent of Tonga’s budget, for instance, and 30 percent of Tuvalu’s.
Read more stories on aid to the Pacific:
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► 'New Zealand could do much more of what they do so well'
► Australasian Aid Conference: What to watch out for
► In small island states, a mixed picture of climate resilience funding
About the author
Lisa Cornish@lisa_cornish
Lisa Cornish is a freelance data journalist based in Canberra, Australia. Lisa formerly worked with News Corp Australia as a data journalist for the national network and was published throughout Australia in major metropolitan and regional newspapers, including the Daily Telegraph in Melbourne, Herald Sun in Melbourne, Courier-Mail in Brisbane and online through news.com.au. Lisa has recently been awarded the 2014 Journalist of the Year by the New South Wales Institute of Surveyors.
