The European Commission wants to explore connections between development and national security, a major U.K. aid contractor faces serious questions, and the United Nations issues its largest-ever humanitarian funding appeal. This week in development news.
The United Nations issued its largest-ever appeal for funding — $22.2 billion to spend on humanitarian relief in 2017 — in recognition of the unprecedented need posed by crises in Syria, South Sudan, Yemen, Nigeria, and elsewhere. "More than 80 percent of the needs stem from man-made conflicts, many of which are now protracted and push up demand for relief year after year," Stephen O'Brien, head of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told reporters in Geneva, according to the AP. The 2017 appeal is 10 percent higher than the 2016 appeal, which is still only 52 percent funded. With governments in Europe and the United States looking increasingly inward — and more skeptically at multilateral cooperation — the outlook for a fully funded 2017 appeal does not look good. In the past 10 years the highest level of international community support for the U.N.’s funding appeal was 72 percent in 2009. As needs have grown dramatically in recent years, so has the funding gap.
British aid contractors are under fire after press reports raised questions about how much they are charging the U.K. Department for International Development for various services. An investigation by the Times — which examined 70,000 financial transactions and pointed to some that seemed unusually high — has reportedly prompted DfID chief Priti Patel to say she will review all foreign aid contracts. In another report, the conservative Daily Mail newspaper published excerpts from a series of leaked internal emails, which appear to show that aid contractor Adam Smith International tried to pass off self-reported testimonials about their work overseas as independent submissions from senior foreign politicians and officials. The report prompted International Development Committee Chair Stephen Twigg to say he would recommend an investigation. The outlet also reported that an ASI employee who formerly worked for DfID shared confidential documents with his new employer in hopes they might help the firm win contracts. A DfID spokesperson told the Daily Mail the allegations were “incredibly serious and would constitute a clear breach of the high standards and integrity expected of all our contractors.”
About the author
Michael Igoe@AlterIgoe
Michael Igoe is a Senior Reporter with Devex, based in Washington, D.C. He covers U.S. foreign aid, global health, climate change, and development finance. Prior to joining Devex, Michael researched water management and climate change adaptation in post-Soviet Central Asia, where he also wrote for EurasiaNet. Michael earned his bachelor's degree from Bowdoin College, where he majored in Russian, and his master’s degree from the University of Montana, where he studied international conservation and development.
