The Netherlands is cutting billions from aid. What happens next?

We now know the size but not yet the shape of cuts to Dutch development spending that are set to rock the country’s aid sector for years to come. A new right-wing coalition agreement, published last month, revealed plans to cut official development assistance, or ODA, by €300 million (around $326 million) in 2025, €500 million in 2026, and €2.4 billion annually from 2027. Last year, the Netherlands was the world’s seventh-biggest donor, both in absolute amounts ($7.4 billion) and as a percentage of gross national income. But the changes would see ODA as a percentage of GNI drop from 0.66% in 2023 to approximately 0.46% in 2027. The coalition was formed following elections last November in which the far-right Party for Freedom, or PVV, led by the anti-immigrant Geert Wilders, won the most seats. Wilders will not lead the new government, however, with former Dutch intelligence chief Dick Schoof likely to become prime minister. The composition of the cabinet is still being negotiated, to be followed by the release of a more detailed governing agreement. Existing priorities for Dutch aid include food security, water management, sexual and reproductive health and rights, or SRHR, and security and the rule of law — with the country especially known for its work in least developed countries, or LDCs, and fragile states in the Sahel, Horn of Africa and Middle East and North Africa. Last month’s coalition deal flags that the Netherlands should still work on food security and water management, though it also adds migration, with an emphasis on reception of refugees in the regions of origin. “There are question marks about continuing work in security and the rule of law,” Paul van den Berg, chief political adviser with the Dutch aid group Cordaid, told Devex. Although the Netherlands is “very much linked to The Hague as the capital of security and justice,” he said, “there has been a critical evaluation by the inspections bureau of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, especially about the effectiveness of investing in fragile and conflict-affected settings, so that puts a question mark behind the continuation on this topic.” SRHR is also debated, van den Berg said, on the grounds that it is sometimes unjustly framed in Dutch debates by conservative parties as a futile attempt to export “our own liberal sexual values to countries that have a completely different view on these matters.” One silver lining for aid advocates in the May deal is the plan to cap at 10% the amount of Dutch ODA spent on housing refugees in the Netherlands itself — lower than the 11% cap recently recommended by the independent Advisory Council on International Affairs. Even when excluding the cost of supporting Ukrainian refugees, the Netherlands spent 17.7% of its ODA on in-donor refugee costs in 2023, above the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development donor average of 13.8%. And an OECD peer review of Dutch aid last year found that “a lasting solution” was needed to stop in-donor refugee costs affecting the “resources available, predictability and effectiveness of development programming.” The new government hopes to drastically reduce the number of asylum-seekers entering the country at all. If they fail in that effort, van den Berg said, there is a risk the government would then try and renege on the 10% cap on counting in-donor refugee costs toward ODA. The ODA cuts follow Germany, the world’s second-largest funder, shaving around €4.8 billion off its core development and humanitarian budgets between 2022 and 2025. Meanwhile, France recently announced a €742 million, or 13%, cut to its ODA for 2024. Cordaid called the Dutch cuts “an incomprehensible measure, both morally and strategically,” noting they were the largest development cooperation cuts in the country’s history. Simon van Melick, CEO of Dutch NGO SPARK – which receives 32% of its funding from the Dutch ministry of foreign affairs — told Devex that “it is cynical and short-sighted of this new coalition to drastically slash these budgets at a time when communities in fragile and conflict-affected regions are more in need of support than ever, especially knowing that stability in countries near Europe is crucial for the security and stability of countries within Europe." There is further pain for NGOs, with the new coalition also planning to stop making donations to civil society and aid organizations tax-deductible. Bas Bijlsma of ONE Campaign told Devex that efforts to stymie civil society are designed to head off possible legal challenges against the government over aspects of its agenda that risk violating international or European law. The coalition agreement also includes a target to reduce the civil service by 22%, which Bijlsma warned could further threaten the government’s ability to contribute to international development.