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Aid Proposals Reopen Debate on "Stingy" US
By Guy Dinmore in Washington
The Bush administration's 2006 foreign aid budget came under fire yesterday from aid organisations that argued the proposed 14 per cent increase masked a decline in money for working projects in the poorest countries.
Presentation of the budget immediately re-opened the debate, in the wake of the Asian tsunami disaster, over whether the US was stingy, compared with other rich nations.
Officials said the increase, in the context of a tight budget overall, reflected President George W. Bush's priority of helping countries out of the poverty trap that the US sees as a breeding ground for extremists and terrorists.
International assistance programmes are budgeted to total $18.5bn (£9.8bn, €14.3bn) in fiscal 2006 - up from projected spending of $16.2bn this year.
Not all of this counts as development spending. The largest single item is $4.59bn allocated for "foreign military financing", much of which goes to developed countries. But there is also the separate "global HIV/ Aids initiative", which has $3bn budgeted, compared with $2.6bn this year.
The administration's favoured vehicle for aid money is the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), a controversial body that Mr Bush established to channel funding to developing countries that pass tests of good governance over a wide range of criteria, including their level of democracy.
Funding for the MCC is requested at $3bn in 2006. Congress appropriated $1.5bn for the MCC in 2005 - some $1bn short of the administration's request.
Jamie Drummond, executive director of Debt Aids Trade Africa (Data), which was co-founded by Bono, the singer in the rock group U2, said Mr Bush had broken all the promises he made in establishing the MCC. Its budget was less than the $5bn originally promised for 2006; none of the money had yet been disbursed; and it appeared from the numbers that it had taken funds from other aid programmes, Mr Drummond said.
"They need to light a fire under the MCC," he said, stressing that Data supported the concept behind the MCC, which is chaired by Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state.
Steve Radelet of the independent Center for Global Development agreed that the MCC had not lived up to its billing, and blamed the administration for "sitting on its hands". He also doubted Congress would approve the full $3bn requested.
However, US aid funding could rise in 2006 to about 0.18 per cent of national income, from about 0.15 per cent in 2003, Mr Radelet said.
--Financial Times
By Guy Dinmore in Washington
The Bush administration's 2006 foreign aid budget came under fire yesterday from aid organisations that argued the proposed 14 per cent increase masked a decline in money for working projects in the poorest countries.
Presentation of the budget immediately re-opened the debate, in the wake of the Asian tsunami disaster, over whether the US was stingy, compared with other rich nations.
Officials said the increase, in the context of a tight budget overall, reflected President George W. Bush's priority of helping countries out of the poverty trap that the US sees as a breeding ground for extremists and terrorists.
International assistance programmes are budgeted to total $18.5bn (£9.8bn, €14.3bn) in fiscal 2006 - up from projected spending of $16.2bn this year.
Not all of this counts as development spending. The largest single item is $4.59bn allocated for "foreign military financing", much of which goes to developed countries. But there is also the separate "global HIV/ Aids initiative", which has $3bn budgeted, compared with $2.6bn this year.
The administration's favoured vehicle for aid money is the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC), a controversial body that Mr Bush established to channel funding to developing countries that pass tests of good governance over a wide range of criteria, including their level of democracy.
Funding for the MCC is requested at $3bn in 2006. Congress appropriated $1.5bn for the MCC in 2005 - some $1bn short of the administration's request.
Jamie Drummond, executive director of Debt Aids Trade Africa (Data), which was co-founded by Bono, the singer in the rock group U2, said Mr Bush had broken all the promises he made in establishing the MCC. Its budget was less than the $5bn originally promised for 2006; none of the money had yet been disbursed; and it appeared from the numbers that it had taken funds from other aid programmes, Mr Drummond said.
"They need to light a fire under the MCC," he said, stressing that Data supported the concept behind the MCC, which is chaired by Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state.
Steve Radelet of the independent Center for Global Development agreed that the MCC had not lived up to its billing, and blamed the administration for "sitting on its hands". He also doubted Congress would approve the full $3bn requested.
However, US aid funding could rise in 2006 to about 0.18 per cent of national income, from about 0.15 per cent in 2003, Mr Radelet said.
--Financial Times
