Enough with the kids, already

by Elizabeth Corley

A picture is worth a thousand words, so they say. But what are those words actually saying? Too often the image we get of development is poor people, frequently children, looking bereft. While these images can be compelling and evocative of those we aim to benefit, they don’t depict aspects of development that involve economic growth.

We are always looking for images that help show the many sides of development. The annual Development Gateway photo contest is now under way. Show us what you think is a great image of development, in all it manifestations. The winner will receive $1,000. Send in your submissions by September 18, 2009.

Pictured here is one of my favorites from last year. It shows a woman harvesting seaweed in Madagascar. The photo was taken by Laura DeBiaggio of Italy.

Relationship building - the overlooked ingredient of effective aid?

by Anna Lauridsen

IDS researcher, Rosalind Eyben recently responded to the call from the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Debt, Aid and Trade for evidence on aid effectiveness. Her response focuses on the importance of relationships.

Eyben argues that effective aid requires as much investment in relationships as in managing money. Hence, development organisations need to change the way they work in order to better manage the multiple partnerships that the Accra Agenda for Action recognises as the core of the aid business.

Part of the problem is the way aid is measured. Currently, the approach assumes that we are in control and that change is predictable. If you do X, Y will follow. Although this approach may be useful for programmes involving mass immunisation campaigns and impregnated bed-nets, in many aid cases change is not predictable or controllable.

In fact, Eyben’s inquiry reveals some effects are simply not reported by development staff because they were not predicted or did not fit the initial logical framework. Eyben points to cases of relationship building on the local level in conflict ridden countries as some of the most effective initiatives. Eyben states that there is no evidence that spending more money with less staff will deliver better results. This observation is due to the fact that achieving impact requires investing in relationships, which requires the support of development organisations.

Staff can understand the specific context in which they are working through investing time in building relationships with different individuals, organisations, and networks. Similarly, the organization’s staff needs to engage with diverse citizen’s groups (in the capital and in the countryside) as well as with government officials, including front-line workers, in order to get a better picture of what is happening and to identify drivers and blockers of change.

Read the full report: Evidence Submission to the APPG Inquiry on Aid Effectiveness

Making sense of aid flows

by Emily Kallaur

Through AiDA (the Accessible Information on Development Activities) database we are trying to provide an increasingly comprehensive picture of development assistance flows around the world. I just came across a picture that illustrates how challenging this problem can be—it’s from a 2007 paper entitled “Trends and Issues in Development Aid,” by Homi Kharas of the Brookings Institution.


It’s quite a complex web! In recent months we have added data feeds from more private aid organizations to AiDA, and we are working to capture more. The more information can be reflected in a single repository, using a single format, the better development actors will be able to assess where funds are going and how they are being used.

The paper and diagram above also highlight the relatively small share of development aid that makes it to countries as “programmable aid.” The definition of programmable aid excludes debt relief, humanitarian and food aid, technical assistance, and donors’ administrative costs—not because these are not worthwhile, but in order to zero in on the aid flows that can be used by recipient governments to invest in development. Kharas found that only about $38 billion of the over $100 billion in official development assistance from OECD/DAC member states was channeled to developing countries as “net programmable aid” (as of 2007). For Sub-Saharan Africa, net programmable aid of about $12 billion in 2005 was approximately the same amount (once adjusted for purchasing power) that was delivered in 1985.

This situation underscores the need for detailed, standardized data on aid flows in order to understand what is really happening on the ground, and gauge its impact. Another implication is that recipient governments need aid information that can be easily disaggregated into programmable aid, that they can reflect in the national budget and direct toward development priorities, and other types of aid (such as technical assistance) which do not represent financial flows to the country. Currently this level of detail is not necessarily the case.

CSO development effectiveness

by Anna Lauridsen

Since its beginning, the international aid effectiveness agenda has primarily focused on the policies of national governments and bi- and multilateral organisations. Fortunately, this policy debate is increasingly trickling down to civil society organisations (CSOs).

In early July, civil society organisations were invited to take part in the consultations of the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) in Brussels. Launched in September 2008 at the Accra High Level Forum, the IATI brings together donor countries, developing country governments, non-governmental organisations, and experts in aid information to agree on ways of sharing more and better information about aid.

The IATI CSO consultations in Brussels had the purpose of better understanding the kinds of information about donor aid flows that European CSOs require and to identify recommendations in developing the IATI standards. Similar consultations will be held with CSOs from the developing world.

In June 2009 some 170 representatives from CSOs, donors and governments from nearly 50 countries from around the world gathered in Prague for the conference “Civil Society Organizations Development Effectiveness”. The conference was organised by the Czech NGDO platform “FoRS” in collaboration with CONCORD.

Participants were invited to tackle questions such as: What are the key principles of development effectiveness? What is the specific role of CSOs in development that could best contribute to their full potential? How is effectiveness influenced by external conditions and how to turn these conditions into advantages? The Prague conference concluded with a statement which sets out principles of CSO development effectiveness. Participants committed to deepen discussions of these principles within the Open Forum for CSO effectiveness.

These two CSO gatherings point to two things. Firstly, the gathering momentum of the aid effectiveness agenda (and how to put it into practice) and, secondly, the need for a broad-based, inclusive effort. In other words, the involvement of development experts from various organisations and structures, be it national governments and civil society pulling in the same direction. With these kinds of initiatives, the aid effectiveness agenda stands a chance of succeeding.

Communicating the value of open data to donors

by Elizabeth Corley

At last week’s unconference I led a discussion on the topic of communicating the value of open data and standards to donors. Here are some of the key issues we discussed.

1. What is open development? Our definition was an attempt to make information about the development process open and transparent for all those who care about it and deal with it, including donors, recipients, taxpayers, regulators, practitioners, and academics. One desired end result is to create a feedback loop.

2. Data sharing should be part of the planning process. It must be considered at the inception to allow for easy sharing. There is a value in unstructured data, before it is assembled into a written document. Projects could be designed with shorter, smaller reports that include leading and lagging indicators.

3. It is incumbent on the implementers of a project to share data. One example of best practice here is the AMREF project in Katine, Uganda. In partnership with Barclays Bank and the Guardian, AMREF allows public scrutiny of its ongoing project.

After our session, the subject of communicating the value of open data and standards come up in conversation with Owen Barder of aidinfo. How do you show donors the possibility of how the data can be used (when sometimes we don’t even know)? He pointed to an example of a new technology sited in an article titled "Web Squared" by Tim O’Reilly and John Battelle.

Imagine if you had a device that could give you information about what was around you. Let’s say you walk by a school in Cambodia. You point the device at a building and on the screen appears the names of donors who funded the construction of the school or the provision of text books. Nice credit for the donors.

But imagine the school is in ruins and the device tells you how much money has been poured into it. Who would want to be associated with failure? This topic also came up in our session and it is one of culture. In some sectors, such as technology, failed enterprises means you have learned a lot. In development, particularly in Washington, we avoid public exposure and the risk of public failure. Maybe that is why we are willing to release data to the taxpayers—but only after the report has been vetted, polished, and refined for public consumption.

Camp brings together those with a passion for development and sharing data

by Elizabeth Corley

It was great to meet so many people working on issues of data and collaboration at the open development camp today. The event showed how much people care about international development and their passion for sharing data. Owen Barder kicked off the event by giving context to the challenge at hand and emphasizing the value of open data and open standards.

The suggestions for topics at the camp ranged from technical issues like maping and crowdsourcing to broader questions on communication and collaboration. You can see here what the grid looked like for session one. Over the course of the day we had sixteen sessions. Notes on each session will be posted on opendev.ning.com.

When asked for his impression of the camp, Matt Gyory, our communications intern, zeroed in on what is next. “Really the core of this day was not so much what was discussed, but the next steps that should be taken. Those that discussed data standards should try to get together to map out what they would like to see in particular and run with their ideas from there. Those that discussed the importance of measuring aid effectiveness should attempt to adopt the strategies offered. Those that discussed open data and development should attempt to add the collection of data and distribution of that data in their projects so it becomes a habit rather than an expensive addition.”

The event was co-sponsored byAidInfo, ForumOne, Global Development Commons, and the World Bank. Special thanks goes to Sameer Vasta, the bank’s social media strategist, who not only secured ample room for breakout sessions, but also delivered on the refreshments.

Innovations in Development Financing

by Emily Kallaur

Recently Development Gateway hosted a brownbag led by Navin Girishankar of the World Bank, who presented his new paper “Innovating Development Finance: From Financing Sources to Financial Solutions”.

The paper takes stock of creative financing mechanisms for development, from solidarity mechanisms like the Stolen Asset Recovery (StAR) initiative to risk management tools such as weather indexed insurance for Malawi. In an effort to mobilize resources to support achievement of the MDGs, donors have also turned to new sources of funding for development initiatives, such as proceeds from national lotteries (in the UK and Belgium) or levies on air travel.

Overall, innovative financing still accounts for a fairly small share of total development aid. The paper concludes that innovative financing should be increasingly mainstreamed, but that it is not a substitute for raising the overall volume of development assistance through traditional means (e.g. for concessional financing). According to the analysis, the only major new source of concessional financing in the period studied has been aid from emerging bilateral donors (non-DAC members), who accounted for roughly $3 billion in development assistance in 2006.

The paper also argues that innovations should be studied to determine whether the transaction costs associated with creative mechanisms are justified by the end results. Capturing better data on non-traditional development financing will be important to gauging the value added of these promising tools.

Demonstrating tools for development at InterAction Forum

by Elizabeth Corley

The InterAction forum starts today, marking the 25th anniversary of that organization which represents 180 international NGOs. With 800 attendees throughout the week, we expect some interesting discussions regarding the future of international assistance efforts. Vanessa Goas will give a brief presentation on the Aid Management Platform on Tuesday, July 7, at 11:05 am. We will have demonstrations of AiDA, our database on aid activities, and AMP at our booth in the exhibitor’s hall.

Sweden begins its EU presidency

by Anna Lauridsen

On July 1 the Czech Republic handed over the EU torch to Sweden.For those not living in Brussels or simply lacking a passion for European politics, this week’s major event must have gone by more or less unnoticed. As I did a quick search on the websites some of Europe’s major newspapers, the news was overshadowed by national events, forcing me to scroll down while attentively looking for the key words: “Swedish” “Presidency”.

The Presidency of the Council of the European Union is one of the most important instruments for promoting the interests of EU member states and influencing the activities of the European Union. Accordingly, member states hold the presidency on a rotating basis following a predetermined schedule broken down into six-month terms.

Normally, the presidency is expected to handle at least one major crisis during its time at the steering wheel. Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt will be forced to hit the ground running with the current global political and financial climate. In the coming months, a few crucial decision will be made as to whether Mr. Barroso will stay on as the President of the European Commission, who his commissioners will be and if the Lisbon Treaty will be successfully ratified by the Member States.

As for the presidency’s ambitions for international development, we have so far been told that it will work on specific measures to make EU development cooperation more effective and to ensure that different policy areas work together to contribute to sustainable global development, i.e. policy coherence for development. This change is seen in the light of the economic downturn which is affecting the poorest countries hardest.

Undoubtedly, the Presidency’s development agenda will culminate in the European Development Days, Stockholm, 22–24 October. The European Development Days is a three-day get together for the movers and shakers of international development, including development ministers, heads of national aid agencies, international aid organizations, NGOs and the like. The Development Gateway will participate for the second year in a row. Please check our website for our booth number closer to the date. You can also read about Development Gateway’s success in DRC.

World Bank report highlights the importance of ICT for development

by Elizabeth Corley


Yesterday, the World Bank launched its report Information and Communication Technologies for Development 2009: Extending Reach and Increasing Impact. The report looks at how access to ICT effects socio-economic development. Among its findings:

• A 10-percentage-point increase in broadband penetration results in an increase of 1.3 percentage points in economic growth.
• In India and the Philippines, results show that for every new job in the IT sector, between 2 and four jobs are created in other sectors.
• E-government can reduce corruption. Based on a survey of five e-government projects in India, analysts found that computerization decreased corruption.

During the discussion at the launch, Christine Qiang, senior economist at the World Bank and manager of the ICT4D reports, noted that behavioral and organizational adjustments must accompany e-government solutions. Business and institutional leadership need to work with technical leadership.

Anand Anandalingam, dean of the Smith School of Business, University of Maryland, commented on the need to focus on information, not just the communication part of these technologies. He also underscored the need for skilled labor to meet the demand for sustainable IT solutions and the role government can play in developing the backbone of the network.

As new applications are developed and mobile telephony expands, the potential for ICT to contribute to economic development grows. The evolving nature of this sector requires policy responses and new models for development. The report includes analysis of trends and best practices to maximize the impact of ICT.