Ireland and Spain only EU countries to increase development aid last year

Ireland and Spain were the only European countries to increase overseas aid contributions last year in an era of severe cutbacks led by the United States.Ireland now stands eighth in the world for international aid spending as a share of national income, a Government report to be published on Friday shows. Cumulatively, the State provided about €1.88 billion in official development assistance last year.Minister of State for international development Neale Richmond said the impact of the closure of the USAID agency by the Trump administration had been devastating. But he said it was not just the US that had reduced its spending, with the UK and other European countries also making cutbacks.READ MORE“It has been devastating. People are dying,” he said.The annual report on Ireland’s official development assistance says the overall €1.8 billion expenditure included a record €807 million under the Irish Aid programme managed by the Department of Foreign Affairs. It also includes funding from other Government departments, Ireland’s share of the EU development co-operation budget and money allocated to host refugees in their first year in Ireland.Richmond said every EU country reduced their aid budget last year with the exception of Ireland and Spain, while Denmark maintained the same level of expenditure.“Irish-based partner organisations and their colleagues in the field have absolutely had to reconfigure their work. We’ve seen mass lay-offs. We’ve seen hundreds of people laid off by these organisations working in the field, in places like Syria and east Africa, but also here in Ireland,” he said of the cuts. “We maintained their funding. They have their multiannual funding. They are weathering the storm well, but last year was just the first year of the storm. We will have to continue to work with them to see what’s sustainable and what programmes are continuing.”[ ‘That has changed’: Helen McEntee says Ireland now takes defence spending seriouslyOpens in new window ]The Minister said Ireland had been able to save its programmes, although USAID was no longer funding the sexual and reproductive health and rights components of some maternal health programmes.“We have had to pivot, and we’re at a situation where Ireland is now the biggest bilateral donor to Sierra Leone. We’re now a bigger bilateral donor than the United Kingdom to Zimbabwe, to Mozambique.” The report says Concern Worldwide received nearly €38 million, Trócaire almost €35 million and Goal about €14 million. Richmond said it was the right thing for Ireland to increase aid spending.“It is very hard to look at starving children and say, we can do something but I am choosing not to. The humanitarian approach is typically Irish,” he said. “But [separately], at its heart, the root of global instability is poverty. The root of all the big issues [raised] at my constituency clinics, from the price of petrol to concerns about irregular immigration patterns to the spread of infectious diseases, go back to instability in the developing world.”