Council approves EU development aid targets for 2020 in a report to the European Council
The Council today adopted conclusions on the EU development aid targets for 2020 in the form of the tenth annual report to the European Council.
The report analyses trends with regard to commitments and delivery on the EU’s official development assistance (ODA). The EU’s development assistance continues to play a crucial role in the overall financing available to the EU to help partner countries achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
In its report, the Council notes that in 2019, the EU’s[1] collective ODA amounted to EUR 75.2 billion, up from EUR 74.9 billion in 2018.
The EU and its member states have therefore maintained their position as the largest global ODA provider, accounting for 55.2% of the total ODA to developing countries from members of the OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC).
The EU’s collective ODA represented 0.46% of the EU’s Gross National Income (GNI), remaining significantly higher than the average of the non-EU DAC members, which stood at 0.21% of GNI in 2019. Four EU member states met or exceeded the 0.7% ODA/GNI threshold.
The Council confirms that more efforts are needed to meet joint and individual targets to collectively provide 0.7% of GNI as ODA by 2030, especially in the light of the multi-faceted crisis that the COVID-19 pandemic has triggered.
The report notes the particular challenges confronting developing countries in Africa, and stresses the importance of targeting ODA to the continent, while fully respecting individual member states’ priorities in development assistance.
[1]The EU aggregate includes the United Kingdom because the reference period ends before the UK’s withdrawal from the EU taking effect on 1 February 2020.
