Development Aid arguments

Development Aid is still a sensitive issue that is being analysed presently as a phenomenom in two different antagonistic aspects

1. The pro-Aid activits advocate for continued help of poor countries

2. The Anti-Aid activists say its a traditional outdated policy to help developing countries through aid

Below are the continued views from the later

A.Corruption and Foreign Aid

( Mark Thorntorn )

“”For a few billion dollars you might expect to be able to bribe some small third world country into cleaning up its act, to defend the property rights of its citizens, to provide a stable currency, and to establish a non-interventionist economic and foreign policy.

With little Switzerlands and industrial revolutions developing around the globe, the U.S. could provide the examples that would establish a classical liberal world order within one generation with less than 1% of the federal budget.

Alas, Americans are united in their opposition to foreign aid—and with good reason! Foreign aid, military aid, debt relief, economic development assistance, and even disaster assistance money—all with “strings attached” to ensure proper behavior—are associated with “fraud, waste, and abuse.”

U.S. aid designed to bring about peace in the Middle East is an ideological seedbed of hatred, war, and terrorism. The big players in foreign aid, the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, are more likely to bring about economic meltdown and social calamity than economic stability.

Ludwig von Mises pointed out  that foreign aid doesn’t create friends in foreign lands, it creates ideological enemies who wish to do us harm:

The United States, they think, is aiding them because its people have a bad conscience. They themselves pocket this bribe but their sympathies go to the socialist system. The American subsidies make it possible for their governments to conceal partially the disastrous effects of the various socialist measures they have adopted.

Mises is here referring to our “friends” in Europe, but the same could be applied to the Middle East, Africa, the Western Hemisphere, and Asia, with the only possible exception being countries like Vietnam and Australia who receive limited or no foreign aid from the United States or the international organizations that we control.

The fraud and failure of foreign aid is now so obvious that it has ended up in the pages of the American Economic Review!

Economists Alberto Alesina and Beatrice Weder ask the simple question, “Do Corrupt Governments Receive Less Foreign Aid?” in the September 2002 issue. Using a host of international economic statistics and several surveys of government corruption, they find that there is no evidence that nations and multinational institutions direct their foreign aid to less corrupt governments and away from more corrupt governments. They state their conclusion quite emphatically:

There is no evidence that less corrupt governments receive more foreign aid. Our vast exploration of the data never uncovered any even weak evidence of a negative effect of corruption on received foreign aid. The same result applies to debt relief programs, an additional form of aid.

Is Foreign Development Aid the cause of Africa´s underdevelopment ???????

Its absurd Africa is so large with many natural mineral resources but lagging behinds in terms of development whether social,political or economical. Why is it so ? That question is quite disturbing as many economic analysts  have different arguments. First and foremost, a great distinction between Relief (humanitarian aid ) and development aid.Though relief aid is being supported by all ,economic aid has drawn mixed arguments among people with some criticising and others supporting it

Miss Dambisa Moyo, a former World Bank employee in her book ” Dead Aid ” strongly believes the foreign aid given by developed world to Africa is the cause of economic underdevelopment in the continent. She suggest Africa has recieved trillions of dollars in development aid but still underdeveloped.She criticises a  government to government aid and suggests african countries should rather engage in capital markets like bonds with the international banks etc.

“Aid has trapped developing nations in a vicious circle of aid dependency, corruption, market distortion, and further poverty, leaving them with nothing but the need for more aid.” Dambisa Moyo

Her arguments have recieved mixed feelings from many people with support from President Kagame ( Rwanda ), Abdoulaye Wade ( senegal ).Gabon and Ghana are so far some of the african nations that overwhelmingly changed development aid policies by embarking more now on capital markets. On ther other hand , Mr Bono ( David Hewison ) have strongly criticised her arguments saying the G20 need to rather increase their development support to Africa,he suggests more philanthropy to Africa.

Dambisa Moyo´s views on Aid

Women and sustainable development of Africa.

Women in Africa play a greater role in social and economic development in either ways ( positively or negatively ). This is so because they contribute a greater percentage of the toatl population.Its also worth emphasising that an average child spends most of his/her infant and adolescent period with the mother therefore the child´s future strongly lies in the guidance of the mother. I therefore call upon all individaul,stake holders and humanitarians to work towards the promotion of girls education in the continent. Africa with more educated females will result  into lowering of infant and child mortality rates ( UNICEF estimated in 2006 about 5 million children in Africa die every year before age of five ).

“”"Mothers who are educated will also have increased confidence in the ability to take care of her children, therefore providing a healthier relationship and environment for them.”