Aid agencies attending an international meeting on the effectiveness of aid say donors have not made enough progress addressing long-time problems in aid.

About 800 participants from donor and aid agencies, recipient countries, financial institutions, and civil society groups are gathering for the first of three days in Accra at a high-level forum to discuss how to improve donor assistance in order to meet fourteen aid effectiveness targets by 2010.

Donor governments and partner countries endorsed these targets in the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness in 2005, to build stronger partnerships so that governments could achieve their development goals.

Robert Fox, head of the non-governmental organisation Oxfam's delegation, told IRIN, “The effectiveness targets set for 2010 won’t be reached unless there’s a sea-change in commitment from all donor countries to match their rhetoric with action.”

Expected conference topics include timing aid to make it more effective, improving donor coordination, avoiding unnecessary bureaucracy, and how to improve the monitoring of spending and outcomes.

Management improving, but still weak

According to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) which set up a working group on aid effectiveness, donors are doing more to help governments manage aid, which is leading to a better evaluation of whether spending makes a difference.

But only ten of the 28 countries surveyed by the DAC in 2006 and 2008 have set up stronger systems to manage public funds.

While donors channel more aid directly through partner governments they do so inconsistently.

Where does the aid go?

In the Paris declaration, donors and partner governments agreed to channel more cash directly through government systems in order to strengthen them and enable aid partners to have more ownership of development funds.

The agreement was made with the understanding that some governments, particularly those in fragile states, find it difficult to absorb large cash flows and do not have strong checks and balance systems in place but that unless such systems are built up, aid will not be sustainable.

According to the DAC survey, only US$10 billon out of US$45 billion in annual aid in the countries surveyed, actually makes it to the governments directly, according to Oxfam. “Too many donors still set up their own parallel management structures or channel their aid through private corporations,” said Fox.

From 2004-2007, 40 donors signed almost 700 individual agreements with the Ugandan government, according to the government’s records.

Unpredictable aid makes it hard to plan

More than half of money donors promised over the last three years was never delivered, according to DAC, which is about 20 percent less than what donors set as a goal at the 2005 Paris conference.

Afghanistan has received US$15 of the US$25 billions it was promised, with the United States delivering half of its commitment and the World Bank just over half, according to Oxfam.

“The lack of aid predictability jeaporadises significantly a country’s ability to plan and account for its resources to its citizens,” stated the DAC report.

Recommendations

To improve aid management , Oxfam’s Fox says donors need to fund governments directly. “It is fundamental that aid is delivered to strengthen the capacity of countries…unless we do this we will always confront the same problems.”

And when it comes to predictability, the DAC calls on partner and donor governments to better document what aid they give and receive so both can be held accountable for what is missing.

For Oxfam the answer is to extend aid contracts. “Donors must commit to three to five years and follow through on those commitments as a fundamental building block for reforming the aid system.”

Fox continued, “If we can’t raise the bar in terms of performance to fulfill these modest targets, then we have no chance of reaching the Millennium Development Goals. We hope this meeting steps up the pressure on donors and builds up confidence among them that this is the way to go.”

IRIN

Youth are the future leaders, it is said and the Church recognizes this point and takes it as vital. Youth are given preference in the Church for their own development and growth. The youth of the Gambian church have a pivotal role to play in the life of the Catholic Church and in society at large. Certain hard times bring back youth from realizing their full potentials for the realization of their role as future leaders in society. The youth also others will blame for bad attitude towards their future lives but the youth is between the Church, parents and the society what is their role towards the youth? Christian Panorama looks through and offers some answers, read on.

The home is the first teacher comprising of the mother, father and other elders of the family in an African setting. The parents are said to be incharge of the child’s growth and early beginnings, which means they owe a lot to the molding of the child from its inception. Children according to psychologists are born with empty brains, what they term as “tablerazers,” meaning empty. The brain is empty until those brains are filled. This takes quite a painful period and parents should be more careful at this stage to enable them get the best.  From the early stage of these developmental stages in man, the neighbours too play their own role in the molding or filling of the brain to what the society would use later. In a Christian setting the parents show very good examples to their children especially through their Christian living. They are obliged to teach them to love God and teach them to pray all the time. Teaching them morals is part of molding them into what it is supposed to be. Many parishes have formulated youth activities, starting from children to the young adult. Parents are only asked to send their children to be a part of such groups. Many parents fear to send their children to such functions so as to get their children under control at home. Most children are not able to comport themselves when parents are absent. Thus bringing the fear to release their children.

The community too sits to watch the good or bad children. Mostly the onlookers that are the neighbours fear to help children fearing other parents’ reaction for instilling discipline. The community has a limited space to discipline those that do not belong to them.

Parents have the bigger say and should be flexible either with the youth, the society or the church in the development of these children. They will receive the greater bit of the successes their children will score as elders or future leaders.

Pope Benedict XV1th. recently met with world youth in Sydney Australia. He previously met with them in Germany. Gambian youths were a part of it and today many of them dream of attending such functions to enhance them.

It was with disappointment that the ticket for going to Australia could not be purchased by some youth that could not afford it. Those who could afford it were refused visa to that country. Society could have done more to ensure that these youth, anxious to meet other youth made to go. But their passports were sent and returned rejected. This made a lot of the youth loose hope and become lazy about their organizations. Many churches did not do much either to see that one or two of their church youth go for the youth function.

Gambia Catholic Youth have not relented either. The Diocesan Youth Council (DYC), responsible for youth activities of the Diocese of Banjul recently called on all youth of the Catholic Churches for a Summer Youth Camp in a secluded area called Soma. This is in line with what Christ Himself had done with His Apostles when he took time out to pray and reflect alone. The DYC under the guidance of Joseph Colley, who has been fighting tooth and nail to bring the youth together, spent four days with the youth in prayer, fasting and reflection. The Summer Camp announced all over the churches could only attract ten of the youth in the diocese. Many people said most of the youth were busy with their summer classes while others feel more should be done for them by helping to pay their camp fee.

The Youth Summer Camp held from August 27 to August 31st. and attended by ten DYC members was a success according to Pierre Mendy. He said they prayed, played and meditated a lot on their future and the past to forge ahead for a better youthful days. He said they were mostly impressed by the youth behaviour and encouraged parents to be part of their children’s growth. “We believe parents have a pivotal role to play to enable youth be more useful as future leaders,” Pierre Mendy said.

Asking one of the parents why she did not let her two children go for such a youth experience, Rose Mendy said it is a good thing for children but it was not easy to let go of my kids for such a vital exposure. “The only problem is I am not sure of what is there and the money too was expensive. It could have cost me nearly a thousand including pocket money for the two of them. Apart from that I could not be sure of girls leaving for an unknown place,” She said.

The problem here for the growth of the youth remains fear, poverty, parents and society and the slow pace of generosity in society. Parents need help to help their children and so it is to put things in place for the development of these youths who would take over from the elderly. “Let us invest on our youth and at our old age they shall improve our lives with the new trend of things we shall not be in line with but they will be vital for our existence,” says David Noah of Bakau.