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A multitude of shocks, interrelated crises and geopolitics are squeezing aid budgets and impacting on long-term development. Pressure to use influence, relationships and development cooperation for economic and national security is growing. In this climate, the opportunity to come together to discuss shared challenges is invaluable.
Earlier this month, CGD once again partnered with the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Norad to host the 2024 Development Leaders Conference (DLC), a forum for leaders from around the globe to exchange ideas and experiences. We were pleased to be joined this year by a host of development providers from the Global South—and to hear a range of perspectives on everything from changing levels of public support for development to what makes a successful partnership.
I invited my co-hosts—Siti Nugraha Mauludiah, Director General of Information and Public Diplomacy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Indonesia, and Bård Vegar Solhjell, Director General of Norad—to join the CGD Podcast immediately after the event to reflect on our key takeaways. In this episode, we discuss the diverse experiences of traditional and emerging donors, the challenges of bridging gaps between sectors and priorities, and the importance of sharing solutions within the development community.
Join us for an engaging conversation that sheds light on the pressing issues facing the global development community today—and explores the solutions that together, we might find.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Welcome to CGD's Podcast. I'm Mikaela Gavas. I'm the managing director of the Center for Global Development, and I'm joined today by two distinguished colleagues, Siti Mauludiah, director general of information and public diplomacy at the Indonesian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. And Bård Vegar Solhjell, director general of Norad, both of whom we have partnered with as the co-hosts of the Development Leaders Conference that we have just concluded here in Bali, Indonesia. Now, the Development Leaders Conference is CGD's annual conference, now in its seventh year, and the conference brings together senior officials from bilateral agencies, multilateral organizations, and development banks, as well as policy strategists and leading thinkers in a unique and private setting under the Chatham House rule, where they really focus on the strategic challenges and opportunities they face, where they can exchange views and experiences, and crucially, where they can learn about each other, about their different approaches and work towards forging new partnerships.
Now, this year's conference was particularly noteworthy for the enhanced participation of the emerging development cooperation providers, some of whom are also recipients of international support at the same time. And I was particularly struck by both the differences, but also the similarities in the perspectives across these two groups. So, I'd like to ask you both what your overall takeaways were from the conversations, which we've just concluded over the past two days, and perhaps I can start with you, Siti.
SITI NUGRAHA MAULUDIAH:
Well, I would like to echo the broader participation of emerging development partners enrich the discussion. We heard so many perspectives, even within the groups, there's also different perspectives. So, this is the second time I joined at the Development Leaders Conference, and the first time it was in Oslo. I think at that time, the conversation more towards the developed donors, you know, the traditional donors, these issues and challenges that you were facing. But today, in these two days meeting in Bali, the issues are also very pertinent to us. You know, the issues discussed from the first session until the fifth session, for instance, the ODA reform, before listening to the conversation here, we see it rather skeptical, you know, that you are taking away the 30% of ODA for one specific focus, for instance, climate change. We were wary about that. But then listening to the reason behind it yesterday, we understand more that it's not about only, you know, focusing on climate change, but some initiatives also, you know, creating the adaptation to climate change.
So, for us, it's encouraging so that, OK, there's a shifting, but we are still talking about, you know, the need for the developing countries to adapt and then mitigate the climate change. The reform of ODA really is very timely because in global South, we are going to have the 70th anniversary of African, Asian-African conference, where we would like to show that the solidarity of global South is enhanced. But at the same time, this is also being supported by the global North because, you know, no matter how much we are doing, how many or much resources we put into it, it cannot really, you know, like replace what the global North has provided. So, I think in the conversation of the reform, we would like to really involve in that so that we make sure that the interests of the global South is also represented in the reform itself.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Thank you. Thank you, Siti. Bård Vegar, your takeaways?
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
I agree with, you know, Siti, and what you said also, Mikaela, that the big difference between this conference, this roundtable compared to many other events and roundtables I do, is, of course, that we both had the global North and the global South here as providers or donors of development assistance. While you largely tend to think about traditional European and East Korea, Japan, the US as providers, and just to give, you know, the listeners an idea of what kind of countries we're talking about, of course, Indonesia and Thailand, for instance, in Asia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Colombia, Argentina, to mention a few that were here. And all these are now providers of development assistance, sometimes referred to as new or emerging. I don't like those words. Many of them aren't especially new, (LAUGH) really, but still. So, two takeaways. First, that it's quite common in our world that a country goes from being poor and receives development assistance to becoming rich. So, France received a world Bank loan in 1947.
So, Finland and Japan, you know, rich countries today received development assistance. And I also know that Greece and Portugal, as late as in the '90s, they were countries that could receive development assistance, ODA, were ODA eligible, as we say. So, I think that's an important mindset, you know, development is happening, countries are graduating, becoming richer. And that's a very common road for poor countries. A second takeaway is, of course a bit, you know, the other way around. So, if you look at the numbers, if you take away China and some of the Gulf states, it's still totally dominated by what we could refer to as the traditional donors. So, many of the, yeah, emerging donors, in lack of a better word, are still, you know, if you look at the amounts that it's quite limited. So, of course, what happens in Europe, in North America, in East Asia, the Pacific is still very important to the large sums of development assistance.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
That's great. So, let's talk a little bit more about ODA. And clearly something that came out of the conference was around the fact that resource constrained governments are using ODA to meet a broadening array of financing demands, including global challenges such as climate change and all of this alongside traditional country focused action. And they're doing this at the same time as without, in fact, growing these ODA flows in line with the scale of the challenges faced. So, Bård Vegar, in your view, what should ODA be used for?
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
So, in a generation or so, ODA has grown, you know, it's almost doubled. But in real terms, when you take inflation into account, it hasn't grown a lot. It's, you know, a rather stable or a little growth. While what it is used for has grown and changed substantially, I would say. And it's not that, you know, this is legal, it's in within in the requirements because they are very broad. Its original purpose is, of course, to reduce or alleviate poverty. Then humanitarian assistance has grown a lot, especially in the last ten, 15 years. But because of the rising number of conflicts, it's growing a lot now. Then there really, the big novelties, of course, that it's increasingly being used for global challenges, especially climate mitigation. And if you look at the growth the last ten years, almost all of it is climate mitigation. Then, of course, the last few years, especially in European development assistance, which is a big part of it, support to Ukraine and support to refugee (INAUDIBLE) in countries has grown a lot.
So, last year was the first year, at least, I know that total ODA development assistance for Europe was bigger than total development assistance for sub-Saharan Africa. And I think this kind of challenges are so, you know, when people talk to me about my job, you know, I lead a development agency in Norway and they think I work with the poorest countries in the world, helping out poor people there. And I do that. But I also work a lot with climate, you know, and global issues or pandemic preparedness. And now Ukraine is by far the biggest recipient of Norwegian development assistance. So, it's like we have a box and we put a lot more into that box without growing the box a lot. I don't have a solution, but I think we need to have a more structured conversation, whether we should think differently about how we support these issues. Poverty alleviation is very different from a global challenge like mitigation or I would say a pandemic, the latter one, a pandemic or climate mitigation, you can do anywhere in the world, you should do it where it's most effective, and it's in this interest of everyone.
While, of course, reducing poverty in a specific country, Somalia or Mali or wherever, it's mostly about solidarity, about helping others out. And maybe we need to think about this, I think, one of the challenges, of course, there is only one really tool in the international toolbox of financing, and that's development assistance, while challenges have grown and changed. So, I think it's a bigger conversation than this, but that's been the best part of the meeting today. I think a lot of people in this room see that we have a challenge here.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Yeah. And differentiating between those places where aid is absolutely essential for basic services, you know, health, education and those places where issues are more global in nature as well.
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
That's correct. And let's say there are now, you know, maybe 20, 30, 40 countries where aid is still quite big part of their budget and financing, often the poorest countries in the world, many of them in sub-Saharan Africa, not all, but many. On the other hand, many of the global challenges I mentioned, for instance, mitigation, of course, private capital will have to play a much bigger role. And also in many big middle income countries, they have to take a bigger part of the responsibility than the poorest countries are able to do. So, that's true. At the same time, I think, everyone understands that the world collectively needs to deal better and more with the global challenges like climate change, because the problem is historically largely created in in rich countries, but also big middle income countries, which now have really, really high emissions and also need to be a part of that financing.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Exactly. And Siti, let's talk a bit about South-South cooperation, I mean, what are some of the financing challenges you're facing when conducting South-South cooperation, and how do you incorporate global challenges like climate into your South-South cooperation?
SITI NUGRAHA MAULUDIAH:
Well, of course, our resources are limited, so we cannot really do whatever it needs to be done, but we have to prioritize it. You know, like we have to make sure that whatever we spend are really on target. Climate change, for instance, the global challenge for climate change to include that in the development cooperation from Indonesia to South countries is necessary and you know, strategic. So, we should do that. But then like back at home, people would say, "Why you're giving aid or assistance on climate change, we need to help them to come out from poverty." And the same in the recipient countries, if we say, you know, labeling it in climate change, they would say, "I need food. I don't care whether it's hot or rain." That's a basic question, actually. But then I think whatever we are doing when we think about climate change while doing it, I think that's also putting the climate change issues in priority. For instance, if we are providing a technical assistance on how to ensure increased productivity on agriculture, for instance, on, you know, like rice field, for instance, it would end up, you know, like that they are using the land more effectively.
So, it means less resources needed. And so, it would at the end contribute to the attainment of adaption of the climate change. So, I think what we have to do here is like mainstreaming the climate change issues in whatever we are doing.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Let's turn to another hot topic of discussion at the Development Leaders Conference, that of demonstrating to the general public that development programs work and that they can be very effective when done right. So, just going back to the narrative, the question to you both is, how can development leaders articulate narratives that best build public support for their endeavors? So, both Indonesia, with its new communication strategy, and Norway, with the public discourse on the future of ODA, provide interesting examples of how the narrative is evolving and how we can learn from those experiences. So, Bård Vegar, your experience.
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
Yeah, so I think the discussion about support of the narrative is largely about two different things. So, one is do we need it? You know, the idea behind it and the other is about results. Does it work? Is it effective? So, the first part, of course, we already talked a little bit about that. But I think the motivation is important. What we see is that still humanitarian development assistance has quite broad support almost everywhere. You know, you need to help people in need when there's an earthquake or disaster or war. The traditional mandate in Norway, it's still strong. We hear here that that's different in many countries, you know, support for the idea of helping people out is not that strong. And then, again, climate is growing again as a, you know, as a, you know, a motivation, but it's very different levels of support in different countries. Broadly in Scandinavia, where I come from, I think it's still fair to say that development assistance has quite strong support, but it's being challenged.
And I think the main reason is a tough fiscal situation for governments and also a social and economic situation in all European and also global North countries, where with rising interest rates and higher prices, inflation and so on. So, then turning to effectiveness, so I have this internal slogan, (OTHER LANGUAGE), it's a Norwegian. It's (OTHER LANGUAGE). It means fact should have the power, you know, but it rhymes in Norwegian. So, yeah, (LAUGH) it works better. But I think when you look at that, it's clear from this conversation that in some fields, like in education or healthcare, sexual and reproductive health and rights, we have a quite good evidence base, especially on the intervention level, meaning exactly what you do on the ground. While I think it's a big challenge that we know much less what to do on adaptation and mitigation, thus on climate change, which is becoming so big and so urgent to really a big challenge we're taking away from here. Another challenge is that we know a lot what works on the intervention level.
But if you go to the system level, you know how to build an education system together with the country, How to partner on integrating climate or human rights or whatever into your work, then it is much more challenging to measure and to show results. And I see that in many European countries that where it's hard to, you know, to argue that you are actually saving lives or achieving very concrete things, then it's also tougher to argue that this is an effective org and good use of public resources.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Exactly. And Siti, from the Indonesian experience, any lessons?
SITI NUGRAHA MAULUDIAH:
Well, yes, we've been providing assistance for quite some times now around, let's say 40 years, even though it was institutionalized formally early 20s. You know, at the moment, if we are talking about providing humanitarian assistance, it's OK. Everybody says, yes, we need to do it. Humanitarian assistance is conflict, you know, conflict, state conflicts or disaster relief. So, it's OK. Nobody is questioning it. Yes, we have to be the first giving the help because we have had help greatly from the international community, for instance, during the tsunami. And people perceive that we did benefit from all these international assistance when the tsunami hit in 2006. And then when it goes up to the technical assistance, when it comes to a grant or infrastructure development, for instance, that we started doing it, since we have the Indonesian aid, people will just, really, are you sure? We need to have that kind of, you know, facilities, for instance, or we need to build something in the remote villages, so you see the perspective.
But then again, we come from, no, from the technical assistance. Now, it's OK, you know, hopefully by the time we are growing our budget for development assistance, they would say, OK, to also grant. And then we really have to have a good narrative for that. Of course, we have to see who are we talking about, you know, it's like we are talking to the public or we are talking to the member of Parliament, we are talking to other stakeholders. It's different, you know, like different way. But again, it's really still a challenge for us. And I, you know, from the discussion, I realized that it's not only the challenge for the developing, you know, the emerging development partners, but the traditional donors is still having some challenges, different challenges. But it's interesting to listen to them. And we will get there somewhere. And so, we get to be ready to address that. So, yeah.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Yes, yes. So, in both the emerging and the traditional countries, there is this precariousness of development cooperation in the perceptions of the public is very real. One of the other topics that we discussed quite a lot, and a crucial topic for the Development Leaders conference is the development of partnerships. And we heard from many colleagues here over the conference how they structure their partnerships with both recipient countries, but also with local partners. So, what aspects did you find particularly interesting and what do you take away from the conversation?
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
So, that development has to be locally led and in a way demand driven. And I think a really interesting thing that I've learned from not only Siti, but you and others and what we refer to as emerging donors, countries that are also receiving development assistance to this, you know, this is even more obvious and crucial to put this even more at the center of what we do. But I also see it, even with many of the least developed countries, that they, which is I think is a really great thing. They demand to be in the driver's seat to a much bigger degree. And I think that also to get results that are lasting and sustainable, you need to have that dimension there. And this is, of course, something many development practitioners or people in an agency would say. But to me, it becomes clearer in a conversation like this one and it, I think, it's getting to a level where we just have to do that better. So, it affects how we do development assistance. We demand more of our partners that they are actually localized, whether they're UN partners or NGOs, and also said that it's about getting resources to the ground, but also the power relation, the way we're kind of understanding that the power relation has to change.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Yeah. And something that came out very clearly from the conversations was this central feature of trust as a basis for partnership. Siti, what were your perspectives on this?
SITI NUGRAHA MAULUDIAH:
I agree with you. It has to be locally owned and it has to be in line with the national interest. We don't like to have traditional donor, our partner for development coming here and then said, "OK, we are going to do this. This is because this is our national priorities." Well, OK, that's your national priorities, but do we really need that, right? Our national priorities, development priorities is his, this, this. So, if you want to help us, this is that we have to work on. I'm talking about us the recipient, right? But then this experience of being the recipient really prepare us when we are becoming the provider. You know that even now, I was surprised that some of our colleagues still says that traditional donors have some vested interest in providing the assistance, right? So, the trust was not there. For us, we used to think like that. But because traditional donor partners has aligned their development assistance to our priority, we gradually trust them more that, yes, you are helping us because we need assistance.
It's not because you see something in your benefit in helping us. So, trust is really, you know, important here. And so, when we are providing assistance, we show them that this is genuine, this is genuine partnership. No one, no hand is above and one hand is down, you know, it's something like that because you mentioned about power play here, no, we, whatever you need, we will provide, we have budget restriction. But to our capability, we are helping you. So, that's the thing in making a long lasting partnership.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Bård Vegar, how do you build trust in a world which is increasingly insecure, geopolitically fragmented? How do you do it?
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
So, that's a great question because it's so difficult. It's harder to build that trust now than when I started in my position four and a half years ago. And it's a changing, quite short time. It's driven by several events, of course, Russia's brutal attack on Ukraine, the war now in Gaza. But I would also say the world's collective handling of COVID. All these three events had a negative effect on maybe especially, you know, global North-South trust, but also, of course, challenging geopolitical tension between Western Europe and Russia and between the US and China. So, first, dialogue talking to people is always at the center of building trust. So, you know, some people say that, you know, and they're so tired of endless talk. But the only thing is worse is that you don't talk, right? So, actually talking to people, having a dialogue, meeting people, you know, across traditional borders is extremely important. I also think that it's a challenge if we were to reduce, you know, development assistance and cut it in a period where we need to show that we're willing to finance development and climate and the other goals we have with development assistance is an issue.
It's an argument I often use, and I hear others using it also in the Nordic debate, for instance. And then, of course, also the focus of our attention, and saying this may be mainly to Westerners, but so the word that has killed most people the last few years is, of course, the war in northern Ethiopia and Tigray by far. We don't know how many, but scientists agree that this has been the worst war in modern times. I think if you're European or probably also North American, you have heard a lot more about the war in Gaza or in Ukraine, and they are very important that every good reason, Ukraine is our neighbor, we are a neighbor to Russia and so on. But we also have to have the ability to care about other conflicts. Right now, for instance, Sudan, a terrible conflict. I think that's extremely important that there is a truly global agenda and outreach to how we spend our resources, and also to our mindset.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Exactly. And the list is growing, Yemen, Afghanistan, so on, Burkina Faso. OK. So, finally, the ultimate question that I would put to you both. So, first, Siti, when you head back to Jakarta, is there anything that you think you might do differently or attempt to change following our two days of discussion here in Bali?
SITI NUGRAHA MAULUDIAH:
Well, this meeting, the DLC meeting was preceded by an Emerging Development Partners meeting. Thanks to you, because we are able to have this meeting, where we agreed that there is a need for us to have the regular meeting. After these two days, I was more convinced that we still need to have the conversation with the traditional donor. So, that's why maybe it's good if we have the same format like today, you know, because then we could have our own meeting separately, but then having this conversation in a broader audience with the traditional donors. So, it's not up to me because I want the collective ownership of this EDPs meeting. But truly, there is no such one of meeting yet. It used to be one held by the UN office of South-South cooperation, but it's not a regular basis. We want to have regular so that it has the impact, you know, and we have a forum that we could seek for, you know, like answer if we couldn't find it ourselves. So, that's, I think, that's what I'm going to do differently.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
That's great. That's great. Thank you, Siti. Bård Vegar, when you go back to Oslo, anything you're going to do differently or maybe do more of?
BÅRD VEGAR SOLHJELL:
So, two very different things for me. So, first, I'm energized by working with the two of you and your institution. So, the center for Global Development, in my view, is probably the leading global think tank on development. So, really a lot of deep thinking and good word data that you are presenting. It's important for our work. And of course, Indonesia and Norway, we we have a very deep and broad collaboration, even though we are two very different countries, you are 50 times as many people and a huge country. We are ocean nations. We work very closely on forests and also on, you know, strong foreign policy relations. So, it's been really good to work with you, Siti. Then one, you know there are different takeaways, but one stays with me longer. We need to discuss both the size and structure of what we spend on development assistance and global issues in the future. By the size, I mean, so there's simply a bigger difference between what's available and the challenges now than in the former decades.
We are doing slower progress on the SDGs. There are bigger humanitarian needs there. Climate mitigation and adaptation is a huge need. And climate alone could take many times over older budgets, and we're not getting enough traction out of mobilizing private capital. There's simply a need to finance more global challenge of finance, more of what we have common challenges internationally. And also, by the structure, I'm returning to the first part of this conversation. We need to discuss whether this one box is the right tool for all these things, or we need to divide more clearly between different goals and different streams of financing. And we need to, you know, address the conversation about stepping up, stepping up from the richest countries, stepping up from new middle income countries that have developed. And I think that conversation needs to be taken more clearly. And I knew it from before, but that these two days have made it very clear to me.
MIKAELA GAVAS:
Thank you, thank you. I mean, certainly my takeaway from the conference is that, well, I walk away with a much better understanding of both traditional and emerging donors, what the real sort of strategic and practical challenges that they face. And I think, you know, everybody did agree that change is needed. There's not so much of an agreement as to what that change is at this point, but this is just the beginning of a journey, and hopefully we can continue the conversation and really pin down what we need to do differently to be as effective as possible in what is a very difficult world. So, thank you very much to both you, Siti and Bård Vegar. We will be hosting next year's Development Leaders Conference, that's in 2025, in Germany, together with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. And we very much look forward to continuing the conversation with both of you. And please do look out for more content from CGD. Thank you. (MUSIC PLAYS)
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CGD blog posts reflect the views of the authors, drawing on prior research and experience in their areas of expertise. CGD is a nonpartisan, independent organization and does not take institutional positions.