Aid

Aid quality is just as important as aid quantity, so the CDI measures gross aid as a share of GDP adjusted for various quality factors: it subtracts debt service, penalizes “tied” aid that makes recipients spend aid only on donor goods and services, rewards aid to poor but relatively well-governed recipients, and penalizes overloading poor governments with many small projects.

Austria’s aid performance

• Score: 3.1
• Rank: 19

Strengths

• Prevents project proliferation; large average project size (rank: 2)

Weaknesses

• Large share of tied or partially tied aid (40.3%; rank: 19)
• Low net aid volume as a share of the economy (0.28%; rank: 17)

Trade

International trade has been a force for economic development for centuries. The CDI measures trade barriers in rich countries against exports from developing countries.

Austria’s trade performance

• Score: 5.6
• Rank: 10

Strengths

• Low tariffs on textiles (6.4% of the value of imports; rank: 3)
• Low tariffs on apparel (6.4% of the value of imports; rank: 3)
• High level of manufactures imports from poorer countries (10.1% of GDP per capita; rank: 4)

Investment

Rich-country investment in poorer countries can transfer technologies, upgrade management and create jobs. The CDI includes a checklist of policies that support healthy investment in developing countries.

Austria’s investment performance

• Score: 4.8
• Rank: 17

Strengths

• Political risk insurance agency provides wide coverage and screens potential projects for violations of human, labor and environmental rights
• Provides some official support for outflows of portfolio investment

Weaknesses

• Lacks policies to fully prevent double taxation of corporate profits earned abroad
• Weak participation and leadership in Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), including no support for the Multi-Donor Trust Fund

Migration

The movement of people from poor to rich countries provides unskilled immigrants with jobs, income and knowledge. This increases the flow of money sent home by migrants abroad and the transfer of skills when the migrants return home.

Austria’s migration performance

• Score: 11.7
• Rank: 1

Strengths

• Large increase during the 1990s in the number of unskilled immigrants from developing countries living in Austria (rank by share of population: 1)
• Bears large share of the burden of refugees during humanitarian crises (rank: 4)
• Large number of immigrants from developing countries entering Austria (rank by share of population: 5)

Weaknesses

• Small share of foreign students from developing countries (35%; rank: 22)
• Tuition for foreign students higher than for nationals

Environment

Rich countries use a disproportionate amount of scarce resources, and poor countries are most vulnerable to global warming and ecological deterioration, so the CDI measures the impact of policies on the global climate, fisheries and biodiversity.

Austria’s environment performance

• Score: 6.2
• Rank: 17

Strengths

• No fishing subsidies (rank: 1)
• Low fossil fuel production rate per capita (0.0 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent; rank: 1)
• Low consumption of ozone-depleting chemicals (rank: 1)

Weaknesses

• Greenhouse gas emissions grew almost as fast as GDP in 1999–2009 (average annual growth rate/GDP, -0.040; rank: 27)
• Low gas taxes ($0.88 per liter; rank: 18)

Security

Since security is a prerequisite for development, the CDI rewards contributions to internationally sanctioned peacekeeping operations and forcible humanitarian interventions, rewards military protection of global sea lanes, and penalizes arms exports to poor and undemocratic governments.

Austria’s security performance

• Score: 6.1
• Rank: 6

Strengths

• Participates in major international security treaties and regimes
• Substantial financial and personnel contributions to UN peacekeeping operations over last decade (rank by share of GDP: 8)

Weaknesses

• Only moderate contributions to non-UN peacekeeping and humanitarian interventions over last decade (rank by share of GDP: 13)

Technology

Rich countries contribute to development through the creation and dissemination of new technologies. The CDI captures this by measuring government support for R&D and penalizing strong intellectual property rights regimes that limit the dissemination of new technologies to poor countries.

Austria’s technology performance

• Score: 5.7
• Rank: 8

Strengths

• Small share of government R&D expenditure on defense (rank by share of GDP: 4)
• Revokes unused patents

Weaknesses

• Offers patent-like proprietary rights to developers of data compilations, including those assembled from data in the public domain
• Imposes strict limitations on anti-circumvention technologies that can defeat encryption of copyrighted digital materials