Official Development Assistance (ODA) could play a crucial role in tackling the immediate impacts of the coronavirus crisis and supporting a recovery centred on human rights, gender equality and a just transition.

After a brief overview of the state of play of ODA, drawing on the most recent data available, this briefing paper looks at the initial responses to Covid-19 of the main bilateral providers of ODA. It finds these responses are significant, representing roughly 20 percent of total bilateral ODA. However, it remains unclear to what extent these resources can be considered as ODA and whether they are in fact additional to the resources that had been committed before the start of the pandemic.

Given the lack of ambition voiced by members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) in their joint statement to ‘strive to protect aid budgets’, it is all but certain that aid spending will remain at current levels in the near future. However, in the context of expansionary fiscal and monetary policies in donor countries and the moral imperative to address the global consequences of the coronavirus outbreak, this paper makes the case for an urgent upscaling of ODA as part of a more comprehensive, systemic multilateral response.

Report by Eurodad