Over the last year we have heard a lot about the Millennium Development Goals and listened to renewed pledges from many of the world’s leading economies to fulfil their promises of aid to reduce poverty and improve access to basic resources. While there are many who say that aid is too much or that it’s wasted by corrupt recipient governments, the reality is that both the quantity and quality of international aid is questionable and donor countries have not been properly held to account.

Aid is not the same as charity and often includes educational and business development. It often comes with conditions reflecting the political and  economic interests of the donor nation such as economic reform. However, in the short-term, these reforms can benefit the donor country more than the recipient as the new policies cause imports to increase dramatically, while the increase in exports lags behind. In 2005, Christian Aid estimated that sub-Saharan Africa was $272 billion worse off as a result of trade policies adopted as conditions of aid and debt relief.

As the same time as being made to sign up to free trade agreements, protectionist policies often mean that important markets in the US, EU and Japan are effectively no-go areas for exporters in poorer nations. Western governments can spend hundreds of billions of pounds every year on agricultural subsidies that create a glut in supply. This results in artificially low prices with which developing nations are often unable to compete. Latin America alone is estimated to lose $4 billion annually as a result of EU farm policies.