Publications
Accountability for our aid dollar - Time to hit the pause button?
OCCASIONAL PAPER
There are serious questions to be asked about the number of NGOs that actively campaign for more aid expenditure in Australia, while they are concurrently recipients of that aid. Some of these NGOs receive aid funding to engage in domestic political activity - such as WWF and ACF - including climate change policy advocacy and consumer campaigns - such as Oxfam.
There are also serious questions about NGOs allocated aid funding and how they spend it on promoting social, political and environmental objectives that run contrary to the aid and development goals of the Australian government.
Australia's aid program clearly supports promoting sustainable economic development. At an earlier stage of economic development than wealthier nations, developing countries are required to exploit their natural resources as they make the leap from a subsistence economy to manufacturing and eventually a service-based economy. NGOs receiving public money - like WWF - have continuously engaged in activities that undermine the ability of developing countries to leverage their comparative advantage, such as in mining, forestry and agriculture development.