Will the G8 deliver on Africa?

By David Loyn BBC Developing World Correspondent

There are no guarantees that aid promises will be honoured

The surprise announcement of a major increase in aid by President Bush ahead of the G8 summit put protestors on the back foot and set the stage for a historic breakthrough; suddenly things could change in Africa.

Well, that was three years ago.

The G8 then, in Kananaskis in Canada, as now in Gleneagles in Scotland, was to focus on the problems of Africa.

So what has happened to the billions of dollars which President Bush promised then in what he called a Millennium Challenge Account?

So far, there's been just one grant, to Madagascar, for less than $100,000.

Targets not met

If the extent of world commitment is to be measured in terms of aid, then Africans can be forgiven for cynicism.

On aid, as the leaders pat themselves on the back for having a timetable which would move towards 0.7%, they should remember that the original commitment a generation ago was 0.7% immediately, moving to 1% by the year 2000.

It was back in 1969 that the Nobel Peace Prize winner and former Canadian Prime Minister Lester Pearson first proposed that industrialised countries should commit 0.7% of their gross domestic product, or GDP, for overseas aid.

The target was adopted by the United Nations the following year, and most developed countries, although not the United States, signed up to it.

But only a handful of small European economies have reached the 0.7% target.

If all developed countries had hit 0.7%, then the global total of development assistance would be £100bn.

At present it is not much more than a quarter of that.

The pledges made ahead of Gleneagles would bring it up to around £50bn.

Lowered ambitions

There have been broken promises too on the other two solutions to Africa highlighted by the Geldof and Bono bandwagon, debt and trade.

On debt, some of Africa's frailest economies have found it hard to qualify for relief, because they cannot fulfil stringent conditions.

And on trade, the current round of negotiations, said to be the round "for the developing world" is already a year beyond schedule, as the biggest economies, Japan and America in particular, along with much of Europe cling onto farm subsidies.

And what about the things which are not expected to feature at Gleneagles: the drain on professionals, which means that there are more Malawian health workers in Birmingham than in the whole of Malawi?

Or the arms trade; diamonds; the role of London in the corruption payments which so damage Africa costing around £75bn a year, dwarfing the aid budget.

On aid, as the leaders pat themselves on the back for having a timetable which would move towards 0.7%, they should remember that the original commitment a generation ago was 0.7% immediately, moving to 1% by the year 2000.

What a difference that would have made.