The proposed aid budget for 2016 is thus NOK 34.8 billion, which is over 1 % of Norway’s gross national income (GNI).
In addition, the Government is proposing to reallocate NOK 4.2 billion to cover the costs associated with receiving refugees.
Next year’s historically large humanitarian aid budget, which includes allocations to Syria and its neighbouring countries, will not be affected. The war in Syria has resulted in a humanitarian disaster and the crisis is steadily worsening. More than 7.5 million Syrians are internally displaced, and over 4 million have fled to neighbouring countries. Not since 1945 have so many people in the world been forced to flee their homes.
In its proposed aid budget for 2016, the Government is giving priority to the areas of education for children and young people, humanitarian assistance, and health in fragile states. It is through our efforts in these areas that we can make the biggest contribution to alleviating need, helping refugees close to conflict areas, preventing new crises from developing and ensuring long-term development in poor countries. These priority areas will be shielded as far as possible from the changes to the aid budget we are now proposing. The same applies to allocations for the Middle East and Africa.
The rules for reporting on official development assistance (ODA) allow countries to use their aid budgets to cover the costs of refugees’ basic needs such as food and shelter for the first year of stay in their country of arrival. This is established practice in a number of OECD countries, including our neighbouring countries Sweden and Denmark, and the Netherlands. These countries are now spending more than 20 % of their aid on costs associated with receiving refugees and asylum seekers in their own countries.
At the moment, we estimate that the costs associated with receiving refugees and asylum seekers in Norway in 2016 will be around NOK 10 billion. The Government is proposing to reallocate NOK 3.825 billion within the part of the 2016 aid budget that is administered by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and NOK 378.3 million within the part of the aid budget that is administered by the Ministry of Climate and Environment (i.e. Norway’s International Climate and Forest Initiative).
These latest changes will mean that over NOK 7.3 billion (21 % of the aid budget for 2016) will go towards covering the costs associated with receiving refugees in Norway.
We are now having to take difficult decisions and make changes to the aid budget in order to be able to receive refugees in Norway and ensure that they are treated with dignity. However, the level of spending on other forms of assistance will continue to be very high. The Government plans to spend NOK 27.5 billion on aid in 2016, not counting expenditure associated with receiving refugees in Norway. Norway’s total aid budget for 2016 makes us one of the largest aid donors in the world, both in terms of percentage of GNI (1.03 %) and not least in terms of foreign aid per capita. In terms of foreign aid per capita, Norway ranks without doubt number one among the OECD countries’, as shown in the table below:
Foreign aid per capita in OECD countries, USD (2014):
|
Foreign aid per capita 2014
|
|
Norway
|
978
|
|
Luxembourg
|
852
|
|
Sweden
|
642
|
|
UK
|
302
|
|
Germany
|
201
|
|
USA
|
103
|
To put the latest changes into perspective: if we don’t count the expenditure associated with receiving refugees in Norway, the proposed aid budget for 2016 is nearly the same as Norway’s total aid budget in 2012 (NOK 27.5 billion and NOK 27.8 billion respectively).
We have largely managed to shield the areas the Government considers are most important for preventing new crises from arising and providing assistance in countries close to areas of conflict – education for children and young people, health, humanitarian assistance, job creation, peacebuilding in fragile states and efforts in Africa and the Middle East.
Like many others, NGOs will notice that there has been a significant change in our priorities. This has been necessary to enable us to respond to the acute migration challenges Norway is facing. At the same time, a number of NGOs have a key role to play in administering the historically high allocations of aid to Syria and other crisis areas.