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Many development advocates are counting on Germany to step up bravely and save on international aid. In fact, the country has just announced a major overhaul of its aid strategy. But this is no fairy tale. Germany’s shining armor may have some flaws.
Also, in today’s edition, relations between Africa and Arab countries are getting closer and closer, but will the promised billions of dollars materialize? Moreover, are African countries selling their citizens’ data to get money from the US? The lucky winners of the year-end quiz will also get an upgrade to pro!
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Will Germany come to the rescue?
The United States, long the world’s number one donor nation, has rightly gotten a lot of attention. In second place is Germany, which is currently attracting a lot of attention as the United States falls back from the top spot.
And many are encouraged by the recent reforms announced by Germany’s Development Minister Riem Aravalli Radovan, aimed at overhauling the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).
These reforms focus on least developed countries (LDCs), offering loans rather than subsidies based on a country’s income level, and a commitment to work with local partners.
“They have made it very clear that they want to focus their foreign aid on the countries where it will have the greatest impact, where it is most needed,” Heiner Janus of the German Institute for Development and Sustainability told my colleague Jesse Chase Lubitis.
“Euros of foreign aid to least developed countries have a much greater potential impact than spending the same money in middle-income countries,” he added, warning that implementation remains vague with scant details on how the agenda will be realized, especially in the context of Germany’s own deep aid cuts.
“There is a risk that ambition and resources will not match,” says Anita Khepeli of the Center for Global Development.
The new strategy is also full of contradictions. For example, Janus says that although there is an emphasis on including German companies, the number of German companies active in LDCs is not large.
That’s not the only red flag. The rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, a weak domestic economy, and pressure from the United States to increase defense spending have combined to force the German government to walk a fine line between appeasing voters and funding development.
Read: Germany charts a new path for global aid
+ Listen: The United States may be down when it comes to foreign aid spending, but it’s certainly not down, at least if Congress has something to say about it. Check out the latest episode of the podcast “This Week in World Development,” where reporters break down a $50 billion foreign aid bill that ignores President Donald Trump’s requested 47.7% budget cuts. From its ramifications for global health to its impact on the extension of the Africa Growth and Opportunity Act, we analyze the bill’s core priorities and its long-term impact on the global development landscape.
African and Arab fusion
The African Development Bank and the Arab Coordination Group have just concluded their meeting in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, and are strengthening their relationship. The meeting marked the first time the Arab Development Financial Institutions bloc convened at AfDB headquarters.
“These high-level consultations mark a deliberate shift from cooperation to co-investment, from parallel efforts to coordinated impact, and from ad hoc deals to programmatic engagement and strategic collaboration,” said AfDB President Sidi Ould Tah, who positions the Bank as a bridge between Africa and new sources of financing, particularly with the Gulf states.
It seems like the feelings are mutual. “Africa is a priority of priorities for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” said Sultan Al-Marshad, CEO of the Saudi Development Fund.
In fact, the Arab Coordination Group, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary, announced that it aims to pump up to $50 billion into Africa in 2023, focusing on energy, trade, food security, private sector financing, economic inclusion of youth and women, and support for fragile states.
However, no significant amount of investment was achieved at the Abidjan meeting. Instead, the main outcome was a joint declaration outlining how the AfDB and the Arab Coordination Group plan to work more closely together, writes my colleague Ayeenat Murthy.
This reflects the close ties Tarr has built with Gulf countries, which was a key reason for his victory in last year’s AfDB presidential election. The background was on display in Abidjan, where Tarr began his speech in Arabic.
“Let this meeting in Abidjan be remembered as a turning point where Africa and the Arab world choose to deepen their already strong partnership, not out of nostalgia for the past, but out of responsibility for the future,” he said.
Read: AfDB and Arab lenders move towards closer cooperation
back to basics
“Radical simplicity,” Dr. Sania Nishtar, CEO of Gavi, the vaccine alliance, described the organization’s transformation at a recent Devex Pro briefing.
It looks like she has the numbers to back it up. Gavi will now support countries with two funding levers instead of 30, reducing the number of contracts from 700 to around 60. We have also digitized the grant process to reduce the bureaucratic burden on countries.
Indeed, countries, and leading countries, are central to Gavi’s reforms.
“When I arrived in March 2024, the health ministers told us they wanted more agencies, more control over resources, lower administrative costs and simpler processes. So I came back and that was the premise of the Gavi Leap for reform,” Nishtar said.
These reforms reduced the organization’s operating costs by 40%, but at the cost of losing 33% of its staff.
Still, Nishtar hopes that Gavi’s reforms will contribute to the conversation about revamping the global health care structure, turning generalities into actionable specifics.
“Every newspaper will tell you that sovereignty is important and that countries should transition. But the devil is in the details. How will that happen? We have to make fundamental implementation choices that put countries in charge. We have to actively demonstrate what graduation looks like,” she said. “There are a lot of conversations going on, but now we need to get into specifics.”
Read more: Gavi reforms will put countries in the driver’s seat, says Sania Nishtar (Pro)
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personal data breach
In detail, the Trump administration has entered into a series of bilateral health agreements in quick succession with various African countries, fleshing out the outlines of a global health strategy.
But again, the devil is in the details. There’s one thing about Kenya’s $2.5 billion health deal that hasn’t been well-received by critics. It involves sharing personal data with the United States in exchange for funding.
“Citizens of Kenya and other countries targeted by the ‘America First’ global health strategy are at risk of losing control over one of their most valuable assets: their health data. Once that control is lost, the benefits generated from the data no longer revert to the people who generate it, but the risks from misuse to exclusion remain,” said Jesse Willem d’Anjou and Nicole Spieker of PharmAccess, and PharmAccess Femke Heddema of the Foundation writes in a paper. Devex opinion article.
They argue that in this “new transactional and asymmetric geopolitical order, even health data becomes a strategic currency.”
“Even when anonymized, health data can be reused, combined, and misused at scale, especially in the age of AI,” they warn. “Over time, this dynamic erodes a fundamental pillar of the digital age: data sovereignty and, with it, people’s individual and collective agency over how their health information is used, managed, and monetized.”
Opinion: In Africa, citizens will pay for their health data as a bargaining chip
In other news
After months of delays, the United States will send a $3 million humanitarian aid package to hurricane-ravaged Cuba, and the State Department has warned Cuban authorities not to disrupt its distribution amid geopolitical tensions in the region. (Reuters)
A Greek court has acquitted 24 former aid workers accused of human trafficking after rescuing migrants on the island of Lesbos, ending years of litigation that was widely criticized as an attempt to criminalize humanitarian aid in Europe. (BBC)
A $1.6 million U.S.-funded hepatitis B vaccine study in Guinea-Bissau has been halted following widespread criticism over ethical concerns about withholding a proven life-saving vaccine from newborns. (The Guardian)
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