1. Role of International Aid Agencies in Educational Development in India
Dr Michael Ward, Senior Education Adviser, DFID India
NUEPA M.Phil/PhD Programme,

2. What is Aid?

3. What is Aid?
A transfer of resources on concessional terms – on terms that is more generous or softer than loans obtainable in the world’s capital markets – from rich countries to poorer countries.
Aid is Official Development Assistance (ODA) and is monitored and reported on by the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
For the DAC, aid qualifies as ODA on three criteria: must be undertaken by official agencies, such as DFID; must be for economic development and welfare; and must have a grant element of 25% or more – i.e., 100% grant or soft loan.

4. How much aid does India receive?

5. Aid to India

6. Sector Shares of Aid?

7. Sector shares of aid

8. Who gives aid to India?

9. Who gives aid to India?
Multilaterals, such as the World Bank, just over one third
Bilaterals – mainly Japan and the UK, but also Germany, just over one third
Smaller bilaterals
Foundations, such as the Gates Foundation
International NGOs

10. History of aid to India
Foreign aid has for the most part been used for part-funding Plan development expenditures.
During the 1980s, external flows covered about 18 percent of India’s total Gross Budgetary Support for central government ministries’ development programmes and assistance to the states, and were around 10% of the total public sector investment per annum, though this has been declining in the 1990s
Total external aid as a percentage of GDP fell from 1.4% in to less than 0.5% in , amounting to USD 3.57 billion.
With the continued rapid growth of the economy, aid had fallen to little more than 0.1% of GDP by 2006/7.
Accordingly, although aid initially made an important contribution to the government’s investment programme, over the past ten years this has become much less significant, and in GDP terms its quantum is now tiny.

11. Aid to Education Priorities
Post-independence and during 1960s and 70s, focus on skills – ‘manpower development’
US and UK support for IITs and Universities
During the 1980s growing recognition that poor quality and partial coverage of basic education was robbing millions of people in India access even to literacy and numeracy

12. Changing education aid priorities
World Conference on Education For All in Jomtien, Thailand, 1990 was a watershed for aid to education and developing countries
It pledged the attainment by 2000 of Universal Primary Education
Following Jomtien, international community, led by World Bank increased emphasis and funding of primary education, most, but not all, major donors followed suit

13. Changing education aid priorities
Dakar EFA, April 2000
Millennium Declaration and Millennium Development Goals, September 2000
Paris Declaration on Donor Harmonisation, 2004

14. Primary Education in India
National Policy on Education 1986 renews commitment to have all children in school
Operation Blackboard
Jomtien, 1990
Programme of Action in 1992
Aid to education in India increased greatly after 1990 and focused on primary education
GoI changed its views regarding aid for primary education and developed APEP, BPEP and ultimately DPEP

15. Primary Education in India
DPEP supported by World Bank, EC, UK and Netherlands focused on the most educationally backward districts:
Increased access;
Improved equity – gender, SC and ST
Improved quality
At its height DPEP covered half the country. 85% of DPEP costs funded from aid.

16. Elementary Education in India
86th Constitutional Amendment Act (December 2002) making education a fundamental right for all children aged 6 to 14 years
Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan designed to make the Act a reality
Right to Education Bill (December 2008?) to secure the gains of SSA and make states accountable for free and compulsory education
World Bank, DFID and EC $2billion for SSA (10% of the total expenditure 2001/02 to 2009/10)

17. Why does India want aid for education
In the 1980s and 1990s, India faced real financial constraints
India wanted to learn from other countries
Technical assistance was necessary for key areas such as curriculum, materials development, assessment
Joint supervision of education programmes, with external scrutiny, helped to increase the rigour of programme management and implementation

18. Benefits of aid to education in india
GoI is responsible for policy, but aid funded programmes have helped to shape the direction and enrich this, particularly in terms of programme design.
APEP, NFE (UNICEF), Shiksha Karmi Project (1987) and Lok Jumbish (1992) in Rajasthan (Sweden and UK), Mahila Samakhya (Netherlands and now UK), Bihar Primary Education project have all contributed to the design of DPEP and SSA

19. Benefits of aid to education in india
Financial support in the 1990s made expansion of primary education possible
International support for Jomtien, Dakar and MDGs have impacted on priorities in Indian education
Joint Review Missions are effective vehicles for policy dialogue, supervision and reflection on what is working, involving the Centre and States
Focus on access giving way to emphasis on quality, technically supported by donors – aid accelerates the pace of change

20. Changing modalities of aid to education
Early years: stand alone projects, such as development of a single institution (IIT)
Broad-based projects: teacher training and textbooks
Programmes
Sub-sector programmes
Sector Wide Approaches

21. CHARACTERISTICS OF FINANCIAL AID
Aid Form
Conditionality
Earmarking
Accountability
BoP Support
Macro
None or nominal
Debt Relief
Macro and budget
None or poverty virtual fund (e.g. Uganda)
Government systems
General Budget Support
Sector Budget Support
Sectoral
To sector or within sector
Projects using Govt systems
(Sector and) Project
Project
Government system
Projects using parallel systems
Limited by low ownership?
Total
Donor

22. Future of aid to education in India
India is an aid paradox: it has lots of poverty and a low quality basic education system, having high rates of non attendance and low achievement levels but aid is tiny relative to the Government’s own fiscal effort and economic growth and middle income status will make it hard for donors to justify aiding the country.
India is a country where aid to education is effective, much more so than many other developing countries

23. Some research questions: a PhD in aid to education?
What has been the impact of aid to education?
How is it that primary education has been prioritised and now secondary education, but not literacy or early childhood?
What international experience and best practice has been brought in and adopted by developing countries through aid?
Has aid been able to influence or enrich India’s education policy?

24. Some research questions: a PhD in aid to education?
Has aid helped to leverage allocations to education?
Has aid helped to improve the quality of education?
Between the tax payer in a rich country and the poor child in India there stands two enormous bureaucracies – the aid agency and the recipient government – how much of the tax payers’ dollars have benefited the poor child inside or outside a school in India?