An economics professor anticipates more aid funding from the Australian government, despite cuts in its latest budget.
Australia pared back its foreign aid spending by nearly $500 million, but it also announced additional short term funding of $AU335 million to help countries, such as Papua New Guinea, cope with Covid-19.
This additional funding will stop after two years.
Photo: Long Zheng/ CC BY-SA 2.0
The director of the Development Policy Centre at the Australian National University, Stephen Howes, said this is not realistic. Although the Budget was disappointing in the sense of embedding those cuts, I think as the situation unfolds the government will recognise that it does need more money and, of course, it can afford more money. It s shown it s willing to run a very large deficit, so I think rather than seeing this support wound back so quickly, we will, in the course of the year, see further extensions of funding, he said.
Australia’s 2021 Federal Budget Reveals the Future of Australian Aid
We unpack what the latest budget means for regional COVID-19 recovery.
Why Global Citizens Should Care
The budget tells us what Australia will spend on international development in the coming year, as well as funding for other key areas like Australian education, gender equality and the environment. With more than 700 million people still living in extreme poverty, and with the knock-on effects of COVID-19 threatening families worldwide, aid is more important than ever. Join Global Citizen and take action on hunger, poverty and global health security here.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, in his hand down of the 2021 Australian Federal Budget last night, revealed the nation’s international development budget for 2021-22 will be $4.33 billion a decrease of $14 million from the year prior.
Date Time
COVID-19 Spikes Across Asia, Australian Aid Falls
The Australian Council for International Development (ACFID) – Australia’s peak-body for international development NGOs – has expressed concern that against the backdrop of an Asia-Pacific at the epicentre of the pandemic, Australia’s development assistance is declining.
Responding to the budget, ACFID CEO, Marc Purcell said:
“The Australian Government did the right thing by front-loading its immediate regional response to COVID-19. But despite COVID-19 deaths rising alarmingly across the Asia-Pacific, Australian development assistance is now declining.
“The situation is fast evolving, but our budget response is not. Beyond the two-year package for India, there are no new, additional investments in this budget for tackling the pandemic.
Published May 11, 2021
As we’re all wrapping our heads around everything the federal government announced in the 2021 Budget – and importantly who the big winners and losers are this time around – Budget responses from political parties and other groups are flowing in thick and fast.
Twitter is ablaze with Budget discussion and arguments, and official responses on different facets of the Budget have been delivered from bodies like the Clean Energy Council, Mission Australia, and the peak body for Australia’s international aid efforts.
Opposition leader
Anthony Albanese released a video response to the Budget, claiming that tonight’s announcements were “more of the same from a tired old government”.
Coronavirus Strikes Papua New Guinea
Coronavirus Strikes Papua New Guinea
There was a time when it seemed Papua New Guinea had managed to dodge a bullet. Instances of SARS-CoV-2 were minimal, along with its disease, COVID-19. Through 2020, the country of eight million people recorded a mere 900 cases. The World Health Organization praised the PNG government in a September 2020 news release in “taking the threat of the pandemic seriously with an all-of-government approach in strengthening the country’s health system and engaging communities to keep them safe from the virus.”
Officials acknowledged that a spike in cases could impair the medical system, despite the fact that three-quarters of the population are under the age of 35. While the elderly population is small, the large number of youthful members poses the problem of asymptomatic transmission. “We know that about 15% of COVID-19 cases will need some form of hospital care,” stated Dr Gary Nou, an importan