The government
has renamed Foreign Aid Policy to Development Cooperation Policy aiming at
increasing its effectiveness of foreign assistance
During the Local
Donor meeting here today to discuss the draft of Development Cooperation Policy
2013, the Finance Ministry also urged the development partners to extend their
assistance through budgetary system as the Development Cooperation Report 2012 had
revealed that almost a quarter of the foreign assistance is still out of
budgetary system. “Some 23 per cent of the total aid has still been out of the
budgetary channel hampering government’s efforts to maintain transparency in
foreign assistance,” chief economic adviser of the Finance Ministry Chiranjibi
Nepal said.
The donors
have been supporting various non-governmental organisations (NGOs) except their
Official Development Assistance (ODA).
“Channelising
the foreign assistance through the budgetary system will help increase the
transparency and accountability,” he said, adding that the transparency and
accountability – the key buzz words of the development partners – will also
help better outcome from the external assistance and lessen the dependency on
foreign aid.
Presenting the
highlights of the proposed Development Cooperation Policy, joint secretary at
the minister and chief of the Foreign Aid Coordination Department Madhu Kumar
Marasini said that the draft has focused on establishing a system to accept and
mobilise foreign assistance in line with the government policy to reap maximum benefit
in a transparent manner.
The proposed
Policy envisages an environment to accelerate economic growth through
effectively channelising foreign aid in line with the government policy, create
an environment for private sector growth, trade enhancement and formulate a
mechanism for effective implementation of donor funded programmes.
The proposed
foreign aid policy will help graduate Nepal from the current status of Least
Developed Country (LDC) to Developing Country status, said finance minister Shankar
Prasad Koirala said, chairing the meeting.
However, donor’s
support would play a key role in its effort to graduate Nepal to developing
country, he said, adding that Nepal with proper utilization of foreign aid
would graduate to developing country status by 2022. “The proposed policy is aligned
to approach paper of third three-year interim plan and included the interest of
development partners, and aims at restoring the confidence of private sector.”
The
political stability after the CA election will ensure the economic growth, the
minister added.
Finance secretary
Shanta Raj Subedi, on the occasion, informed that the timely budget for the
current fiscal year will help spur the economic growth this fiscal year
2013-14.
Addressing the meeting, World
Bank country manager for Nepal Tahsin Sayeed asked the government to speed up
the process of implementing the long pending economic reform to create
investment friendly environment in the country.
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