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Written by Patrick Smith
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Monday, 25 May 2009 14:08 |
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In the worst financial crisis since the 1930s, arguments over the role of foreign aid are central to the debate over Africa’s policy options. In London on 7 April, Ghana’s President John Atta Mills insisted that he was on a mission to negotiate trade and investment and not looking for aid, adding that the crisis would force Africa to become more self-reliant: “I am not returning to Ghana with my pockets full of pounds sterling. We will have to import less food and grow more locally.”
After The Africa Report interviewed Zambian economist Dambisa Moyo, author of ‘Dead Aid’, which advocates the rapid phasing-out of the foreign-aid cycle in Africa, the debate was joined by development economists, finance ministers and officials in international financial institutions.
The IMF’s Africa director, Antoinette Sayeh, also took a strong stance on proposed aid cuts: “Aid has been shown to have a very positive impact on growth and poverty reduction in Africa. We think it’s actually dangerous to suggest that the appropriate response to Africa’s problems at this very difficult time is to further deprive AIDS patients and young people, who’ve been out of school for a decade because of a civil war, of access to education and health.”
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