Slovenia

Total aid in 2011: €45m

About Slovenia's aid commitments:

Main changes in 2011

The amount of Slovenian ODA has increased from last year but the international commitments on aid quantity were not met. There were not any significant changes in relation to aid quality. Most of the recommendations from 2010 were taken to account by the Slovenian MFA insufficiently; for example The Slovenian government made further ODA cuts which threatens the predictability of ODA.

Aid Quantity

In 2011 Slovenia’s ODA amounted to €45 million. The proportion of GNI remained at the same level as in 2010 – 0.13. The main improvement was recorded in the increase of the genuine aid from 92% in 2010 to 97% in 2011.

System of development cooperation

The national coordinating body for development assistance is the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and it’s Directorate for development cooperation and humanitarian aid. The Directorate is responsible for planning and coordinating strategies and policies of multilateral and bilateral development assistance and for preparing and monitoring of the normative standards in this field. In this scope it designs geographical and sectoral priorities, multiannual programs of development assistance for certain countries and bilateral agreements. It also monitors and cooperates in multilateral activities carried out by international institutions.

Recipient countries and sectors of bilateral aid

Poverty reduction is not the main objective of Slovenian ODA. Most of ODA is allocated as pre-accession aid to Western Balkan countries and Moldova.

Main challenges in 2012 and beyond

According to current official projections of MFA, Slovenia will not fulfil its 2015 target and will remain at the level of 0,13-0,14% until 2015. The other challenges are linked with aid effectiveness of Slovenian ODA, mainly transparency, predictability, gender and consultations with CSO in the policy processes

Recommendations

• Increase bilateral ODA and ensure that ODA will be spent on activities which have primarily focus on reducing poverty. Efforts must be done that aid is not used to pursue Slovenian foreign policy or commercial interests.

• Prevent any further ODA cuts and, despite crisis, progressively work towards ODA increase.

• Improve transparency of the ODA and provide more timely and detailed information on development aid flows, negotiations and procedures, include data on specific projects and relevant documents on the MFA website, as well as increase access to aid information for southern partners.

• Improve the consultation process with CSOs and other relevant stakeholders in all strategic planning of ODA. Consultation should also become more meaningful and structured.

• Define the role of the private sector in development cooperation, including develop clear framework how to hold private sector accountable for respecting and implementing existing principles of development effectiveness.