Development Policy

 

Luxembourg’s development cooperation increased significantly throughout the 1990s and continues to do so today. In 2000, it joined the group of countries which devote at least 0.7% of their GNI to ODA and the current government’s ODA objective is to reach 1% of GNI by 2005. See OECD figures.

 

Bilateral ODA is the principal pillar of Luxembourg’s development cooperation policy. In 2001, it accounted for 75% of its aggregate ODA. The 10 target countries of Luxembourg Development Cooperation in 2003 were Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Mali, Namibia, Niger, Senegal, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Laos and Vietnam. In addition to these countries, the West Bank and Gaza are considered a quasi-target country.

 

Luxembourg’s development cooperation activities focus on education ; training of human resources ; health (stressing the ESTHER initiative) ; water ; integrated development. Also, Luxembourg has made a contribution of €0.52 million to the HIPC initiative to benefit three target countries (Burkina Faso, Niger and Nicaragua), even though Luxembourg has no bilateral claim vis-à-vis HIPC.