Sections:
Multilateral organisations
Multilateral organisations have a critical role to play in helping developing countries achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Three institutions – the European Commission, the World Bank and the United Nations – already account for around 30% of global aid.
Multilateral agencies are usually established by intergovernmental agreement and are independent of the interests of any single country member or recipient government. Multilaterals have a strong comparative advantage in the fight against poverty because of the global reach of their operations, unique legitimacy, breadth and depth knowledge and expertise of staff.
Multilaterals set their own policies and have their own governance arrangements. As a member of a multilateral, Her Majesty's Government (HMG) has rights and duties which include participation at board meetings. These meetings provide an opportunity for HMG to influence the design and implementation of multilaterals’ policies and practices but only alongside all other members whose priorities may differ.
Institutional strategies
For many of the key multilateral organisations, DFID has developed individual Institutional Strategies (IS's). IS’s set out how DFID aims to work in partnership with each institution to deliver mutually agreed objectives, and contain action plans to assess progress against our strategic objectives. They are normally produced every 3-4 years in consultation with each institution itself and a range of civil society and other contacts.
The purpose of the IS to set out a framework for DFID’s engagement with an individual multilateral agency. This document
- Explains the agency's role within our overall vision of the international system, taking into account its mandate and effectiveness.
- Identifies priority objectives for our partnership, which will normally be linked to the agency’s own reform or change process.
- Explains and justifies a medium term strategy for financial support.
- Sets out a framework for assessing, on an annual and periodic basis, progress towards the identified objectives, including improvements in the agency's performance against its own and DFID's targets
- Outlines the management arrangements with the agency and any risks.
IS’s aim for a partnership approach, emphasising joint objective-setting and mutual benefit. A key focus of IS’s will also be to strengthen their ability to work in partnership with developing countries.
NAO report on Engaging with Multilaterals
The National Audit Office 2005 report on
Engaging
with Multilaterals
was commissioned as a management report for DFID rather than a published report
for Parliament. DFID found this a very helpful report that recognised the
complexity of the multilateral system. The report recognised that DFID has good
systems and assessments in place to ensure its support to multilaterals is
aligned with poverty reduction objectives. It also acknowledged that compared to
other benchmarked donors DFID has done most to analyse multilateral policies,
capacity, and performance and to inform its membership and funding decisions.
The report made some recommendations on how DFID can tighten its relationships and the need for a statement of our policy on multilaterals. DFID has already addressed some of these issues and is taking forward the main recommendations in the context of the 2007 White Paper on International Development.
- See further information on our recent work around multilateral effectiveness.
Last updated 17 September 2007