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Consultative Group Meeting and Increased Donor Support to Yemen
On 15 and 16 November DFID hosted and led the hugely successful Yemen Consultative Group meeting at Lancaster House. The Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for International Development, Gareth Thomas, was there to meet the Yemeni President, Ali Abdullah Saleh, who used the occasion to reaffirm Yemen’s commitment to reform and poverty reduction.
The meeting raised a total of £2.6 billion for Yemen’s development needs, exceeding our expectations and those of the Government of Yemen. As well as hosting the meeting, DFID led the way on funding by announcing our intention to increase our programme to £50 million per year by 2010/11. This marks a five fold increase on current aid levels and means that we expect to deliver as much as £117 million to support Yemen’s development between now and 2011. Gareth Thomas also announced our intention to enter into a 10 year Development Partnership Agreement to help support and sustain the Government of Yemen’s commitment to reform and poverty reduction in the long term.
This scaling up of DFID’s assistance marks a major step change in Britain’s development relationship with Yemen. It is in response to Yemen’s high levels of poverty and the Government of Yemen’s political commitment to necessary and difficult reforms. As DFID increases its aid programme our priorities will be strengthening governance, increasing economic opportunities for poor people, and investing in Yemen’s people, with a priority on education for girls.
DFID already has programmes in basic education and maternal health, public financial management, security sector reform and justice reform. As well as increasing our work in these areas we anticipate working with other donors on water, which is a crucial issue for Yemen. We also plan to broaden our assistance to secondary and vocational education, again alongside other donors.
Looking forwards, we hope the Consultative Group marks the start of a fruitful and honest partnership to tackling Yemen’s problems. We are determined to do all we can to help and look forward to further work with the Gulf states and wider donor community in tackling this exciting and challenging agenda.
