Japan is biggest aid donor

Japan is biggest aid donor
AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE

TOKYO, OCT 20: Japan was the world's biggest donor of overseas development aid for the ninth straight year in 1999, but six smaller countries gave a greater proportion of their national wealth, the Government said on Friday.

"Japan was the top ODA (Official Development Assistance) donor in the world in 1999. That makes nine consecutive years since 1991", that Japan has led the donor rankings, a foreign ministry official said. Japan's ODA rose by $ 4.7 billion, or 44.0 percent from the previous year, to $ 15.3 billion in 1999.

In yen terms, ODA rose 352.7 billion yen, or 25.3 percent to 1.75 trillion yen. "The yen surged significantly against other currencies. Japan focused on dealing with Asian currency and economic crisis," the ministry explained in a report. Japan donated about 3.3 billion dollars to Asian currency crisis assistance funds via the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the ministry said.

Japan's bilateral ODA to Asian countries in 1999 was $ 6.6 billion, up 23.4 percent from $ 5,372 million in 1998, accounting for 62.8 percent of its bilateral assistance to the world, slightly up from 62.4 percent in 1998. Japan's total bilateral development assistance was $ 10.5 billion in 1999, compared with $ 8.6 billion in 1998.

Almost 10 percent of Japan's bilateral assistance - or $ 994.6 million - went to Africa in 1999, up from $ 950.3 million in 1998.

Aid to Eastern Europe dropped to $ 17.5 million, accounting for 0.2 percent of its entire bilateral assistance in 1999, down from $ 47.42 million in 1998. Japan's paid out the equivalent of 0.35 percent of its Gross National Product (GNP) in development aid last year, placing it seventh out of 22 countries on the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)'s Assistance Committee.

It was ranked 12th in 1998. Denmark gave the largest proportion of its national wealth with a ratio of 1.0 percent, followed by Norway's 0.91 percent, and the Netherlands' 0.79 per cent. The United States gave the least of the 22 with an aid-to-GNP ratio of 0.1 percent, the ministry said.