Today in Berlin, Welthungerhilfe and Terre des Hommes presented the 19th annual report "The Reality of Aid". The Parliamentary State Secretary in the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development, Gudrun Kopp, commented:
"Chancellor Angela Merkel has once more expressly reaffirmed her commitment to provide 0.7 per cent of gross domestic product for development cooperation by 2015. This is reflected in the development of the BMZ's budget: for three years now, the budget has been growing, reaching a third successive all-time high this year. Generally, it must be said that the amount of money spent is not an indication of the value of the assistance. What matters is its effectiveness. This is also why in January this year, we merged our three implementing agencies for technical cooperation into the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ). And we want to tap additional funding, for example by increasing our guarantee envelope for development loans. As a result, we will have more funding for the poorest countries. As far as tied aid is concerned, I would like to note that the BMZ is acting in line with OECD guidelines. It must be pointed out that as part of international commitments such as the Paris and Accra declarations, we have committed ourselves to untying our aid. We can be proud of the progress made so far. Almost 80 per cent of the flows we deliver through various implementing agencies has already been untied. So it is certainly not accurate to say that we are providing export assistance to German enterprises."