The global recession has forced international relief agencies to cut jobs and scale back overseas aid programmes and there may be worse to come
LONDON (AlertNet) - The global recession has forced international relief agencies to cut jobs and scale back overseas aid programmes and there may be worse to come. AlertNet talked to a range of sources in the overseas aid and development sector to get a sense of how the economic climate was affecting their operations.
Here are some of their comments on key issues:
PUBLIC DONATIONS
John Davison, head of media, Christian Aid
"The main problem has been a serious downturn in voluntarily giving in the UK, to us, particularly at Christian Aid week in May. This year we came in something like 3 million pounds under what we'd hoped for Â? On top of that there's been a more gradual shortfall in giving that's been reflected across the sector Â? We'll have to cut back on international department spending, with staff cuts and programme cuts, which is all highly regrettable"
EXCHANGE RATE
John Low, Charities Aid Foundation
"The biggest problem for the overseas charities is the real burden of the exchange rate loss. They've committed projects where they said theyÂ?d support particular pieces of work and sometimes they're faced with additional funding of 25 percent ... theyÂ?re not able in the current environment to wind up their fundraising easily"
Marie Staunton, director, Plan UK
"This year, for example, our transfer-to-field programmes went right down because we judge them in the euro Â? therefore the pound is buying less. We went through all our ongoing projects and worked out which ones we had to slow down because the pound was buying so much less. It's a question of slowing things down rather than stopping things. If you do things early enough you can slow things down, if not you have to stop things."
GOVERNMENT AID
Dirk Willem te Velde, researcher, Overseas Development Institute
"I think there are major challenges ahead. We're not out of the woods yet. In a number of developed countries there will be severe pressures on budgetary resources for some years to come and that will include scrutiny about aid resources. We have to realise that aid is more needed than ever before Â? You want to have more aid going into developing countries now because thereÂ?s a shortfall of financial flows"
EMERGENCY APPEALS
Brendan Gormley, chief executive, Disasters Emergency Committee
"Although we continue to be impressed by the publicÂ?s generosity, recent appeals have fallen short of the totals we would normally hope to achieve. Another sign that people are feeling the pinch is the significant increase in the number of offers of goods or time that we saw during our recent appeal for Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam. Although such offers are clearly well intentioned they are not the best way for people to help during an overseas emergency."
STAFF CUTS
John Low, Charities Aid Foundation
"WeÂ?ve seen a number of jobs cut in the donor countries to try and preserve jobs out in the field which is quite harsh, and that means it's hard to do the fundraising support and work with the donors if theyÂ?re scaling back"
Farhana Faruqi Stocker, managing director,
"In terms of unrestricted funds, compared to all previous records, there's been a significant impact. We've had to do restructuring which basically resulted in two full-time members in the London office and a high number of staff here in country being laid off"
STRATEGIC THINKING
Suman Nag, head of communications, SEEDS, India
"What is being reinforced is that we need to be doing our own fundraising, that institutional donors may continue (to give) but this economic situation has reinforced the thought that there should be a mechanism where the share of institutional donors and your own fundraising should be balanced"
FUTURE MERGERS
Barbara Wallace, vice-president for membership and standards at InterAction
"We held a meeting last May about innovative solutions for tight resources, including sharing projects and sometimes even sharing staff over things, and really looking to collaborate in new ways. We also did something about mergers and acquisitions, when do you know when it's time for you to just join with someone who's got a different resource set so you can keep the projects going but inside a different structure"
2010 OUTLOOK
Tom O'Connor, director of communities and supporters, Cafod
"I'd be inclined to think we've got hard times again, with taxes rising and possibly unemployment going up further"
John Low, Charities Aid Foundation
"There's a lag factor - at the beginning of your recession or final crisis everyone is in work who is going to be in work and then they start to lose jobs so the decline in donations lags behind the worst of the recession. It happens time and again and itÂ?s happening this time"
Barbara Wallace, InterAction
"What we do know is that when we had the Great Depression, giving decreased but it didn't decrease at the same rate as the depression so that's hopefully a predictor but nobody knows"
- Additional reporting by Thin Lei Win in Bangkok, Anastasia Moloney in Bogota
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