Comments

I believe that removing the rankings would basically destroy the usefulness of the DB. They have been an important tool for achieving progress in business environments.

Dear Ashlee Thanks for opening this conversation. The International Development Contractors (IDC) Australia certainly welcomes the announcement of a Minister for International Development. While we acknowledge the result is not exactly as was proposed by the Independent Review of Aid Effectiveness, we consider this a positive step. We agree with earlier commentary by Professor Stephen Howes regarding the “uncertainty around the aid program’s future” and how a lack of predictability of forward funding can impact effectiveness. Consequently, we hope this Ministerial elevation as a recognition of the size and importance of the aid program assists to ensure a good program is built upon and strengthened in its pursuit of delivering effective aid to help the world’s poor. MEL DUNN Chair, IDC Australia <em> The IDC brings together more than 20 Australian and international private sector organisations that manage the delivery of international aid to the world’s poorest countries, on behalf of multilateral and bilateral organisations including AusAID.</em>

The 2013 People's Survey has just been released and can be downloaded here: http://www.ramsi.org/Media/docs/FINAL-Peoples-Survey-2013-1-final-111900c1-79e2-4f41-9801-7f29f6cd2a66-0.pdf

It’s good to see this discussion on the DB reports. The methodology is far from perfect and clearly requires improvement. The issues around this have been discussed for quite some time, including the IEG’s evaluation published in 2008. I am not sure I agree with the recommendation to remove the index. While the rankings are crude, they are a powerful tool for getting countries to think about these issues. The media love it and it gets governments and business to at least begin to talk about the need for reform - unlike other more “sound” assessments undertaken by the World Bank and other agencies. My biggest problem with the DB rankings is how they have been misused and included as measures of success for development assistance programmes.

I agree this is a big deal, the rankings are quoted extensively by a range of actors so to critique them in such harsh terms is really significant - thanks for highlighting this

Great to read about Helen's contribution to all of us former students. She pushed, shoved and bullied us through our PHDs - and we are all so grateful for that. Part of her legacy is a vast alumni across many developing countries, all pushing and shoving in our own way for sensible economics.

I completely agree Joel. I also particularly like that all of the data inputted into it is in the IATI standardised format, meaning that you could technically use the same software platform to show all of the data that has been published to IATI over the years from the 150+ organisations that have published (some not as rigorously as others) so far. Whether DFID wants to tread on that many toes is another question!

Thanks for the correction Jo, I'll amend the text above.

Sam, well done.

Thanks for highlighting this important issue and it is good to note Julie Bishop's response. For the record, the Family Planning Guidelines still exist - they were just rewritten.

It looks fabulous, well done

This is a very naive post. Belinda has never worked with India or China as they deliver their "aid." She have not experienced the way a developing country needs to deal with these two big players first hand, versus the much, much easier to work with EU, Australia. There are heavy consequences for not working with China the way they wish, and they replace local labor with foreigners, so bad things happen.