Evidence-based Policy Making to Enhance Development Effectiveness

Abstract

In 2016 around USD 142 billion, the highest amount of ODA in history, went into developing countries to support their education, health, and governance, and ultimately to enhance the economic growth of developing countries. Korea's development assistance achieved a new peak of USD 2 billion in 2016, a 3.4% increase in real terms from 2015. Thus the amount of development assistance provided to developing countries from developed countries including Korea has been continuously increasing since 1990. After several decades of development assistance, policymakers and the civil society are questioning the effect of development assistance. What results are these huge amounts of development assistance actually having? Does this assistance efficiently and effectively support the growth of developing countries? If not, what can we do to enhance the effect of development assistance?