Aid

•To help, support or relieve
•It does not have to be money
•It can be goods, technical assistamce in the building up of infrastrucure, agriculture and industry

Advantages:

•Aid is diverse in both the way it is delivered and the objectives of any programme

•Quick and easy supplies of money and/or resources can be gathered and shipped to where they are needed

•As a means to development it can be directed to economic development or humanitarian purposes, social development or environmental improvement

•When spent in the correct way eg. sepnt on schools, it can benfit future generations

Disadvantages:

•Recession - high income countries should give 0.7% of their GNI in aid

•In 2006 aid was estimated $280 billion below this target

•By 2012 only 5 countries has met their target: Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden

•Aid dependency - aid agencies hesitate to provide food and other help for extended periods following emergencies to not create dependency

•Conditionally (tied aid)

•Focuses on specifics not the whole country

•Some argue that aid has made the situation worse in Africa (good book to read on this is Dead Aid by Dambisa Moyo)

•Corruption/ineffective use of aid - aid money often does not get to where it is needed or used inefficiently eg. Chad