Swedish Multi-Bi Aid and Development Effectiveness

Sammanfattning

The use among OECD donors of earmarked aid through multilateral channels, so called multi-bi support, has been increasing over the years. Multi-bi can result from the earmarking of core support to multilaterals (a “bilateralization” of multilateral aid) or from using multilateral organizations in bilateral aid (a “multilateralization” of bilateral aid).

Sweden’s increase in multi-bi funding has in general been an effect of the latter. At least since 2006, Sida has channelled an increasing share of its bilateral aid through multilateral organizations. However, the earmarking of core contributions (decided by the Government) has increased sixfold since 2018, amounting to over 2.6 billion SEK in 2023. With a total of over 13 billion SEK, multi-bi is now the single largest channel for Sweden’s bilateral aid. This is in line with the Government’s ambition to decrease the share of multilateral core support and to increase the weight on multi-bi aid.

Given the size of multi-bi aid, the effectiveness of this channel will have implications for the effectiveness of Sweden’s aid at large. EBA therefore commissioned this working paper on how Sida works with the internationally agreed development effectiveness principles in its multi-bi support. The authors study how the principles are promoted in, what is labelled the structural, normative, and operational dialogue with Sweden’s multi-bi partners. While the authors note that the effectiveness principles are of great importance to Sida, they find that promoting these principles in relation to multi-bi partners is challenging, in particular concerning the operational dialogue.

We hope that this study will be of relevance to the Swedish development cooperation offices at embassies that work with multi-bi support, but also for those working with development effectiveness at large.

EBA working papers are shorter studies that investigate a question of limited scope or that complements a regular EBA study. Working papers are not subject to a formal decision from the expert group but instead reviewed by the secretariat before publication. The authors are, as with other EBA publications, responsible for the content of the report and its conclusions.