MINISTER OF State for overseas development Peter Power has said most EU states, Ireland among them, are struggling to meet their development aid targets in the economic crisis.
While Minister for Finance Brian Lenihan is likely to cut Ireland's aid allocation in the upcoming budget, Mr Power disclosed yesterday that the Government is obliged under a commitment it made four years ago to increase its aid allocation next year.
Mr Lenihan cut aid expenditure this year to €696 million from €920 million in 2008, a decrease that took the level of expenditure down to about 0.48 per cent of gross national product (GNP) from 0.59 per cent.
Despite expectations that aid expenditure will be curtailed next month when Mr Lenihan cuts the public spending bill by a total of €4 billion, Mr Power said the Government promised when signing the 2005 "European consensus on development" pact to bring aid expenditure in 2010 to 0.51 per cent of GNP.
"It wouldn't be widely known that we have made an interim commitment to reach 0.51 per cent by 2010 next year. There was general agreement that each country must do its utmost to reach that figure next year," Mr Power said on the fringes of a meeting of EU development ministers.
"It's clear from the development ministers at the meeting this morning that most if not all countries are struggling to deal with development aid in the context of the economic downturn so the key point is that Ireland is not alone."
Mr Power said he would be meeting Mr Lenihan today but he would not comment on the likelihood of his budget being cut.
While stating that all ministers were fighting to retain their budgets, he said the actual allocation was a matter for the Cabinet.
"I can't really go into the detail of what my discussions will be, I'm just reporting on what the outcome of this meeting is," he said.
"Everybody set out the difficulties which they face and were not alone in them."