Plan to double overseas aid budget to €1.5bn unveiled

Ireland will spend more than €1.5 billion a year on overseas aid by 2012, more than twice the current budget, according to the Government's newly published White Paper on Aid.

Launching the document yesterday, the Taoiseach reaffirmed the Government's commitment to increasing aid spending to United Nations target levels and said it represented the blueprint for Ireland's assistance to the developing world into the future.

"These huge increases in spending demand that we plan carefully for the future," Mr Ahern writes in a foreword to the 128-page document. "In this White Paper we set out for the Irish people to see precisely where and how we propose to spend your money and what we believe are the priorities on which it should be spent."

Aid agencies and missionary groups gave the White Paper a warm welcome, but the Labour Party described it as a missed opportunity for dialogue with the developing world.

Mr Ahern also said there would be no rowing back on the decision to decentralise the State's aid programme, known as Irish Aid, to Limerick.

"I think decentralisation is a good thing for this country, we have to get away from this concept that Dublin is Ireland," he told journalists after the White Paper launch in the Mansion House.

"Here we're talking about working with the poorest countries all over the world. Where the office is makes no difference."

However, it emerged yesterday that more than half the positions in Limerick remain unfilled. Minister of State for Development Co-operation Conor Lenihan said 43 per cent of the staff requirement for Limerick had been met, and the first staff would move there next May. Difficulties with specialist staff, who are largely opposed to the move, remain unresolved, he said.

Mr Lenihan said the White Paper would confirm Irish Aid as a world leader in development, as well as moving development to the heart of foreign policy.

The document, the first White Paper on aid, contains a number of major initiatives and proposes new oversight mechanisms to ensure Irish aid is well spent and is not subject to corruption.

A dedicated unit for conflict analysis and resolution is to be established in the Department of Foreign Affairs. This will assist the Government in playing a direct role in supporting peace processes where conflicts have occurred.

A hunger task force also is to be established. This will draw on the public and private sectors in attempting to tackle the root causes of food scarcity, particularly in Africa.

The Government is also to set up a rapid response initiative, including a roster of highly skilled people for deployment to emergency situations and disaster as they occur.