On Monday, 12.01.25, Development Minister Alabali Radovan presented her plan for the reform of German development cooperation. Roger Peltzer, Chairman of Pro Small Holder Farmers Africa e.V., comments on these plans:
The mountain has been circling for 7 months, and what is now in the minister’s reform plan presented on Monday, January 12, is not a mouse, but certainly not a very fundamental reform of the previous DC either. Nevertheless, there are a number of clear positive shifts in emphasis:
a) The fact that the special programs created by Minister Müller have been dissolved and the special program “One World – No Hunger” has been integrated into the “normal” BMZ work is certainly a positive development. The strategic goal of food security, particularly in Africa, will be retained. It is to be hoped that the BMZ will also overcome former Minister Müller’s narrow focus on food production. In fact, in recent decades, the BMZ has very successfully launched value-added programs in the area of sustainable cash crops for smallholder farmers, which not only make a strong contribution to food security through the income generated, but which also de facto promote food production in an integrated manner, so to speak, because all smallholder farmers grow cash crops such as coffee, cocoa, cashews and cotton in combination with food.
b) The number of cooperation countries will not be reduced. But cooperation with the individual partner countries is to be made much more flexible. This will hopefully put an end to the bad habit of the BMZ prescribing the sectors in which German development cooperation must take place “in dialog at eye level”.
c) Bilateral cooperation in the health sector is discontinued in favor of multilateral programs in the health sector such as Gavi. This measure makes a great deal of sense, as the multilateral programs mentioned in the concept work much more efficiently than German development cooperation in this area. Multilaterally, one euro invested in the health sector creates significantly more value for the target group than the previous bilateral development cooperation.
d) In the core of cooperation with emerging economies, no more grants are to be awarded. This also applies to TC. The emerging economies should also contribute more to the costs of TC measures. This also makes sense, especially as it means that the GIZ will have to face up to competition and become more efficient. The emerging economies will think carefully about what they themselves spend money on. Overall, TC measures should also be implemented more via other agencies, non-governmental organizations, etc. This also strengthens competition. This also strengthens competition. However, it would have been desirable to have an even clearer formulation that TC measures will in future be implemented much more via local executing agencies (para-statal institutions, NGOs, companies). Almost all countries now have the necessary expertise locally. The extremely expensive use of expats can and should be drastically reduced.
e) With regard to China, the paper suggests that the BMZ will have to adapt more strongly in future to the fact that the emerging countries of the Global South are becoming increasingly involved in development cooperation themselves. The BMZ must adapt to this to a much greater extent. It would be desirable to have a staff unit that systematically monitors the development cooperation of China, India, Brazil, Gulf countries, Turkey, etc. and evaluates it with regard to cooperation approaches with German/EU development cooperation. This would also be very beneficial with regard to a dialog on an equal footing with the emerging countries.
f) The tiresome topic of harmonizing FC and TC (this separation is absolutely unique in Germany) is addressed as in dozens of papers in the past, but the proposed solutions remain vague as in the past.
g) The possibility of offering partner countries significantly more loans at market conditions via the KfW Development Bank and DEG is mentioned, but again not backed up by concrete targets or measures. Here it would be important for the Finance Minister to significantly increase the guarantee framework for the KfW Development Bank. He seems to be finding this as difficult as his predecessors, even though the HA risks are extremely low.
After all, DEG has received a capital increase of EUR 400 million from its parent company KfW. This will allow it to expand its financing business by up to 50 percent over the next three years. This is no “small-small” and will in particular also lead to DEG gaining significantly more weight in its cooperation with other European development banks, the IFC, the EBRD and also with Arab funds. However, this measure was probably already initiated under the previous government and is not a product of the current reform considerations at the BMZ.
h) The BMZ itself also wants to streamline its internal processes. This is also absolutely necessary. It is currently the case that even enquiries/applications for smaller projects disappear for months, if not longer than a year, in the BMZ’s coordination maze until there is a response, if at all. The response times are often adventurous. The measures that are to be taken to streamline the process remain rather vague in the paper.
i) There is a great deal of public discussion about the desire to involve the German private sector more closely in development cooperation. This objective, presented programmatically by the BMZ, corresponds to the spirit of the times and the wishes of the coalition partner. However, a close analysis of the concepts presented suggests that there will be no truly “revolutionary” changes in this respect either. The BMZ has not given in to German industry’s wish for German development cooperation to be tied to supply. This would have meant that a German supplier would have been awarded the contract even if it had offered twice the price of the local manufacturer, for example. Instead, greater consideration is to be given to the specific qualifications of the German economy in the tenders. There is no objection to this, nor to the BMZ making greater use of the expertise of German companies that are already active there in its cooperation with partner countries.
Conclusion
A few steps in the right direction, but no truly fundamental reform. You will search in vain for truly innovative ideas. One could live with this if the reform process were conceived as an ongoing project in which, for example, interim results were evaluated and then used as the starting point for further reform steps. However, this requires quantifiable reform targets with a clear timeframe. For example, the BMZ could aim to halve the number of coordination processes within the organization by the end of 2027. That sounds very technocratic, but it would lead to a medium-sized revolution in administrative processes at the BMZ. Unfortunately, such concrete goals are completely absent from the reform paper. The impact orientation demanded by the BMZ is consistently negated by the BMZ with regard to its own administrative apparatus.
Cover picture: Press photo of Reem Alabali Radovan, Member of the German Bundestag and Federal Development Minister; Copyright: Selin Jasmin / @photobyselin
