We can today announce the donors that will be included in the 2020 Aid Transparency Index, along with the timeline for data collection. The Aid Transparency Index is the only independent measure of aid transparency among the world’s major development agencies. It tracks and encourages progress, while holding donors to account for commitments they have made to open up their information.

Two donors have been added to the donor list for next year’s Index, joining the 45 donors included in the 2018 Index. These are Saudi Arabia’s King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre (KSRelief) and TIKA the Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency. The inclusion of these two agencies reflects the rise of south-south donors. As the structure of the global economy continues to be reconfigured, emerging economies are increasingly playing a role on the international stage as aid donors. Turkey is now a major official development assistance (ODA) spender and, as well as spending billions of dollars on in-donor refugee costs, it is also spending significant amounts of ODA in other developing country regions including Sub-Saharan Africa, South and East Asia, Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Saudi Arabia is one of the lead aid agencies working in Yemen, the world’s largest ever humanitarian crisis, where it has disbursed USD 14 billion to date, according to the Saudi Aid Platform.

The 2020 Index continues to reflect the diversity of international aid donors. It features a cross-section of different types of development actors, while holding them to the same transparency standards. Of the donors selected 15 are multilaterals; 30 are bilateral donors; there are three humanitarian agencies (ECHO, UN OCHA and KSRelief) and one philanthropic foundation (the Gates Foundation). The total number of organisations assessed will be 47.

Donor selection criteria

The criteria for inclusion of donors in the 2020 index has not changed from the 2018 Index. Donors must fulfil a minimum of 3 out of 4 of the following:

1. The organisation is in majority public ownership, with one or multiple governments as shareholders;
2. Its primary purpose is providing aid and/or development finance across borders, or it is responsible for the oversight and administration of significant proportions of aid for development resources;
3. Its budget for aid and/or development – or the resources that the organisation has at its disposal to spend upon aid and development – is at least USD 1 billion per year;
4. The organisation plays a leading role in setting aid and/or development policy in its home country, region or specialist sector.

In cases where a donor does not pass the USD 1 billion threshold but does meet the other criteria, at a minimum, it must have a budget to spend on aid and/or development of at least USD 250 million per year. Publishing data in the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) Standard is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for inclusion in the Index.

Timeline

Data collection for the 2020 Index will start on 1st December 2019 and end on 30th March 2020. The Index report will be launched in June 2020.

Methodology consultation

The 2020 index will not feature any major changes to the index methodology. For now, please refer to the 2018 Technical Paper and 2018 Guidelines for guidance.

As in previous years we will carry out an online consultation through Github to solicit views and suggestions for any changes to the ruleset tests used by our Aid Transparency Tracker to assess the quality of organisations’ IATI data.  This consultation will run from 9^th to 19^th September.  We will share a link to the consultation prior to the start date.

Once the consultation has closed we will update and re-issue the technical paper and guidelines with any adjustments incorporated.

Progress since 2018

The 2018 Aid Transparency Index demonstrated that large amounts of data are now being made available by major international donors on a regular basis. This is particularly encouraging and demonstrates that progress is achievable. However, the 2018 Index also revealed serious data shortfalls: only 25% of aid worldwide was given by donors that meet the highest transparency standards. Performance related data (development objectives, results, impact appraisals and evaluations) was considerably lacking across the board, something which is particularly useful for data users.

The 2020 Index comes at a time when ambitious global development targets, such as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), are under scrutiny and donors are increasingly under pressure to demonstrate that budgets are being spent effectively and have impact.

Next steps for donors – what you need to know

We will work closely with donor organisations and independent reviewers to make sure that the data we collect is as accurate as possible. All organisations included in the 2020 Index will be given the opportunity to review the information we collect and to share their feedback during the data collection period.

Publish What You Fund has several tools that donors can take advantage of in preparation for and during the data collection. Our Data Quality Tester allows publishers to independently check the quality of their IATI data before they upload it to the registry. IATI Decipher is a browser plug in that visualises IATI organisation files to facilitate verification of the data and documents that have been included.  IATI Canary is an early warning system that provides an email alert when datasets are broken or invalid against the IATI schema.

Full list of donors

1. African Development Bank
2. Asian Development Bank
3. Australia, Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
4. Belgium, Directorate-general Development Cooperation and Humanitarian Aid
5. Canada, Global Affairs
6. China, Ministry of Commerce
7. Denmark, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
8. European Bank for Reconstruction and Development
9. European Commission, DG Development and Cooperation
10. European Commission, DG Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations
11. European Commission, DG Humanitarian Aid and Civil Protection
12. European Investment Bank
13. Finland, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
14. France, Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs
15. France, French Development Agency
16. GAVI Alliance
17. Germany, Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development – GIZ
18. Germany, Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development – KfW
19. Inter-American Development Bank
20. Ireland, Irish Aid
21. Italy, Agency for cooperation. and dev. AICS (Direzione Generale per la Cooperazione allo Sviluppo)
22. Japan, International Cooperation Agency
23. Japan, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
24. Korea, International Cooperation Agency
25. Netherlands, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
26. New Zealand, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade
27. Norway, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
28. Saudi Arabia, King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre
29. Spain, Agency for International Development Cooperation
30. Sweden, Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency
31. Switzerland, Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation
32. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
33. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria
34. Turkey, Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency, TIKA
35. United Arab Emirates, Ministry of Foreign Affairs
36. United Kingdom, Department for International Development
37. United Kingdom, Foreign and Commonwealth Office
38. United Nations Children’s Fund
39. United Nations Development Programme
40. United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
41. United States, Agency for International Development
42. United States, Department of Defense
43. United States, Department of State
44. United States, Millennium Challenge Corporation
45. United States, President’s Emergency Fund Plan for AIDS Relief
46. World Bank, International Development Association
47. World Bank, International Finance Corporation