Blog Archives

How to track aid flows to local organisations

By Gary Forster | May 19, 2022 | Blog

Many donors have adopted targets to direct more funding to local organisations. But past efforts to track funding flows have often struggled to agree on a definition of local. In this blog we present an approach we’ve been testing for six months. Using USAID as an example, we’ve been working to understand, interpret and present existing data in a way that enables stakeholders to undertake analysis and track funding based on their own definitions of local.

Why do DFIs invest in financial intermediaries and why do we need to know more?

By Farzana Ahmed | Apr 27, 2022 | Blog

This blog discusses the DFI Transparency Tool’s fifth component – financial intermediaries. Farzana Ahmed outlines why financial intermediaries are a significant aspect of DFI investments. She considers the importance of transparency of financial intermediary investments in order to understand their impact and allow community accountability efforts.

Meet our independent reviewers

By Elma Jenkins | Mar 31, 2022 | Blog

As we await the final results of the 2022 Aid Transparency Index, Elma Jenkins has been speaking to some of our most crucial but least known researchers, the independent reviewers. The 2022 Index process has so far involved three months reviewing several thousand documents, extraordinary amounts of International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) data, 50 publishers and 36 independent reviewers. The reviewer role is crucial in ensuring we make a full and fair assessment of publishers’ data.

It’s time for the UK government to change track on aid transparency

By Elma Jenkins | Feb 9, 2022 | Blog

The UK government has published its latest Open Government Partnership National Action Plan, but it has failed to include a commitment on the transparency of aid spending and failed to gain civil society support. Urgent action is now needed to improve aid transparency, build public trust and accountability.

Transparency of financial information: The key to increasing development flows

By Paul James | Feb 3, 2022 | Blog

This blog discusses the DFI Transparency Tool’s fourth component – financial information – and argues that improved disclosure of both mobilisation and concessionality is critical to scaling up financial flows in support of the Sustainable Development Goals and achieving development impact.

If DFIs are truly committed to openness and accountability they should publish all environmental and social documentation

By Ryan Anderton | Jan 20, 2022 | Blog

This blog examines the importance of ESG and accountability to communities – the third component of our DFI Transparency Tool. It reviews how the rights-based approach for access to information has affected the ESG disclosure of development finance institutions. It welcomes the shift towards presumption of disclosure from DFIs, and discusses why a commitment to pro-active disclosure of all ESG information is needed for openness and accountability to the public and project-affected communities.