Aid effectiveness in Africa: the unfinished agenda

Africa is the world's most aided major region. Yet economic growth has been disappointingly low there. A number of factors explain the poor outcomes a nd limited sustainability of and in Africa. But the organisation and manage ment of the aid relationship is a particularly important one, including the dependence of Africans on that aid. The currently popular nostrums for sol ving the problem of the effectiveness in Africa - selectivity, ownership, s ector investment programme and more aid - are as yet inadequate and often c ontradictory Much more work and honest debate needs to occur before the pro blem of aid effectiveness can be tackled in Africa.