Development aid in Ethiopia : A comparison of development aid from two european countries

Ethiopia being one of the countries in the world currently in the most need of help, has the support and financial aid of several countries, many who are part of the European Union. The objective of this essay is to examine the differences in development aid from two of these countries, France and Sweden, to Ethiopia. The compliance to the European Union’s policy for developmental aid is also considered and compared between the two concerning their development aid in Ethiopia. The subject is approached by studying firstly the European Union’s policy for developmental aid. We then examine the manner in which Sweden and France work with developmental aid, both generally in the world and specifically in Ethiopia. It was found that in the general developmental aid, France focused more on international stability and the elimination of poverty while Sweden focused on peace, free trade and democracy. Other than this they were found to have similar goals. We then continue by examining the nature of the projects that are executed by the two countries in Ethiopia and their compliance to the European Union’s policy. A comparison between the works of the two countries is performed throughout the essay to find any differences or similarities. It was found that while both France and Sweden had projects in the same fields of action, some were specific for their respective country as well. It was also found that France seemed to have fewer projects running in Ethiopia than Sweden. A possible cause to this is that the countries prioritize differently since Ethiopia is one of 19 focus countries for developmental aid in France and fourth on the list of countries receiving the most of Sweden’s developmental aid. Both of the two countries’ developmental aid in Ethiopia was largely in compliance with the EU policy