HL Deb 04 February 1980 vol 404 cc1142-3WA
Lord MERRIVALE

asked Her Majesty's Government:

  1. (a) regarding the current United Nations Development Programme for Madagascar within the Indicative Planning Figure (IPE) of 23.75 million dollars, what individual projects have been approved and financed by the UNDP Administrator and to what extent these projects have been financed by the United Kingdom;
  2. (b) what is the present extent of this country's contribution to multilateral projects initiated by other international organisations; and
  3. (c) in the field of bilateral development co-operation what projects are currently being pursued and what will be the financial contribution made to each of them.

The SECRETARY of STATE for FOREIGN and COMMONWEALTH AFFAIRS (Lord Carrington)

(a) The most recent data available concerning the projects are contained in the UNDP's Compendium of Approved Projects and the annex to the annual report of the UNDP Administrator for 1978. Relevant extracts from these reports will be placed in the Library.

UNDP country programmes are funded in full from its general resources which are provided by voluntary contributions from Member States. These contributions are not earmarked for specific purposes; it is therefore not possible to say how much of the British contributions goes to the Malagasy programme.

  1. (b) It is similarly not possible to say how much of our contributions to the programmes of other international organisations is spent in the Malagasy Republic.
  2. (c) As regards United Kingdom bilateral aid, we have two technical co-operation officers working in the Malagasy Republic, providing advice on agro-climatology and air crash search and rescue techniques. We are looking into the possibility of assistance in certain artisan industries (tanning, and brick and tile making), fisheries and poultry production. We estimate that about £100,000 will be spent on our bilateral programme in 1979–80.