§ Lord Jenkins of Putneyasked Her Majesty's Government:
Whether an estimate (by Susan George) that since 1982 $334 billion have been transferred from the South to the North, net of the full amount of aid and new loans, is probably accurate.
§ The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth office (Lord Brabazon of Tara)We believe the figure is inaccurate. It would appear to refer exclusively to debt-related flows—the balance of principal and interest repayments against new lending. The World Bank's calculation for this balance in the period 1983–88 is lower—$243 billion at 1986 prices. However, these figures do not cover aid, nor other external resource flows such as direct private investment and private grants. Taking all these flows into account, aggregate net resource transfers to developing countries (North to South) in the period 1983–88 are positive at $39 billion (World Bank estimate, again at 1986 prices).