§ Mr. Simon HughesTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the statistical impact made by his Department's programme in the relative distribution of wealth between the world's 20 richest and 20 poorest countries.
§ Mr. Baldry[holding answer 9 February 1995]: Twenty-nine per cent. of the United Kingdom's total bilateral net official development assistance disbursements in 1992 went to the 20 countries listed as poorest in GNP per capita terms according to World bank information. The only countries with a higher percentage than the United Kingdom were Norway, Denmark and Finland, all of which had lower total disbursements to these countries in volume terms.
However, it is not possible to isolate the statistical effect of aid disbursements to these countries—let alone disbursements by a single donor—from other factors when examining their economic growth.