Types of Aid.

Essay by owneroftheuniverseHigh School, 11th gradeA-, October 2005

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There are six main types of aid that are available to poorer countries to help them. These are development aid, emergency aid, bi-lateral aid, multi-lateral aid, project aid and programme aid.

Development aid: development aid (also development assistance, international aid, overseas aid or foreign aid) is aid given by developed countries to support economic and social development in developing countries. It is distinguished from emergency aid as being aimed at alleviating poverty in the long term, rather than alleviating suffering in the short term. An example of development aid would be Ethiopia in Africa. It has been given billions of pounds so that in the future if there is a famine or a draught it will be able to rectify the problem itself, or be able to see out the problem with food stocks that they themselves have grown. This will stop it becoming a dependency culture.

Emergency Aid: Emergency aid (also known as Humanitarian aid) is assistance given to people in distress by individuals, organizations, or governments to relieve suffering.

The term often carries an international connotation, but this is not always the case. Many full time, professional emergency aid organizations exist, both within government (USAID, DFID, ECHO), and as private voluntary organizations (or non-governmental organizations, e.g. Oxfam, Mercy Corps). The International Committee of the Red Cross is unique in being mandated by international treaty to uphold the Geneva Conventions.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) is mandated to co-ordinate the international humanitarian response to a natural disaster or complex emergency (normally linked to conflict), it is often distinguished from development aid by being focused on relieving suffering caused by natural disaster or conflict, rather than removing the root causes of poverty or vulnerability. Unfortunately Emergency aid has been in the news a...