The 21st replenishment for the International Development Association (IDA21), the World Bank’s low-income country lending arm, is now finalised, with the pledging meeting taking place on 5-6 December in South Korea yielding a $100 billion total replenishment package (see Observer Autumn 2024).
At the Group of 20 Summit in mid-November, the United States pledged $4 billion to IDA21, up from $3.5 billion in 2021. This 15 per cent increase was trumped by other early pledges in Rio de Janeiro, including a 50 per cent increase from Norway, and a 45 per cent increase from the Republic of Korea. However, the final December pledging meeting confirmed just a $200 million increase on IDA20 in terms of direct contributions from IDA donors compared to the IDA20 replenishment: $23.5 billion versus $23.7 billion (see Observer Winter 2021).
“Given the development and economic challenges faced by the world’s poorest countries, African leaders and institutions had called for a replenishment that would total at least $120 billion,” said Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi of Ghana-based thinktank African Center for Economic Transformation on social media site LinkedIn. “This IDA replenishment, which came in significantly below Africa’s asks, underscores that as a continent we cannot wait for the world to step up and solve our issues.”
Following a drip-feeding of updates on donor pledges (including from Poland, Latvia, Denmark and Spain) and the fourth meeting of IDA deputies in late October (see Dispatch Annuals 2024), the draft IDA21 policy package was released on 7 November, with just one week for public feedback. Amid global crises and “The Great Reversal” of many economies relying on IDA, civil society organisations (CSOs) once again reiterated the importance of addressing crucial gaps across themes including climate, gender, fragility, conflict and violence, and health in the IDA21 policy package.
While the final IDA21 policy package had not been published at the time of writing, CSO concerns included a potential increase to the IDA Private Sector Window (PSW) from $2.5 billion to $4 billion. UK-based CSO Publish What You Fund has demonstrated the PSW has been essentially a subsidising tool for investments in the International Finance Corporation and the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, the Bank’s private investment and political insurance arms, respectively, with limited evidence of it mobilising external finance or of its development impact.
