Saturday, August 27, 2011

After my presentation

Hi,

I was very surprised and impressed by everyone's presentation on Thu.
All of you had a great job, to be honest, I really enjoyed it!
I was very disappointed with myself that I couldn't manage the time limit,
even though I practiced many times... :( I must have been super nervous! (me and presentation... we never can be friends...)

Although the opportunity is gone, I'd really want to talk to you about the last point I couldn't make it, if you don't mind.

My topic was "Is aid positive or negative?" and the last point was about the negative side which was the most important part of my presentation!! I mentioned three major problems in Korean development aid- inefficient budget allocation on development projects, repetitive projects implemented by different agencies in the same beneficiary country and the lack of respectful partnership with the beneficiaries. But! I had no time to explain with detail. So, let me tell you more about these three problems and I promise it won't be long.

Do you remember that the current situation of Korean development aid can be described as 'winning the championship' or 'sharing aid'? That is because there is a massive competition among different departments of each ministry and local governments to obtain the budget on development aid. Even though the major portion of development budget is allocated to KOICA, the rest of it is still big amount of money! So, they 'share' the rest of it but, since there are many participants, the amount of allocation for each is not sufficient to complete a proper project. Moreover, they implement the EXACTLY SAME kind of projects in the EXACTLY SAME developing counties! What's the point?!?!?! It is a waste of money to implement such repetitive projects in the same place!!!! It's totally meaningless and non-sense! Another problem is the lack of respectful partnership which is frequently complained by the beneficiaries. When Korean development agencies perform their projects in developing countries, they tend to exclude the recipient country's government or people who are involved in the project. I think it is very arrogant and disrespectful attitude. Even though they've got advanced knowledge or techniques, they are not native so they definitely need cooperation from the developing country's government or local people! If they want to work separately like that, I don't see why they bother to help them.

Well, that was all I want to tell you about and I wish I could tell you this in person on that day...
Anyway, whoever read this, I do appreciate your patience.

Have a wonderful weekend, all of you!


Hanna



2 comments:

  1. I like your conclusion. Cooperation is the main problem to develop the world

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  2. Yes, I think trying to apply any theory, in this case via a project, without consideration for the context, to the 'recipients' of aid (or any service, for that matter) is high risk.

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