The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said on Thursday that international development assistance is set to fall 23% in real terms in 2025, to the lowest level since 2015.
Preliminary data has pointed to the largest drop in donations from Development Assistance Committee (DAC) members and associates since records began.
For the first time on record, all five top international providers reduced their input.
The cuts were led by the world’s richest country, the US, which cut its official development aid spending by 56.9%, making Germany the world’s largest donor by default, even as it once again missed its target for international aid.
America is now the least generous donor in terms of economic power
Some key statistics on official development assistance spending of the 34 DAC members and other key countries were:
- Total ODA spending by the 34 members was $174.3 billion (about €148 billion).
- This is equal to just 0.26% of the gross national income (GNI) of these countries.
- Only four countries – Denmark, Luxembourg, Norway and Sweden – meet the UN target of spending 0.7% of GNI on aid
- All five top donors – Germany, US, UK, Japan and France – reduced their contributions to 2025
- Overall, these countries contributed 95.7% of the total reduction
- The US alone accounted for three-quarters of the overall decline, as Donald Trump delivered a stinging rebuke to USAID upon his return to the White House.
- Washington’s 56.9% reduction in aid spending was the largest by any country on record.
- This now makes the US the least generous donor as a share of the size of its economy in the entire DAC, donating 0.09% of GNI.
- The average donation by members is equivalent to 0.26% of GNI, barely one-third of the UN target
- Other bilateral aid providers outside the DAC – notably Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar – are becoming increasingly meaningful donors due to declining European and US input.
What did the OECD say about the cuts?
“It is extremely worrying to see such a large decline in ODA in 2025 due to dramatic cuts among top donors,” said Mathias Cormann, OECD Secretary-General. “In this challenging environment, the significant decline in official development assistance highlights the need to use them more effectively to maximize the impact of available resources and unlock new sources of investment.”
Carsten Storr, chair of the OECD Assistance Committee, told a news briefing on Thursday that “the message is extremely sad.”
The organization also forecasts a decline of 5.8% in real terms in 2026, if more modest. It said the environment of sharp and sustained decline had presented “a major shock to the system”.
Germany misses spending target again, but still becomes biggest overall donor amid US cuts
Germany’s ODA contribution decreased from 0.68% of GNI to 0.56% in 2024, totaling $29.09 billion. If you remove refugee aid funds spent inside Germany, the figure drops to 0.46%, based on development ministry data.
Yet Germany became the world’s largest overall donor for the first time in history as the US, whose economy is about six times larger than Germany’s, cut its spending.
Overall, the US remains the second largest donor, followed by EU institutions and the UK in fourth place.
Aid organizations criticized the government in Berlin, while Philipp Rotman, a security expert at the Global Public Policy Institute, said the cuts were “not in Germany’s security interests”, as the US withdrawal would leave a “fatal gap” that Russia and China would seek to take advantage of geopolitically.
“The world is on fire and the cuts in Germany continue,” said Charlotte Becker, chair of Oxfam Germany. He said the cuts would have life-threatening consequences.
Church charities such as Bread for the World, Miserere, Caritas International and Diakonie issued a joint statement condemning the “alarming decline” in spending.
Aid to Ukraine increased due to EU input, dominating overall outlay
Net bilateral aid from DAV members to war-torn Ukraine declined by 38.2% last year, according to OECD data. This was due to a sharp decline in the US after Trump returned to the White House, while 23 countries increased bilateral contributions.
However, due to new support channeled through EU institutions in Brussels rather than through member states, total donations to Ukraine were $44.9 billion in 2024, an 18.7% increase over 2024 that bucked the overall trend and “the largest amount of net ODA to a single recipient in any year on record,” the OECD said.
“This amount was larger than the combined bilateral ODA of DAC members to all least developed countries ($28.1 billion) and all countries in sub-Saharan Africa ($29.2 billion),” it said.
The decline in donations was sharpest in bilateral development assistance, falling 26.4%. Multilateral ODA expenditure levels fell by 12.7%. The volume of bilateral development grants fell much more rapidly (down 29.3%) than bilateral spending on loans (down 10.3%).
edited by: