European Development Fund

The European Development Fund (EDF) is the main instrument for European Union (EU) aid for development cooperation in Africa, the Caribbean, and Pacific (ACP Group) countries and the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCT). Funding is provided by voluntary donations by EU member states. The EDF is subject to its own financial rules and procedures, and is managed by the European Commission (EC) and the European Investment Bank.

Articles 131 and 136 of the 1957 Treaty of Rome provided for its creation with a view to granting technical and financial assistance to African countries that were still colonised at that time and with which certain countries had historical links.

Usually lasting 6 years, each EDF lays out EU assistance to both individual countries and regions as a whole. The EU is on its 10th EDF from 2008-2013 with a budget of €22.7 billion. This represents about 30% of EU spending on development cooperation aid, with the remainder coming directly from the EU budget.

The budget of the 10th EDF can be broken down as follows:

Negotiations for the 11th EDF would cover the period 2014-2020. This one-year extension compared to the 10th EDF allowed the end of the 11th EDF to coincide with the expiration of the Cotonou Partnership Agreement in 2020 and the EU budget period. The EDF has to date been funded outside the EU budget by the EU Member States on the basis of financial payments related to specific contribution shares, or “keys”. The Member State contributions keys are subject to negotiation. The EDF is the only EU policy instrument that is financed through a specific key that is different from the EU budget key, and which reflects the comparative interests of individual Member States.

There was a debate on whether to 'budgetise' the EDF. However, in the Communication ‘A budget for Europe 2020’, the European Commission underlined that it was not appropriate at present time to propose that the EDF be integrated into the EU budget. The perceived advantages include:

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