The urgency of FCDO setting out more detail on its strategic agenda on development
2025 will be remembered as a year of crisis for the development cooperation system.
The most obvious characteristics of this crisis were the cuts in Official Development Assistance (ODA) made by the UK, USA, Germany, France and others, which will reduce global ODA by a third (compared to its 2023 level) by 2026.
At the same time, there has been a crisis facing multilateral processes on sustainable development, with (for example) recent UN Financing for Development and G20 processes failing to respond to calls from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) to reform the development finance and economic systems and scale up their delivery ambitions.
What is needed at such a time of crisis is a clear vision for how to deliver the most impact from the current development cooperation system, as well as the steps that are needed to revitalise and reform this system so that it is fit for the future.
However, despite being in office for 18 months already, and almost a year on from announcing its own devastating cut in ODA (from 0.5% to 0.3% of gross national income), this government is yet to set out such a vision for its development cooperation.
Within months of the election, the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) initiated a Development Review to explore its development priorities in more detail. More than a year on from this Review, it is still not clear what its outcomes were, as its conclusions (and those of parallel reviews on UK economic diplomacy and partnerships with emerging powers are yet to be published in any form. This government has also not published any sort of development strategy, nor, amazingly, has the FCDO published any major new sector-specific strategies since the change in government.
However, what has been announced are a range of thematic priorities and shifts the UK is planning for its ODA programme, as well as set of general principles to guide its relationship with Africa – see below:
| Thematic priorities for UK ODA | Shifts for UK ODA | Africa Approach principles |
|---|---|---|
| – Health – Humanitarian support – Climate and nature – Economic development – Partnership – moving from donor to partner NB – Education and gender equality have also been explicitly deprioritised | – Donor to investor – partnering on growth, jobs and trade – Service delivery to system support – supporting countries to build their own public services and systems, and only delivering them where essential (e.g. in humanitarian contexts) – Grants to expertise – leveraging UK expertise – From international intervention to local provision – supporting partners to drive their own sustainable, locally-led solutions | – Investment and trade – Migration – Climate, nature, and clean energy – Peace and security – Inclusive growth – Africa’s representation in the global system – Innovation and cultural partnerships |
| Source: IDC, 05/25, Q1 | Source: Promising Development, Chp 1 | Source: Africa Approach, speech, 15 Dec |
There is much to welcome on ODA in the confirmation of these priorities and shifts, especially (from Bond’s perspective) the emphasis on strengthening development partnerships and promoting sustainable, locally led solutions. However, the lack of detail shared to date (in remarks to MPs, speeches and brief essays) on how all these priorities and principles will be taken forward leaves many important questions unanswered on the future of UK ODA, including:
- What aspects of priority sectors will be the focus of future UK ODA programmes (e.g. what health, humanitarian and climate challenges will be prioritised)?
- For deprioritised sectors, how will resourcing be scaled back responsibly and how might diplomatic (and other) capacity be used to provide support in these areas?
- What exactly is meant by these shifts, what will be prioritised in taking them forward (e.g. what aspects of local leadership) and how will these shifts be adapted to diverse contexts (e.g. fragile states, where services delivery and grants will continue to be critical)?
- How will potential unintended consequences of (e.g. declines in services) and clashes between (e.g. promoting local provision, but also UK expertise) these shifts be addressed?
- To what degree and how will key cross-cutting themes – e.g. poverty reduction, Leave No One Behind and responding to the rollback in rights – be addressed across the FCDO’s work?
- How FCDO will evolve its partnerships, and look beyond governments (whom it has emphasised strongly) and engage civil society as a key element of this effort?
Answering these (and other) important questions will be vital for maximising the development impact of the UK’s ODA, avoiding unintended consequences of the planned shifts and ensuring that the UK can help to drive impactful change to the development cooperation system.
It is not only on ODA that strategic clarity on the government’s development agenda has been less than ideal. Bond and its members have been disappointed by the lack of detail and ambition set out by the government to date covering how it will promote reform to the global economic system – especially to tackle unsustainable debt, corporate tax dodging, illicit outflows and unfair trade – to ensure that LMICs can stop the massive flow of resources out of their economies to the global North and generate more of their own resources. There is no pathway towards a sustainable, prosperous and inclusive future for LMICs with these types of reforms.
We had hoped that the cross-government ‘Africa Approach’, under development since late 2024, would provide some clarity on the government’s priorities beyond ODA, with a detailed strategy thought to be the planned outcome. However, the Africa Approach was merely set out in a brief speech in December, which presented a set of principles and didn’t go into much detail on its concrete focus or commitments that delivery could be judged on.
What makes answering these (and other) important questions on the UK’s development agenda so urgent, is that the FCDO is in the middle of processes to allocate its budget for the next three years and reduce its staffing by 15%-25%, with decisions to be finalised early in 2026. Deepening and publishing its strategic agenda will therefore enable effective FCDO resourcing and capacity decisions to be made and facilitate scrutiny of the FCDO’s work.
The first half of 2026 provides important opportunities for the government to further develop its strategic agenda on development. The valuable conferences FCDO is organising on the Future of Development Cooperation (May 2026) and Illicit Financial Flows (June 2026) will be vital for not only mobilising global action and reform on development cooperation and IFFs, but also for shaping its own agenda in these areas. In addition, the start of UK preparations for leading the G20 (from December 2026) can help to generate new and ambitious ideas for the UK’s role in promoting global economic reform.
We are optimistic that 2026 could be a year of renewed development progress, and that the UK can play an important role in securing this outcome. Bond and its members are eager to partner with the government to help make this happen.
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