Sectors & partners
What does Australian aid support? And who do we work with to deliver our aid?Sectors
Australian government aid is provided to help with a range of different issues (usually referred to as ‘sectors’ in the language of aid).
Over time different Australian governments have focused more or less on different sectors, reflecting their own priorities or global events. The charts below show how Australian government aid has been allocated by sector for each year since 2013, based on DFAT’s own reporting.
Over the past decade the main areas that Australian aid has been directed towards include: education, health, humanitarian assistance, economic development investments such as those in infrastructure and agriculture, and developing governance and civil society in recipient countries.
Focusing on gender and climate aid
Rather than making additional funding commitments, the Albanese government’s 2023 international development policy promises to allocate bigger proportions of its existing aid budget to gender and climate aid. In the case of gender, from 2022-23 all new investments valued at over $3 million will include gender objectives. In the case of climate change, the government has said that from 2024-25 at least half of all new bilateral and regional investments that are valued at more than $3 million will have a climate change objective, with the goal of this rising to 80 per cent in 2028-29. The charts below show Australia gender and climate spending as a proportion of total aid over time using the DAC definition of this spending needing to have a gender or climate outcome as a “principal” and/or “significant” objective.
Focusing on humanitarian aid
Humanitarian aid is the aid that the Australian government gives to developing countries in response to disasters. (Read more about the difference between development aid and humanitarian aid on the Aid 101 page). The amount of humanitarian aid the Australian government gives varies from year to year, responding to need, but at the same time the year-on-year change is less than you might expect. This is because in most years there are no shortage of disasters or ongoing crises, and the government aid program has a pre-planned humanitarian aid budget every year (it may vary from the budget if needed).
Partners
Australian government aid is given in different ways. The chart below shows the channels through which government aid has been delivered since 2010-11.
Multilateral organisations include UN organisations like the UNDP and World Bank, and organisations such as the Asian Development Bank (learn more on the Aid 101 page). Commercial suppliers are often consulting companies that provide aid services on behalf of the government. Much of the aid under the heading ‘universities’ comes in the form of scholarships given to students from developing countries. Aid given via other government departments includes funds for discreet programs run by organisations such as the Australian Federal Police or the Australian Electoral Commission.
Summary
- Over the past decade, the main sectors that Australian aid has been directed towards include: governance, health, education, and humanitarian assistance.
- Australian aid to health sector has increased significantly in recent years. In contrast, aid to education has declined greatly.
- Our humanitarian contribution dropped significantly from 2003-04 to 2014-15 and has gradually increased since then.
- Multilateral organisations and commercial contractors are responsible for delivering around two-thirds of Australia's aid.
- The share of commercial contractors increased from 15% in 2010-11 to 25% in 2021-22.
- The share of Australian aid delivered through partner governments was in decline from 2014-15 to 2018-19, but now the decline has been reversed.
- Aid delivered through universities have continued to decline.