PB16 Measuring Australia’s foreign aid generosity, from Menzies to Turnbull

Australia’s foreign aid budget fell to 0.22% of Gross National Income (GNI) in 2016-17, an historic low. Some commentators, invoking OECD statistics, have claimed that in the 1960s under Prime Minister Robert Menzies, and into the 1970s, aid spending was regularly above 0.5% of GNI. A review of Australian government statistics, including some from lesser-known sources, indicates that the OECD inflates Australia’s aid/GNI ratios from the early 1960s up to about 1995. The highest ratio achieved at any time was actually 0.48% in 1967-68. However, governments in the 1960s and 1970s did believe they were doing better than this, at a time when per capita incomes were less than half their present level in real terms