FAAE Committee Report

Canada’s contribution to international democratic development involves dozens of organizations and hundreds or even thousands of Canadians working for government departments, NGOs or international institutions. The major players in this area are those that comprise the Democracy Council, which includes key government departments and arms-length organizations. While definitional issues make it impossible to arrive at an overall total for the amount spent in this area, the vast majority comes from government, specifically CIDA. The latest comparative figures it provided are from 2004-2005 and are represented schematically below[1]. ODA reporting on “Government and Civil Society” released by CIDA in December 2006 suggests that of the $359 million spent bilaterally by the Government of Canada in this area in fiscal year 2004-2005, some $341 million or 95% was spent by CIDA.

CIDA is likely the largest source of funding for all the other Canadian organizations active in this area. A small unknown total amount comes from non-Canadian government sources. The Parliamentary Centre, for example, received about $5.4 million of the $6 million it spent in this area in 2006 from CIDA. The Parliamentary Centre also received nearly $500,000 in that year from the World Bank Institute, the UNDP, the Austrian Development Agency and the Danish International Development Agency. In addition, “in-kind” contributions such as donated time mean that while CIDA provided the Federation of Canadian Municipalities with some $12 million in 2006, the Federation estimated before the Committee that the actual value of the work it did in this area was about $20 million.[2]

Notes:

1.      A sample of CIDA’s Canadian partners in this area includes:

2.      Other Government of Canada (GoC) departments and statutory bodies include: