Most industrialized nations in the North, including Canada, have sharply reduced their aid budgets since the mid-1980s, with the biggest cuts being made by the United States and Australia.

The US now gives barely one-thousandth of its gross national product in aid, compared with a UN recommended minimum of seven times that amount. Canada’s figure is below 0.3 per cent of GDP. Only four countries maintain their aid at or above the UN’s minimum level: Denmark, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands. (Denmark gives a full one per cent of its GDP.)