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Renato Baumann is a leading research fellow, Institute for Applied Economic Research (IPEA), Brazil.

ORCID 0000-0003-1851-6796

Rafael Schleicher is head of the International Policy Centre (IPCid), Institute for Applied Economic Research (IPEA), Brazil, and researcher at the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (FIOCRUZ), Brazil.

ORCID 0000-0002-9737-7677

For citation: Baumann, Renato and Schleicher, Rafael, 2023. International Development Cooperation: The Case of Brazil, Contemporary World Economy, Vol. 1, No 1, January–March.

Keywords: International Cooperation, IPEA, South-South Cooperation, 2030 Agenda, SDGs.

Abstract

International cooperation is a less well-known characteristic of developing economies. It is often associated with concessional financing and humanitarian initiatives and understood as a means of exerting “soft power”, whose intellectual origins date back to the Cold War. Unlike in power-based interpretations, international cooperation initiatives among developing economies do not take the shape of direct monetary contributions. Instead, they are mostly focused on shared development agendas, which in practice means technical support, educational and scientific activities, humanitarian support, assistance to refugees, peacekeeping operations and other partnerships implemented with the support of multilateral and regional agencies. Brazilian initiatives have been systematically measured since 2005 by IPEA, and they show a significant and increasing effort in terms of the volume of resources involved, as well as a diversified set of initiatives. Brazil’s international cooperation accounting procedures are in line with the TOSSD methodology, as well as with the UNCTAD pilot project on the quantification of South-South Cooperation for Development. All methodologies revolve around the issue of measuring the progress of the Sustainable Development Goals. Most of the projects benefit African and Latin American countries, while other initiatives counterintuitively benefit individuals from developed countries. In 2021, the estimated total volume of official resources destined for Brazilian international cooperation surpassed US$ 1.3 billion, a significant figure for a developing country. The initiatives directly implemented by the state and local governments of the Brazilian federation are still rather unexplored. This fact supports a general perception among policymakers in Brazil: future methodological improvements will inevitably reveal higher levels of expenditure and shed light on the intricacies of the Brazilian participation in the International Development Agenda.

I – Introduction

One lesser known dimension of the international insertion of an economy is the provision of cooperation initiatives to other countries, particularly those made possible with the country’s own official and budgetary resources.

International cooperation initiatives are most often associated with the provision of credit under differentiated conditions and humanitarian programs. In terms of foreign policy and national interests, the rationality for this type of initiative is associated with the logic of “soft power”, as proposed by Nye (2004): a country manages to influence partners and eventually derive business opportunities from this relationship without the use of force, from cooperation projects that can also be beneficial to both parties.

However, the international framework for supporting the development agenda is underpinned by both monetary and non-monetary contributions. Especially in partnerships between developing economies, cooperation can be effective via measures that involve the transfer of knowledge and the sharing of practices in technical, educational, and humanitarian cooperation activities, among others.

In the case of cooperation between developing economies, the similarity of the conditions among partners can lead to more efficient results than projects financed by industrialized countries. In addition to the similarity between policy transfer contexts, countries in the Global South see common realities and problems in the structure of the international system that facilitate dialogue and communication. It is less a case of exercising persuasive power and more of partnership.

International cooperation as an instrument of foreign policy is a creature of the last 70 years. The ideological conflict aggravated by the end of World War II led the two main contenders to adopt a set of measures gravitating around two options: either what were conventionally called democratic power structures or adherence to the Marxist-Leninist principles, which formed the basis of the “non-Western” side.

Strictly speaking, both sides were considered imperialist by several developing countries. The South-South cooperation as a political project emerged between the 1950s and 1960s as a “third way” for the elaboration of countries’ own initiatives, aiming to avoid unequal relations with the two hegemonic states and other former European metropolises.

Although the rationality for its existence stems from the struggle of the countries of the South for the reduction of inequality in the international system, international cooperation for development also constitutes a channel of influence for developed countries. Designed as an instrument to support the economic development of lower-income countries, its genesis was essentially the expansion of financing at subsidized prices in lower-income countries, as part of the exercise of non-military power over developing countries, although explicitly exercised.

For some years now, Brazil has been conducting various projects to promote international cooperation for development and has a unit in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs dedicated exclusively to this work. Since 2010, the Brazilian Cooperation Agency (Agência Brasileira de Cooperação) has been working closely with the Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA, Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada) to quantify and analyze the Brazilian contribution to the international development cooperation agenda. The partnership between the two institutions has increased the stock of knowledge of international cooperation initiatives implemented by several institutions of the federal, state, and municipal governments of Brazil.

The expression “soft power” seems to make little sense in the case of Brazil, either because Brazilian diplomacy does not seek a hegemonic position in any sense or because the concept was developed to interpret the behavior of developed countries. However, given the volume of resources involved, the diversity of beneficiary countries and the variety of forms of cooperation, it is possible to argue that the Brazilian case is innovative in terms of strategies for providing support in numerous sectors and economic activities.

This article discusses the Brazilian experience of the provision of cooperation for international development in six sections. The next section brings a very brief historical retrospective of international cooperation activities and their evolution over time. The movement gradually became a mechanism for reducing the differences between industrialized economies and less affluent countries, and progressively became an instrument of technical complementarity between developing economies.

The third section discusses the main formats and modalities in which international development cooperation takes place, either in direct operations between countries or with the intermediation of international institutions. The very conceptualization of international cooperation has changed over time, as well.

The fourth section contains a brief reference to the relationship between international cooperation operations and the commitments made under the United Nations 2030 Agenda. The setting up of a monitoring system to identify cooperation operations compatible with the Sustainable Development Goals is today at the heart of the debate on how countries implement their activities.

The fifth section presents the basic data of Brazil’s recent experience of international development cooperation. The non-monetary nature of operations (except financial contributions to multilateral organizations) is a central theme, as well as indications of the main modalities of cooperation promoted by the country, in addition to its sectoral economic impact. The sixth and closing section brings in the main aspects of the Brazilian experience of international cooperation, highlighting desirable adjustments and proposing policy measures.

II – The evolution of international cooperation

The post-World War II period was characterized by the transfer of massive resources from the United States to the reconstruction of Western European economies, with similar measures adopted by the Soviet bloc for the same purposes. The Marshall Plan provoked resentment from non-European countries which had also participated in the conflict, and which also faced economic difficulties due to the consequences of the war. This sentiment was politically capitalized in the context of the independence of several nations, while the division into ideological blocs potentiated the rivalry for the implementation of initiatives that could reduce economic difficulties in developing countries.

The 1950s-60s were characterized by the emergence and consolidation of a multilateral structure of institutions responsible for providing official aid and development assistance. In the United Nations, the focus on technical assistance over these two decades was the axis of creation and operation of several specialized multilateral agencies. The 1970s brought skepticism about the validity of cooperation between rich countries and developing economies. The perception was that dependence was being reproduced due to the structural inequalities and the conditionalities frequently imposed. In this context, technical cooperation initiatives between the countries of the South began to flourish.

South-South cooperation had its roots in the 1940s, and was strengthened as a political movement in the 1950s-60s. The 1970s, however, crystallized the potential for cooperation between countries in the South, as well as political coping strategies and economic trade and investment agendas. It was in this context that initiatives were developed between the countries of the South; they materialized in the form of the Buenos Aires Plan of Action (BAPA) of 1978. Knowledge sharing between Southern countries was particularly important in agriculture. In the 1970s, there was also a significant increase in the price of fresh products in general, with a food supply crisis in some countries, a situation that stimulated economic and political relations between the countries of the South.

To navigate the new waters, donor countries and international organizations began to consider issues related to poverty reduction, income inequality and access to wealth, demographic growth and rural-urban migration, making the focus on effectiveness and participation in development assistance more specific. Similarly, the financing of smaller-scale projects, especially in the areas of health, education and sanitation, gained relevance, and the use of experimental techniques for quantitative evaluation of development projects rose.

The 1980s was characterized by crises in developing economies, affected by shocks in oil and other commodity prices, with profound impacts on the volume and importance of relations between the countries of the South in the global context. This was also a period of significant increase in the availability of statistical data. Thus it became possible to count on detailed information about production, income distribution indicators, composition of expenses and others.

With the end of the Cold War, the political component of foreign aid lost intensity, with fewer resources available and less prominence on the international agenda. Development had also come to be understood as a process that enables countries to stop being dependent on foreign aid, opening up productive and creative potential. The expansion of more liberal ideologies in major developed economies has led to a reduction in the role of the state and significant budget cuts, with significant reductions in international aid flows. The second half of the 1980s and the early 90s was marked by the strong conditionalities and pro-market reforms associated with sending official development aid.

The crises that characterized the end of the twentieth century were compounded by the theme of indebtedness of several economies, especially smaller ones. Debt relief has become one of the main modalities of development aid, with processes managed by multilateral institutions and conditionalities whose long-term beneficial effects have proved doubtful. The agenda also included conditionalities to curb practices related to corruption and money laundering.

Since the 2000s, international institutions linked to development assistance have competently rescued the environmental component that has existed since the Brundtland Report, bringing “sustainable development” to the center of the debate. As successors to the Millennium Development Goals, the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) represent a decisive element in guiding international development cooperation efforts until 2030.

III – What is International Development Cooperation?

The concept of International Development Cooperation has undergone several changes over time, with greater complexity in terms of the number and type of participating actors, sources of funding, implementation arrangements, objectives, and governance structures. The non-existence of a global central authority gives a political dimension to the issue: it depends on the actions of states and their mutual interests. However, there is a more practical dimension, associated with issues of justice and minimum standards of existence:  international development cooperation (IDC).

Roughly speaking, there are two non-exclusive views on how International Development Cooperation can be operationalized: (i) by Official Development Assistance (ODA); (ii) by South-South Development Cooperation (SSDC). These two visions have as common areas the focus on technical assistance/capacity development and its association with Sustainable Development Goal 17 (“Partnerships and Means of Implementation”), of the United Nations Agenda 2030 (IPEA, 2022).

Official development assistance (ODA) is defined by the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) as government assistance with specific objectives: the economic development and social welfare of developing countries. Development assistance flows are resources provided on concessional terms by official agencies, including state and local governments, or by their executive agents. The concessional equivalent is the measure of effort considered by the donor.

The discussion on the coordination of development assistance by wealthier economies began with the formation of the Development Assistance Group (DAG) and the inclusion of the word “Development” in the name of the then Organization for European Economic Cooperation (OEEC) in 1960. In this context, one of the most enduring concepts in Development Cooperation is that of Official Development Assistance (ODA), which has remained unchanged for four decades (1972 to 2012). The modernization that began in 2012 was designed to include the contributions of countries not linked to the ODA-OEEC system and philanthropic entities, and update the possibilities and instruments of financing, in addition to providing more accuracy in the relationship between the development cooperation agenda and expenditures on humanitarian assistance, international security, and debt relief.

The South-South Development Cooperation has its political origin in the decolonization initiatives of the African and Asian peoples of the mid-1940s and 1950s. The most widely accepted starting point is the 1955 Afro-Asian Conference, called the “Bandung Conference”. Solidarity between the countries of the South would be forged six years later at the Belgrade Conference (1961), the starting point for the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). With proper coordination and organization, NAM members were instrumental in the creation of the G-77 in 1964. The New World Economic Order was consolidated, with an emphasis on the protection of economies, and management of national resources aimed at the development of local industries and renegotiation of terms of trade in international trade.

As an important milestone for the separation between political, economic and cooperation agendas, in 1978 the first United Nations Conference on Technical Co-operation between Developing Countries took place in Buenos Aires. The Buenos Aires Plan of Action (BAPA) established the principles of South-South Technical Cooperation for Development, such as non-intervention in internal affairs, autonomy, solidarity and horizontality.

In 2009, the “Nairobi Declaration” refined definitions for the characterization of SSDC. In 2018-2019, a second Conference was again organized in Buenos Aires. The resulting document particularly recommends strengthening SSDC monitoring and evaluation systems, developing methodologies to assess their impact and effectiveness, and recommending that countries engage in multilateral and regional fora for this same purpose (Schleicher et al., 2022).

IV – Measuring South-South cooperation in the context of the 2030 Agenda

Adopted in 2015 by the heads of state and government attending the celebrations of the 75th anniversary of the United Nations, the 2030 Agenda implies a multidimensional vision of development. More ambitious than its predecessor, the agenda has 17 goals and 169 targets, divided into the three dimensions of sustainable development – economic, social, and environmental.

The action plan reflects a concept centered on promoting people, the planet, peace, prosperity, and global partnership. Diagnosis starts from the recognition that reducing extreme poverty is a global challenge and is a necessary condition for achieving the desired levels of justice on the sustainable development agenda. Efforts aimed at meeting the objectives of the agenda are monitored by global indicators related to its goals. Governments are also encouraged to develop their own national indicators associated with targets and objectives.

Through the Institute of Applied Economic Research (IPEA), Brazil has, since 2010, been disseminating the statistics regarding Brazilian cooperation for international development, in the reports entitled Brazilian Cooperation for International Development (COBRADI, Cooperação Brasileira para o Desenvolvimento Internacional). Between 2010 and 2018, the Institute produced five reports, creating Brazil’s first historical series on this topic.

Unlike the cooperation initiatives disseminated by developed economies, Brazilian cooperation does not focus on the components of loans or transfers of budgetary resources to other countries. Brazilian actions are predominantly of a non-financial nature, comprising initiatives distributed by modalities of technical, educational, scientific, and technological cooperation, and of humanitarian aid, assistance to immigrants and refugees, the cost of United Nations peacekeeping forces, contribution to international organizations, and capital contributions to multilateral banks.

The challenge of monitoring the 2030 Agenda has made the existence of common and integrated metrics fundamental. Total Official Support for Sustainable Development (TOSSD) is an attempt to build a minimum international statistical framework to monitor international development cooperation and interventions supporting progress towards sustainable development goals. The TOSSD methodology was developed with the support of OECD and refined by a Task Force composed of experts from developed countries, developing countries, multilateral organizations, and civil society institutions. Briefly, the methodological structure of TOSSD includes: a) official development assistance; b) other flows of official resources; c) South-South cooperation; d) triangular cooperation; e) expenditure on international public goods, and f) private resources mobilized through official interventions.

Due to considerable differences of opinion on how participation of the countries of the South in the International Development Cooperation should be monitored, a Working Group on Measurement of Development Support was created, within the scope of the Inter-agency and Expert Group on Sustainable Development Goals Indicators (IAEG-SDG), which developed differentiated criteria for the measurement and quantification of SSDC within the scope of Agenda 2030, particularly its indicator 17.3.1.

The results from the discussions of the working group is the possibility that countries such as Brazil, Mexico, Costa Rica, India, Colombia and others can propose methodological contributions from a different perspective from developed parties, which offer financial transfers. In the former’s view of cooperation, both spending and quantification of non-monetary efforts are central to understanding SSDC. Another consequence of the broader involvement of some developing economies in methodological discussions was to change the list of potential recipients, making it more diverse and closer to reality.

In order to improve the Brazilian statistical system on the subject, in 2020 IPEA decided to voluntarily participate in the TOSSD task force debates. This implied not only methodological approximation, but also a commitment to provide the estimated indicators to the OECD on a regular, annual basis (Schleicher & Barros, 2022).

Following the Brazilian tradition of dialogue and broad partnership with all countries and institutions, Brazil also decided to support UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) in the development of a pilot project on the methodology of quantification of South-South Cooperation for Development. Brazil is one of the countries that helped develop the methodology under the IAEG-SDG. The COBRADI survey conducted annually by IPEA provides information to both the OECD and UNCTAD, as well as being the source for Brazil's official report on international development cooperation (COBRADI Report).

V – Brazil on the recent agenda for International Development Cooperation

IPEA is the Brazilian institution responsible for the production of national statistics on international development cooperation. As the Institute has been mapping Brazilian initiatives since 2005, it is possible to identify some durable characteristics of the contemporary Brazilian IDC.

The cooperation provided by Brazil is essentially divided into three frameworks. In the South-South Cooperation for Bilateral Development, cooperation takes place directly between Brazil and a developing country. In the Trilateral Cooperation, cooperation can take place: (i) between Brazil and two developing countries; (ii) between Brazil, a developed country and a developing country; (iii) between Brazil, an international organization and a developing country, when cooperation takes place within regional/sub-regional organizations or arrangements. The third framework, the decentralized SSDC, occurs between subnational entities in Brazil and subnational entities in another developing country.

Regardless of the framework, the cooperation provided by Brazil includes a range of different areas, such as technical, humanitarian, educational, and scientific cooperation, peacekeeping operations, refugee assistance, and contributions to international organizations.

In terms of the volume of resources involved, the main component of Brazilian international cooperation is its contribution to various international organizations and contributions to International Financial Institutions (IFIs). This set represented on average 68% of the total annual expenses computed by Brazil between 2005 and 2021. Of these resources, a significant percentage refers to contributions to agencies of the United Nations System and International Financial Institutions (IFIs). The trend of the proportion of contributions is expected to fall in the coming years, since the coverage of the statistical system tends to expand with methodological improvements promoted by the IPEA since 2020.

Technical cooperation is predominantly bilateral and channeled mainly through the Brazilian Cooperation Agency. Cooperation with partners from the South has a greater focus on other Latin American countries, followed by sub-Saharan African countries, in particular Portuguese-speaking countries, and some Asian countries, especially those with lower per capita income. However, it also includes one-off initiatives with some high-income countries in North America, Western Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. The aforementioned character of universality and partnership is supported by the data: on average, there are more than 100 countries/international institutions where there is a record of some type of cooperation by Brazil. Between 2019 and 2021, South-South Cooperation for Development corresponded to approximately 40% of Brazil’s total initiatives.

Another striking feature of recent Brazilian International Cooperation is its focus on capacity development actions and projects. Whether due to its own capacity to provide cooperation or due to the characteristics of solidarity and horizontality that define most SSDC projects, the exchange of practices and knowledge is the Brazilian value proposition. Although it is possible to say that Brazilian technical cooperation has a predominantly South-South character and contributes to global governance structures, it is possible to identify initiatives that also include a South-North dimension, with horizontal cooperation with developed countries.

In humanitarian cooperation, the countries that benefit most are in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa, as one would expect, in view of the country’s commitments to rapprochement with its neighbors and historical links with the African continent[1]. Sending food, medicines, vaccines, equipment and support personnel to deal with extreme situations are the main activities in this modality. The pandemic showed the importance of humanitarian cooperation: According to the IPEA (2021) humanitarian cooperation was the only cooperation modality offered by Brazil that saw an increase between the years 2019 and 2020, from R$ 21 million to R$ 94 million, in a scenario where the total amount was reduced from R$ 2.6 billion to R$ 1.5 billion.

Another dimension that has shown significant performance is scientific and technological cooperation. Again, the regions of Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean are the main focus. Sharing knowledge and know-how, strengthening public management processes and fostering international research networks characterize both types of cooperation. In 2021, 90% of Brazilian cooperation initiatives were in scientific and educational modalities (IPEA, 2022).

Brazilian international cooperation also includes an educational dimension. At academic levels from undergraduate to post-doctoral courses, scholarships for foreigners are the main instrument here, and these include the provision of international airline tickets and participation in events. Students come not only from Portuguese-speaking countries, as might be expected, but also from the most diverse regions of the planet, including several developed countries.

The methodology for capturing information on educational cooperation by IPEA was improved and expanded in the collection of data for the year 2021, with data collection directly from federal and state public universities, as well as through the processing of the primary databases of official development agencies such as CAPES (Coordination for the Improvement of Higher Education Personnel), CNPq (National Council for Scientific and Technological Development) and FAPESP (São Paulo State Research Foundation), among others.

International cooperation can also be done on the territory of the supplier country, not only abroad. This is the case, for example, of activities to support refugees and asylum seekers in Brazil. Accommodation, medical support and basic food for at least some time are important elements to enable the integration of these individuals in the host country. In the case of Brazil, there are several dozen nationalities who have benefited from these initiatives. These activities are developed, for the most part, in conjunction with the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and through the transfer of resources to selected NGOs with expertise in this area. The 2021 COBRADI Survey estimated the number of refugees and asylum seekers at 162,000, since they receive direct assistance from the Brazilian state and/or are integrated into social assistance and education policies.

The set of international cooperation activities also includes Brazilian participation in peacekeeping missions coordinated by the United Nations. Brazil has participated in a significant number of these missions over time, in the most varied regions of the world. According to data from the COBRADI Survey, in 2021 Brazil spent USD 260,000 in support of the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL).

IPEA (2022) brings the most comprehensive quantification to date of Brazilian international cooperation, with an expansion of the scope of agencies – federal and subnational – data providers, as well as the consideration of previously unexplored data, such as that related to the health sector (care for non-residents), the judiciary and an unprecedented level of data detail regarding the educational sector, among various other innovations. Researchers have also begun to consider the international cooperation of subnational entities, with significant contributions from the State of Sao Paulo, Goiás, Minas Gerais and the Federal District.

It was estimated that in 2021 the volume of resources involved in international cooperation by Brazil exceeds USD 1.22 billion, which is the highest nominal value of the entire historical series that began in 2005. Although the value is a record, it must be clarified that it contains an extraordinary contribution made by the Brazilian government to the New Development Bank (the “BRICS Bank”), on the order of USD 631 million, an amount that should not be repeated in coming years. The Table 1 below shows the expenses disaggregated by the modality of international cooperation.

Table 1. Expenses and Volume of Brazilian Cooperation Initiatives for International Development, by Modality (2021)

Modality of International Cooperation	Total Spend (in millions of USD)	Number of Initiatives	Total Spend (%)
B - Financial Contributions to Programmes and Funds	1062	231	86.36%
C - International Cooperation Projects	0.36	16	0.03%
D - International Technical Cooperation	53.92	305	4.38%
E - Scholarships and Student Expenses	55.33	6421	4.50%
G - Administration Costs	4.79	8	0.39%
I - Support for Refugees, Applicants, Protected Persons	18.66	2	1.52%
J - In-kind Donations	23.95	228	1.95%
K - Research and Development	10.84	663	0.88%
Grand Total	1230.71	7874	100.00%

Source: IPEA, 2022

The amounts referring to financial contributions to programs and funds dominate Brazilian spending on international development cooperation in 2021. However, there are several contributions made by Brazil in 2021 that do not fall into the category of “mandatory”. If the value of the contribution to the NDB were not considered, the percentage of mandatory contributions would fall to 65%, a value close to the historical average of Brazil’s cooperation. Considering that spending on mandatory contributions represents Brazil’s international commitments, and knowing that such commitments depend on adherence to treaties and approval by the National Congress, the percentage of such spending should be stable in relation to the total spending on the Brazilian IDC. As already mentioned, the expansion of the population of interest for the production of national statistics may decrease the proportion of contributions in the total spent by Brazil with IDC.

A second trend that may be intensified is the share of spending on education, and research and development modalities, in relation to total spending. In 2021, the amounts of spending in this modality exceeded the activities and projects of international technical cooperation, even considering that Brazil was one of the countries most affected by the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, in the first half of 2021.

Table 2 shows the expenditures and total initiatives disaggregated by economic-industrial sector. The classification used by Brazil is the “International Standard Industrial Classification” (ISIC), a statistical system used by the United Nations to classify economic data. Brazil is currently the only country participating in the TOSSD task force to use the UN classification.

Table 2. Expenses and Volume of Brazilian Cooperation Initiatives for International Development, by Economic Sector (2021)

Economic-Industrial Sector	Total Spend (in millions of USD)	Number of Initiatives	Total Spend (%)
A - Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries	8.009	26	0.65%
B - Mining and Quarrying	0.467	2	0.04%
C - Industry and Production	0.627	5	0.05%
D - Energy, Gas and Electricity	0.253	5	0.02%
E - Water and Sewerage	0.657	4	0.05%
F - Construction	41.288	2	3.35%
H - Transport and Storage	0.001	3	0.00%
J - Information and Communication	0.688	13	0.06%
K - Financial and Insurance Activities	726.270	46	59.01%
M - Professional, Scientific and Technical Activities	12.90	713	1.05%
N - Administrative and Support Services Activities	0.247	9	0.02%
O - Public Administration and Defense	8.293	210	0.67%
P - Education	58.828	6490	4.78%
Q - Health and Social Care	46.398	250	3.77%
R - Arts, Entertainment, and Recreation	0.446	3	0.04%
U - Activities of Extraterritorial Organizations and Bodies	325.33	93	26.43%
Grand Total	1230.71	7874	100.00%

Source: IPEA, 2022

Financial and insurance activities, and those of extraterritorial organizations and bodies dominate total spending, with an amount that represents 85.44% of total spending. The high value corresponds to the payment of capital in Development Banks, classified as “International Financial Institutions” (IFIs). In essence, contributions in sector K constitute capital payments in institutions that will fund development projects in several countries in the South, such as the NDB.

Another highlight, although lower, in the total expenses, corresponds to the activities related to education and research and development, for the reasons previously mentioned. Such expenditures, as well as those related to technical and scientific activities, tend to grow in value in future surveys, due to the increase in the participation of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and other Brazilian public research institutions.

In the case of the health and social care sector, the high value should not be surprising, since Brazil is an example of international best practice, due to its Unified Health System (SUS, Sistema Único de Saúde)². The exchange of practices, the transfer of knowledge and donations of medicines and equipment are regular features of the history of international cooperation and Brazil’s relationship with its partners in the Global South (Buss & Burger, 2021).

One of the main innovations of the 2021 COBRADI Survey was the disaggregation of data by Sustainable Development Goal (SDG). The data refer to Brazil’s external spending to advance the SDGs in other developing countries. Table 3 presents the 2021 expenses disaggregated by SDGs.

Table 3. Expenses and Number of Brazilian Cooperation Initiatives for International Development, by Sustainable Development Goal (2021)

Sustainable Development Goal	Total Spend (in millions of USD)	Number of Initiatives	Total Spend (%)
SDG 01 - No Poverty	1.913	7	0.16%
SDG 02 - Zero Hunger	34.778	41	2.83%
SDG 03 - Health and well-being	66.185	260	5.38%
SDG 04 - Quality Education	69.490	6443	5.65%
SDG 05 - Gender Equality	0.055	4	0.00%
SDG 06 - Clean Water and Sanitation	0.327	4	0.03%
SDG 07 - Affordable and Clean Energy	0.326	5	0.03%
SDG 08 - Decent Work and Economic Growth	63.722	71	5.18%
SDG 09 - Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure	740.985	677	60.21%
SDG 10 - Reduced Inequalities	19.842	8	1.61%
SDG 11 - Sustainable Cities and Communities	3.418	15	0.28%
SDG 12 - Responsible Consumption and Production	0.391	3	0.03%
SDG 13 - Climate Action	0.740	7	0.06%
SDG 14 - Life Below Water	1.140	11	0.09%
SDG 15 - Life on Land	1.709	12	0.14%
SDG 16 - Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions	49.144	197	3.99%
SDG 17 - Global Partnership	176.541	109	14.34%
Grand Total	1230.71	7874	100.00%

Source: IPEA, 2022

The expenses and initiatives for international development cooperation in Table 3 do not differ from what could be expected, considering that Brazilian spending is mostly concentrated in various contributions to international institutions. The concentration on SDG 9 is explained by the same logic discussed earlier for financial and insurance activities: high capital payment amounts for international development banks, whose central mission is investment in infrastructure projects, innovation, etc. Similar logic to the contributions to SDG 17, essentially linked to the means for the implementation of the SDGs, constitutes a “transversal” objective. The same education trends discussed for the data shown in Table 1 can also be viewed in the context of SDG 4.

A rather peculiar characteristic for the 2021 data on Brazilian cooperation for international development is the concentration of spending in three clear groups. The first group could be characterized as “social assistance”, bringing together spending related to SDGs 2, 3 and 4. The second group gravitates towards SDGs 8 and 9, with the majority being economic issues of growth, labor, and industry. Finally, the third group concerns broader governance/institutions issues (SDG 16) and partnerships for development (SDG 17), exceeding R$1 billion.

The largest Brazilian effort in International Development Cooperation is concentrated on education and health, a result that is also not surprising, given the relative size of these sectors in the Brazilian economy and on the national public policy agenda. The unexpected feature is the number of initiatives linked to SDG 9, as the large expenditures relate to a few capital payment initiatives to IFIs. One explanation is that SDG 9 comprises various financial support to international research and development projects of which Brazil is a part.

VI – Final remarks, based on the Brazilian experience

The previous section showed the significant volume of resources that Brazil has allocated to international development cooperation activities and the diversity of modalities. It also showed that these activities greatly contribute to the advancement of the Sustainable Development Goals.

The experience gained since the beginning of the quantification of international cooperation activities promoted by Brazil leads us to believe that by expanding the scope of coverage of data collection with the inclusion, for example, of more teaching and research units and initiatives by subnational governments, values should increase significantly, further highlighting the country’s prominent global role in terms of cooperation.

Until now, international cooperation initiatives by subnational governments have been, at most, presented in an individualized way, nurturing a dimension that has been conventionally called “paradiplomacy”, that is, initiatives with international impact from subnational entities.

However, it makes sense to claim that there is a formalized mechanism for collecting information related to all international cooperation initiatives. This would allow a better knowledge of the various initiative projects of the three levels of the Brazilian public administration, and it could obtain a more precise idea of what is being done at each moment.

This is not an academic concern: the systematic information on the set of international cooperation measures made by the country paves the way for the identification of opportunities for the intensification of economic and political relations with other countries, as well as leading to an external image of the country more consistent with the efforts actually made.

In parallel to efforts to achieve centralized calculation of the various projects, there should also be a progressive shift from the axis of quantification of expenses, activities and deliveries to the axis of studying the impacts of international cooperation activities by Brazil. As it is about the use of public resources, measuring the effectiveness of projects should be a basic condition. This conclusion is in line with the recommendations of BAPA+40 on the need to improve the statistics and methods of measuring the effects of SSDC.

To date, the data known and processed in relation to the Brazilian IDC relate to projects developed by public sector agencies, both at the federal level and by subnational governments. It is recognized, however, that there are several initiatives by the national private sector that are clearly identifiable as international development cooperation, in addition to being completely aligned with the idea of a multisectoral partnership advanced by the 2030 Agenda.

Last but not least, the full picture should include the mapping of possible loans at different rates to developing countries, provided that these are not transactions linked to commercial transactions, but being strictly focused on cooperation. That is, those initiatives that are directly linked to the special financing of development priorities in Brazil’s partner countries in the global South.

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Notes

¹ Not only in these regions: for example, support was sent to Lebanon in 2021, when the Port of Beirut was blown up.

² For information on the SUS system and health policies in Brazil see Giovanella (2012).