, logo = File:Irish Aid logo.jpg , picture = File:Ministry for Foreign Affairs (Ireland).jpg , picture_caption = Iveagh House in

Dublin Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 ...

, DFA headquarters , agency_type = , logo_caption = , company_type = , formed = 1974 , headquarters = Iveagh House, 80

St Stephen's Green St Stephen's Green () is a garden square and public park located in the city centre of Dublin, Ireland. The current landscape of the park was designed by William Sheppard. It was officially re-opened to the public on Tuesday, 27 July 1880 by ...

2
Riverstone House, 23-27 Henry Street,

Limerick Limerick ( ; ga, Luimneach ) is a western city in Ireland situated within County Limerick. It is in the province of Munster and is located in the Mid-West which comprises part of the Southern Region. With a population of 94,192 at the 2016 ...

, chief1_name = Ruairi De Burca , chief1_position= Director-General , jurisdiction =

Government of Ireland The Government of Ireland ( ga, Rialtas na hÉireann) is the cabinet that exercises executive authority in Ireland. The Constitution of Ireland vests executive authority in a government which is headed by the , the head of government. The go ...

, employees = 184 Irish Aid staff
290 locally recruited staff
Total: 474 , budget = €870 million (2019 ODA) , parent_agency = Department of Foreign Affairs , website = , footnotes = Irish Aid ( ga, Cúnamh Éireann) is the

's official international development aid programme. Irish Aid is managed by the Development Co-Operation and Africa Division'' (''DCAD'') of the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) ''. The Irish Government allocated €870 million to

official development assistance Official development assistance (ODA) is a category used by the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) to measure foreign aid. The DAC first adopted the concept in 1969. It i ...

(ODA) in 2019, mainly focused on overseas aid to reduce poverty and hunger, and to improve education, healthcare and governance in

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an ...

, the

Middle East The Middle East ( ar, الشرق الأوسط, ISO 233: ) is a geopolitical region commonly encompassing Arabia (including the Arabian Peninsula and Bahrain), Asia Minor (Asian part of Turkey except Hatay Province), East Thrace (Europ ...

and

Latin America Latin America or * french: Amérique Latine, link=no * ht, Amerik Latin, link=no * pt, América Latina, link=no, name=a, sometimes referred to as LatAm is a large cultural region in the Americas where Romance languages — languages derived ...

. The Irish Aid programme is an integral part of Ireland's

foreign policy A state's foreign policy or external policy (as opposed to internal or domestic policy) is its objectives and activities in relation to its interactions with other states, unions, and other political entities, whether bilaterally or through ...

Priority areas of work

Ireland works towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals as set out by the

United Nations The United Nations (UN) is an intergovernmental organization whose stated purposes are to maintain international peace and security, develop friendly relations among nations, achieve international cooperation, and be a centre for harmonizi ...

. Accordingly, Irish Aid's priority areas are; Ending Poverty, Hunger, Gender Equality, Environment and Climate Change, Health,

HIV/AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual ...

, Governance and Human Rights, Education, Trade and Economic Growth, Agriculture, Water and Sanitation. Irish Aid also responds to

humanitarian crisis A humanitarian crisis (or sometimes humanitarian disaster) is defined as a singular event or a series of events that are threatening in terms of health, safety or well-being of a community or large group of people. It may be an internal or extern ...

around the world, including locations not in their area of operations, through humanitarian relief/assistance and supporting

non-governmental organization A non-governmental organization (NGO) or non-governmental organisation (see American and British English spelling differences#-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization), spelling differences) is an organization that generally is formed independent from g ...

s (NGOs) with multilateral aid. The Irish Aid Rapid Response Corps (RRC) is a team of highly skilled and experienced professionals available to deploy at short notice to humanitarian emergencies anywhere in the world, working with the

UNHCR The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is a United Nations agency mandated to aid and protect refugees, forcibly displaced communities, and stateless people, and to assist in their voluntary repatriation, local integrati ...

WFP The World Food Programme; it, Programma alimentare mondiale; es, Programa Mundial de Alimentos; ar, برنامج الأغذية العالمي, translit=barnamaj al'aghdhiat alealami; russian: Всемирная продовольствен� ...

, OCHA and

UNICEF UNICEF (), originally called the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund in full, now officially United Nations Children's Fund, is an agency of the United Nations responsible for providing humanitarian and developmental aid t ...

to identify and fill specific skills gaps in emergencies. Ireland sits on the

OECD The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; french: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, ''OCDE'') is an intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate ...

's 30-member Development Assistance Committee (DAC).

Partner countries

The main focus of Irish Aid is on East, West and Southern Africa. Long-term development assistance has been established in nine "Key Partner Countries", these are; * * * * * * * * * Irish Aid also works in a number of other countries affected by conflict, including;

Liberia Liberia (), officially the Republic of Liberia, is a country on the West African coast. It is bordered by Sierra Leone to its northwest, Guinea to its north, Ivory Coast to its east, and the Atlantic Ocean to its south and southwest. It ...

, Palestine,

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring count ...

, and

Zimbabwe Zimbabwe (), officially the Republic of Zimbabwe, is a landlocked country located in Southeast Africa, between the Zambezi and Limpopo Rivers, bordered by South Africa to the south, Botswana to the south-west, Zambia to the north, and Mozam ...

. In 2014, more than 80 countries benefited from Irish bilateral aid. Irish Aid operates its assistance programmes through the network of Ireland's overseas diplomatic missions.

Organisational structure

* Director General * Multilateral Unit * Humanitarian Unit * Civil Society & Development Education * Planning & Performance Unit * Bilateral Cooperation Unit West & East Africa * Bilateral Cooperation Unit Southern Africa, Asia & Palestine * Evaluation & Audit * Policy Coherence & Research Unit

Employees

The Irish Aid programme is managed by staff of the Department of Foreign Affairs. Recruitment is generally managed through the Public Appointments Services, with some positions advertised directly by the Department of Foreign Affairs on their website. Most positions are for permanent employment, and include general civil service, diplomat and development specialist positions. There are also temporary two-years contracts through the Junior Professional Internship (JPI) scheme. There are 145 permanent posts attached to Irish Aid's domestic headquarters in

and

in the Republic of Ireland. There are 39 permanent posts (excluding locally recruited staff) within Irish Aid missions in nine programme countries and a further 290 locally recruited overseas staff across all missions. This brings the agency's total number of employees to 474.

Budget

Ireland allocated €870 million in

(ODA) in 2019. This represents 0.32% of

gross national income The gross national income (GNI), previously known as gross national product (GNP), is the total domestic and foreign output claimed by residents of a country, consisting of gross domestic product ( GDP), plus factor incomes earned by foreig ...

(GNI). Since the beginning of 2000 has been an overall expansion in the scale and scope of Ireland's development assistance programme which has seen the foreign aid budget rise from €255 million in 2000 to €870 million in 2019. The ODA GNP% peaked at 0.59% in 2008, later reducing to a consistent 0.32% since 2015. According to the

, 2020

from Ireland decreased 4.1% to USD 972 million. Irish_Aid_ODA_2000-2019

Locations

Irish Aid's headquarters in Ireland are at the Department of Foreign Affairs, Iveagh House, 80 St Stephen's Green, Dublin 2 and Riverstone House, 23-27 Henry Street,

. Irish Aid has permanent offices in Irish embassies in; Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, Vietnam and Zambia.

References

External links

Irish AidDepartment of Foreign Affairs
{{Authority control Foreign relations of Ireland Department of Foreign Affairs (Ireland) International development agencies Economic development organizations Development finance institutions Government agencies established in 1974