Between the financial years of 1996-97 and 2005-06, Zambia received £662.3 million from the UK as bilateral aid. Of this amount, DFID's bilateral programme totalled £309.6 million and included financial aid, technical cooperation, humanitarian assistance and debt relief. General poverty reduction budget support also featured in financial years 2000-01, 2004-05 and 2005-06. Aid from other (non-DFID) UK official sources amounted to £352.7 million and includes CDC Group (originally known as Colonial Development Cooperation) investments, non-DFID debt relief and contributions from the British Council among other items. Table 1 provides further details on UK bilateral aid to Zambia over the past decade.
Between 1996 and 2004, Zambia also received an estimated £128.7 million through UK contributions to multilateral institutions such as the European Commission, United Nations and World Bank.
Zambia has benefited from substantial external debt relief in recent years. Following the attainment of the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Completion Point in April 2005 and implementation of the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI) in 2006, Zambia's external debt stock has declined from US$ 7.1 billion in 2004 to approximately US$ 0.5 billion in nominal terms at year-end 2006. As a result, the net present value of debt to GDP ratio has fallen from around 28 per cent. in 2004 to 4 per cent. following the MDRI. At the end of 2006, domestic debt was estimated at $1.74 billion some 20.2 per cent. as a share of GDP in 2006.
Zambia is currently in the process of drafting a debt management strategy to avoid relapsing into an unsustainable debt situation. The UK strongly welcomes the good progress being made in this area.
£ Financial Year General Poverty Reduction Budget Support Other Financial Aid Technical Cooperation Grants and Other Aid in Kind Humanitarian Assistance 1996-97 — 3,200,460 7,031,160 3,760,561 — 1997-98 — 2,837,825 7,012,721 3,199,013 — 1998-99 — 2,525,380 5,620,201 3,536,130 284,077 1999-2000 — 1,051,284 5,157,360 4,983,230 266,053 2000-01 15,000,014 25,895,749 5,367,947 6,595,293 388,184 2001-02 — 32,499,895 4,467,724 4,792,960 217,711 2002-03 — 17,038,809 6,084,034 8,690,280 6,407,759 2003-04 — 14,951,846 5,521,455 4,612,986 1,279,151 2004-05 9,000,000 11,720,117 4,894,246 3,670,354 398,296 2005-06 20,700,000 11,125,069 4,574,717 4,615,373 4,552,220
Financial Year Debt Relief Total DFID Bilateral Programme Aid from other UK Official Sources Total Bilateral Gross Public Expenditure 1996-97 3,280,942 17,273,123 23,130,000 40,403,123 1997-98 2,975,000 16,024,559 30,558,400 46,582,959 1998-99 2,867,453 14,833,240 18,704,229 33,537,469 1999-2000 2,816,469 14,274,396 32,383,000 46,657,396 2000-01 2,735,485 55,982,672 37,362,000 93,344,672 2001-02 2,714,501 44,692,790 14,510,000 59,202,790 2002-03 2,660,717 40,881,599 4,256,000 45,137,599 2003-04 1,154,732 27,520,170 4,747,000 32,267,170 2004-05 871,788 30,554,801 132,952,000 163,506,801 2005-06 2,036,713 47,604,092 54,088,089 101,692,181 Notes: 1. No Sector Poverty Reduction Budget Support was provided between financial years 1996-97 and 2005-06. 2. Aid from other UK official sources includes CDC investments, non-DFID debt relief and contributions from the British Council among other items.