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NGOs in developing countries account for over 30% of international development aid, but their effectiveness is mixed due to poor oversight and management. They can cause harm by disrupting natural coping mechanisms and promoting their own agendas. However, small, locally involved NGOs can build sustainability from the ground up and generate more trust in local populations.
Non-governmental organization (NGO) movements to alleviate poverty, protect the environment or defend human rights are widespread throughout the developing world and, as of 2002, accounted for over 30% of aid international development. While many of the smaller NGOs in this group are regarded as positive and uplifting services to local communities, the larger multinational examples of social organizations are prone to the same types of endemic corruption as other corporate entities. Furthermore, NGOs often promote ideologies such as equal rights for women which are in direct conflict with the political goals of a local government.
Another specific limitation of many NGOs that gives them both a unique strength and weakness is their focus on a key aspect of a general problem within a society. For example, working to provide access to clean water for the poor without being able to address the regulatory issues such as industrial pollution that led to the contamination in the first place can lead to self-defeating efforts in long-term changes. This leads to the conclusion in development aid circles that the success of NGOs over the past 50 years has had mixed results, often due to poor oversight and poor management of stated goals.
By neglecting to examine the effects of humanitarian actions in a broader context, some NGOs have acquired a negative image in the eyes of the governments of the countries in which they work. A prominent example of this is a food crisis in Niger in 2005. Niger’s President Mamadou Tandja accused international food agencies of exaggerating his country’s problems and portraying them in a simplistic way that did not reflect real conditions and need. International media portrayed Niger’s crisis as sudden and acute to gain support and funding for NGO services, when, in reality, the people of Niger were experiencing chronic malnutrition that had resulted from years of scarcity and rising prices. Such mismatches in aid and the very real needs they seek to fill often result in short-term over-delivery and little attention to the chronic conditions that created the crisis in the first place.
The image of non-profit aid agencies in developing countries is often one of overestimating their effectiveness and underestimating the harm they can cause by causing disruptions in natural coping mechanisms within societies. Food aid to Zambia in 2002 to avert a perceived famine predicted to come by the United Nations was banned by the donor nation of the United States due to the fact that the donated corn came from genetically modified corn crops. US donor NGOs at the time thought that such a Zambian policy was absurd and would lead to the deaths of millions, but Zambia did not experience famine conditions partly due to non-GM food aid coming from Europe.
Where NGOs are effective in alleviating a crisis or work in concert with government policies, their presence is often appreciated, but the lasting effects may be minimal. Further efforts to address the root causes of the problems are deemed necessary. Independent organizations have provided aid to the Sahel region of Africa’s southern Sahara desert, covering the territory of six nations, for example since 1972, yet the same famines and emergencies continued to occur in 2011.
Among the main advantages offered by NGOs is the fact that they generate more trust in local populations if they are small and intimately involved in daily activities as opposed to the intervention of foreign and multinational governments. They can also have a more radical focus building sustainability from the ground up if they are managed and administered correctly. Key to their effectiveness is the ability to represent civil society organizations that can operate without larger racial or ethnic agendas. NGOs that have grand visions for change often set a tone of local meddling by promoting their religious and political agendas, but distinguishing which organizations are welcome and which are frowned upon needs to be done on a case-by-case basis.
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