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Julien Serre (E99): ‘Official Development Assistance Must Be Reinvented’

Interviews

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07.01.2025

Having worked for the UN, Julien Serre (E99) now provides his expertise to businesses and international organisations, helping them to adapt to geopolitical upheavals. He takes stock of the major crisis in Official Development Assistance (ODA). 

ESSEC Alumni: How did you develop your expertise in ODA?

Julien Serre: After ESSEC, Sciences Po and Harvard, I spent more than 20 years dealing with funding, security and governance issues at the United Nations Secretariat in New York, then on the ground in Africa, with the European Investment Bank for Near and Middle-East countries initially, followed by the Sahel with Expertise France. All these organisations use Official Development Assistance and loan & guarantee mechanisms. These experiences forged my belief that every euro allocated can make a difference, but all too often it is lost in the meanders of bureaucracy and corruption, or in the lack of logic and long-term impactThat is why I founded Whaydon, which designs radical new strategies in this field, free of institutional burdens. 

EA: What does ODA consist in?

J. Serre: ODA describes the funding provided by some countries, including France, to promote economic growth and improve living conditions in developing countries. The OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (DAC) established ODA as the benchmark standard for external aid in 1969. The OECD also defines the list of developing countries. Officially, it is a transfer of public resources (subsidies, loans, guarantees, expertise or equipment) overseas. The historic aim of ODA is to reduce poverty and support infrastructures, but now also includes climate transition. In reality however, ODA also encompasses geopolitical, environmental and commercial goals; it reflects the interests and priorities the powers that provide it. 

EA: How does ODA work, in practical terms?

J. Serre: In theory, we differentiate between bilateral aid, i.e. direct funding towards a beneficiary country in the form of subsidies or loans, and multilateral aid, which is channelled via international institutions such as the UN or the World Bank. The procedure is based on a system of complex but transparent calls for tender, audits and assessments. In France, bilateral ODA is managed by the State Treasury, the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Agence Française de Développement (AFD), along with its implementation body, Expertise France.

EA: Could you give us some key ODA figures? 

J. Serre: Firstly, funds are declining significantly. In 2024, the French Government already validated an initial cut of €742 million. In 2025, if we disregard certain accounting tricks, the budget has fallen to just €3.6 billion... a drop of around a third from one year to the next. 

EA: What impact does this have? 

J. Serre: It all depends on what we are talking about. Our international influence? Stability and peace in fragile states? Our infrastructure loans and returns on investment for our national industries? There’s a lot to say.

EA: What is the reason for these budgetary cuts? 

J. Serre: As I wrote in Les États fragiles [Fragile States] in 2016, progress has been only marginal over a decade. In fact, ODA is not without its critics, particularly when it comes to monitoring funds and strategic coherence. In my experience, we tend to spread funding across a wide variety of initiatives, simply because they meet a certain number of bureaucratic criteria, yet they do not always serve our national interests and sometimes produce only negligible benefits, or are even counterproductive for the populations in question. Humanitarian NGOs regularly sound the alarm bells in this respect. All too often, however, technocrats develop their projects without considering key underlying constraints, what economist Dani Rodrik calls ‘binding constraints’ and are nevertheless the most urgent to deal with if we are to achieve a significant impact.  

EA: Have you witnessed these discrepancies on the ground?

J. Serre: In Northern Mali in 2017, I saw a project by Cases de la Paix aimed at promoting dialogue between communities, but the women beneficiaries already knew each other very well, and were more in need of help to sell their farm and craft produce at markets. In Mogadishu in 2024, I witnessed a team ‘misunderstand’ an initiative and promote desertification instead of addressing it. I have plenty of examples.

EA: Have you observed other problems? 

J. Serre: Another structural shortcoming does merit our attention. In the subsidy system, which by definition is non-competitive, the ‘desk’ effect generates a huge number of administrative complexities. This bureaucracy slows down the flow of money, and sometimes in an irrelevant way. As a result, we emphasise audits and reports, but overlook the key question: are we really funding the right priorities, at the right time, in optimal conditions to make a true impact? 

EA: What solution do you suggest?

J. Serre: Firstly, I believe we can adopt a more liberal approach while respecting our values, thanks to social innovation. Secondly, I advocate considering the national interest of our allocations a little more. For example, it would be advantageous for us to prioritise our national implementation agencies, Expertise France and Civipol, which would not prevent them from teaming up with the European Commission and bilateral European partners. Likewise, it would be good to redirect our humanitarian aid, without reducing it, towards French NGOs as a priority. Lastly, let’s ask AFD to commit to an annual target of €4 billion in contracts awarded to French companies (to be set against its €12-billion budget, 85% of which comes from bond issues) and 50% of the volume of calls for tender reserved for French companies. 

EA: We’ve seen a drastic turnaround in US aid, too. What are the arguments for this?

J. Serre: Yes, there is a drive by the Trump administration to restructure or dismantle America’s international development agency, USAID. Upon his investiture, the US President accused USAID of being run by ‘crazy extremists’, and ordered a 90-day freeze in funds, notably to allow time to eliminate programmes deemed not in keeping with his objectives. When Elon Musk was appointed to the head of the Department of Government Efficiency, he described the agency as a ‘criminal organisation’ destined to ‘die’ soon. Lastly, Marco Rubio, Secretary of State and acting administrator of USAID, placed the agency under the supervision of the State Department, claiming that ‘the United States does not do charity’ and that every dollar spent should serve America’s national interest. As a result, thousands of projects were withdrawn with a huge impact on the beneficiaries.

EA: In this context, how will American assistance change in the coming years?

J. Serre: Assistance will probably be limited to humanitarian issues with a dedicated agency. Matters of security, politics and governance will be handled directly by the State Department. As for the rest, the model will be capitalistic with a profit-making and business-generating goal, based on what already exists with the Development Finance Corporation.

EA: Here again, are there projects you believe could be scrapped?

J. Serre: Yes, some of USAID’s projects did not end well. The climate project in Sub-Saharan Africa, which swallowed millions of dollars in recent years, has produced only solar panels, which are mostly unused, not to mention embezzled funds. The Feed the Future initiative in Haiti, endowed with $300 million since 2010, was more beneficial for American companies than local farmers in 2024. And in Syria or Iraq, €200 million invested in the 2020s for schools ended in empty or looted buildings. 

EA: That said, you do not recommend disengagement. 

J. Serre: The aim is rather to stop writing cheques without conditions. I advocate stricter targeting of truly profitable investments in truly strategic sectors such as energy transition. It’s not a question of slashing ODA, but of rethinking it. From a liberal perspective first, by boosting private initiatives and creating wealth for recipient countries, so that local populations gain prosperity through investment and entrepreneurship, rather than charity alone. From a conservative perspective secondly, by defending national interest so that every euro invested benefits our security, economy and values. In other words, I’m calling for a reinvention of ODA, which would combine moral stringency and efficiency, without capitulating either our principles or sense of responsibility. This will require a strong vision. Beyond the budget alone, we need a meta-project which factors in our foreign policy, security and economic strategy.


Interview by Louis Armengaud Wurmser (E10), Content Manager at ESSEC Alumni

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