5. Development Cooperation Policy vis-à-vis Africa

In recent years, India has often been described as an ‘emerging donor’. However, New Delhi has a long history of development cooperation. The country’s first assistance programmes were introduced immediately following its independence, and its signature capacity-building scheme ITEC was launched in 1964, with the underlying normative principles deeply embedded in the concept of South–South Cooperation. Of course, New Delhi’s assistance to developing countries has significantly increased and changed in the last decades such that while India may not be a newly emerging actor, it is certainly an ascending actor in development cooperation. This chapter first analyses the legacy and normative foundation of India’s development cooperation policy. Subsequently, the volume, scope and evolution of India’s main development cooperation instruments and the main actors in this policy field are examined—both in general and vis-à-vis Africa. In the process, the chapter examines the developmental aspects of India’s economic relations with Africa. Three aspects are scrutinised in greater detail: first, the “aid” aspect of Indian lines of credit and their compatibility with the tenets of South–South Cooperation; second, the developmental aspects of the overall composition of trade flows and third, the developmental aspects of India’s economic relations with Africa, with a special focus on the health and agriculture sector.