France

Responsibility for defining France's official development assistance (ODA) policy is shared between the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs.

Agence Française de Développement (AFD) is the bilateral financing institution for the public sector and NGOs which contributes to the implementation of France's policy in terms of development and international solidarity.

Since 2021, with the programming law relating to inclusive development and the fight against global inequalities, in the context of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, AFD's resources have been reinforced. Thus, from an executing agency, it has now moved to a group with an enlarged scope to finance, support and accelerate transitions towards a fairer and more resilient world, in a strong partnership logic.

In addition to the climate, biodiversity, peace, gender equality, and health, education is one of France's clearly identified priorities.

In 2020, France's ongoing commitments to education worldwide amounted to €1.8 billion, including €467 million in new commitments, i.e. 13.7% of France's ODA, when member countries of the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the OECD spend 8% on average on education.

In addition, in its 2017-2021 strategy for education, vocational training and integration, and as defined in February 2018, the French Inter-Ministerial Committee for International Cooperation and Development (CICID) had reaffirmed these strategic objectives and decided that France's development policy in education, on which AFD relies, would focus on:

• Universal access to basic education
• Integration of youth in the market place
• Women and girl’s empowerment
• Democratization of higher education, research, and innovation
• Support for French-speaking countries in promoting the French language

France sees education as a key sector to improve employability and security in partner countries. In the context of the Sahel Alliance, which is pursuing development and security in the G5 Sahel countries (Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger), France is a leading donor on education and youth employment.

In 2020, the main beneficiary countries of ODA granted by France were Morocco, Algeria, China, Turkey and Senegal.

France chairs the Performance, Impact and Learning Committee and is a member of the Finance and Risk Committee.

President Emmanuel Macron, alongside President Macky Sall of Senegal, co-hosted GPE’s Financing Conference in Dakar in February 2018.

France is an international leader on global education. In the context of its G7 Presidency in 2019, France chose “fighting inequality of opportunity, promoting in particular gender equality, access to education and high-quality health services” as one of the G7 program’s five goals for fighting inequality.