Country_12_Sweden_EN

Sweden

Commitment to Development Index 2012

Sweden

David Roodman and Julia Clark

The Commitment to Development Index (CDI) ranks 27 of the world’s richest countries based on their dedication to policies that benefit poor nations.

Looking beyond standard comparisons of foreign aid flows, the CDI measures national policies in seven areas that are important to developing countries: aid, trade, investment, migration, environment, security and technology. This report reviews Sweden’s performance on the 2012 CDI. For more details, visit cgdev.org/cdi.

Denmark Norway Sweden Luxembourg Austria Netherlands Finland New Zealand United Kingdom Portugal Canada Germany Belgium France Spain Australia Ireland Switzerland United States Italy Greece Hungary Slovakia Czech Republic Poland Japan South Korea

Overall Score

Sweden’s 2012 CDI Performance n Overall rank 2012: 3 n Overall score 2012: 6.4 n Change since 2003: -0.3 (using 2012 methodology) Sweden ranks 3 overall in 2012. Sweden places in the top half of CDI countries in all components except for security and technology.

The Swedish foreign aid program is one of the best in the world in terms of quantity, weighted for country size, as well as its quality.

Sweden also bears a large burden of refugees in humanitarian emergencies, provides little protection to domestic producers of agricultural products, and has the lowest greenhouse gas emission rates per capita of the CDI countries.

Sweden is penalized for high arms exports to poor and undemocratic governments, and weak support for the creation and dissemination of technological advances.

Sweden’s CDI Performance, 2003–12 2003

Aid

2012

Trade Investment

rd

www.cgdev.org/cdi

Migration Environment Security Technology Overall

0

4

8

12

16

Sweden Country Report

Aid

Aid quality is just as important as aid quantity, so the CDI measures gross aid as a share of GDP adjusted for various quality factors: it subtracts debt service, penalizes “tied� aid that makes recipients spend aid only on donor goods and services, rewards aid to poor but relatively well-governed recipients, and penalizes overloading poor governments with many small projects.

n Score: 12.6 n Rank: 3

Rich-country investment in poorer countries can transfer technologies, upgrade management and create jobs. The CDI includes a checklist of policies that support healthy investment in developing countries.

n Score: 5.3 n Rank: 11 Strengths

Strengths - High net aid volume as a share of the economy (0.97%; rank: 3) - Prevents project proliferation; large average project size (rank: 1) - Small share of tied or partially tied aid (0.3%; rank: 5)

Weaknesses - Small amount of private charitable giving attributable to tax policy (rank as a share of GDP: 14)

Trade

International trade has been a force for economic development for centuries. The CDI measures trade barriers in rich countries against exports from developing countries.

- Political risk insurance agency provides wide firm and sectoral coverage and screens potential projects for violations of human, labor and environmental rights - Employs foreign tax credits to prevent double taxation of corporate profits earned abroad - No restrictions on pension fund investments in emerging markets and provides official support for outflows of portfolio investment

Weaknesses - Denies domestic investors the benefits of tax incentives in developing countries - Loopholes in domestic legislation permit bribe payers to circumvent the OECD Convention on Bribery

Migration

The movement of people from poor to rich countries provides unskilled immigrants with jobs, income and knowledge. This increases the flow of money sent home by migrants abroad and the transfer of skills when the migrants return.

n Score: 5.8 n Rank: 6 Strengths - Low agricultural subsidies (equivalent to a tariff of 8.2% of the value of imports; rank: 6) - Low tariffs on textiles (6.4% of the value of imports; rank: 3) - Low tariffs on apparel (6.4% of the value of imports; rank: 3) - High level of manufactures imports from poorer countries (10.1% of GDP per capita; rank: 4)

Center for Global Development

Investment

n Score: 7.8 n Rank: 4 Strengths - Large number of immigrants from developing countries entering Sweden (rank by share of population: 3) - Large increase during the 1990s in the number of unskilled immigrants from developing countries living in Sweden (rank by share of population: 6) - Bears large share of the burden of refugees during humanitarian crises (rank: 8) - No tuition fee for foreign students

Sweden Country Report

www.cgdev.org/cdi

Environment

Rich countries use a disproportionate amount of scarce resources and poor countries are most vulnerable to global warming and ecological deterioration, so the CDI measures the impact of policies on the global climate, fisheries, and biodiversity.

n Score: 7.3 n Rank: 5

Technology

Rich countries contribute to development through the creation and dissemination of new technologies. The CDI captures this by measuring government support for R&D and penalizing strong intellectual property rights regimes that limit the dissemination of new technologies to poor countries.

n Score: 4.7 n Rank: 18

Strengths - Low greenhouse gas emissions rate per capita (3.5 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent; rank: 1) - No fossil fuel production per capita (0.0 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent; rank: 1) - High compliance with mandatory reporting requirements under multilateral environmental agreements relating to biodiversity (rank: 7)

Weaknesses

Strengths - High government expenditure on R&D (rank by share of GDP: 7)

Weaknesses - Low tax subsidy rate to businesses for R&D (rank: 25) - Large share of government R&D expenditure on defense (rank by share of GDP: 24) - Does not force patent holders to license to meet social needs - Does not revoke unused patents

- High fishing subsidies (rank: 19)

For More

Security

Since security is a prerequisite for development, the CDI rewards contributions to internationally sanctioned peacekeeping operations and forcible humanitarian interventions, military protection of global sea lanes, and participation in international security treaties. It also penalizes arms exports to poor and undemocratic governments.

Visit cgdev.org/cdi for the complete 2012 edition of the Commitment to Development Index. There, you can explore the numbers with our interactive graphing tool, view additional publications and background papers, and dive deeper into the CDI methodology by downloading our data and code.

n Score: 1.2 n Rank: 27 Weaknesses - High arms exports to poor and undemocratic governments (rank by share of GDP: 27) - No protection of global sea lanes (rank: 17) - Has not ratified the Convention on Cluster Munitions (CCM)

Center for Global Development

Sweden Country Report

www.cgdev.org/cdi

Commitment to Development Index 2012 Country Denmark Norway Sweden Luxembourg Austria Netherlands Finland New Zealand United Kingdom Portugal Canada Germany Belgium France Spain Australia Ireland Switzerland United States Italy Greece Hungary Slovakia Czech Republic Poland Japan South Korea

Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 11 13 13 15 15 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27

Aid 11.5 13.0 12.6 13.0 3.1 9.5 6.6 3.3 6.8 3.1 5.0 3.9 6.4 4.2 4.0 4.3 7.5 5.2 3.2 1.3 1.6 0.8 0.8 1.1 0.7 1.6 1.0

Trade 5.3 1.1 5.8 5.3 5.6 5.9 5.8 8.1 5.5 5.6 6.2 5.5 5.5 5.6 5.5 7.4 5.2 1.5 6.7 5.7 5.3 5.4 5.8 5.5 5.6 0.1 -1.3

Investment 4.7 6.1 5.3 4.2 4.8 6.3 5.1 4.3 6.3 5.2 6.1 6.3 5.3 6.1 5.9 6.1 2.9 4.4 5.0 5.4 4.0 3.6 2.9 3.9 4.1 5.2 5.6

Migration 6.2 9.9 7.8 6.8 11.7 5.5 4.4 6.4 4.7 4.0 7.0 6.9 5.0 4.0 5.4 4.2 2.8 8.6 5.2 4.7 6.4 1.7 0.6 1.3 0.6 1.9 1.3

Environment 6.8 3.2 7.3 5.5 6.2 6.7 7.4 6.2 7.2 7.2 2.5 6.9 7.0 6.9 6.4 3.8 6.5 5.8 4.3 6.7 5.9 7.9 8.3 7.2 7.4 4.5 4.2

Security 7.7 7.6 1.2 5.0 6.1 3.2 6.6 7.3 5.4 6.0 5.7 3.7 3.6 3.7 3.4 5.1 6.9 4.4 4.6 5.0 5.7 5.4 5.5 1.6 3.8 4.5 1.4

Technology 6.6 5.7 4.7 4.2 5.7 5.4 5.9 4.8 4.3 7.4 5.5 5.0 4.6 6.6 5.8 5.2 3.9 4.8 4.9 4.2 2.8 3.4 2.6 5.3 2.7 6.1 7.0

Overall Score 7.0 6.6 6.4 6.3 6.2 6.1 6.0 5.8 5.7 5.5 5.4 5.4 5.3 5.3 5.2 5.2 5.1 5.0 4.8 4.7 4.5 4.0 3.8 3.7 3.6 3.4 2.7

Change since 2003 -0.2

+0.7 -0.3

n/a +0.7 -0.1

+0.1 0.0 +0.7 +1.1 +0.3 +0.5 +0.5 +1.0 +0.7 +0.2 0.0 +0.2 +0.8 +0.7 +0.7 n/a n/a n/a n/a +1.3 n/a

The above table lists scores for each of the 27 CDI-ranked countries across seven policy areas. A country’s overall performance is the average of its seven component scores, each of which are scaled so that an average score in 2012 equals 5.0. The final column shows the change in each country’s overall score since the CDI began in 2003 (using 2012 methodology).

About The CDI The Commitment to Development Index has been compiled each year since 2003 by the Center for Global Development (CGD), an independent think tank that works to reduce global poverty and inequality through rigorous research and active engagement with the policy community. CGD senior fellow David Roodman is the chief architect of the CDI, and collaborators have included William R. Cline on trade; Theodore H. Moran on investment; Jeanne Batalova, Kimberly A. Hamilton, and Elizabeth Grieco on migration; Amy Cassara and Daniel Prager on environment; Michael E. O’Hanlon, Adriana Lins de Albuquerque, Mark Stoker and Jason Alderwick on security, and Keith Maskus and Walter Park on technology. The Index is supported by the CDI Consortium.

Center for Global Development

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