Estimating Chinese Bilateral Aid for Health: An Analysis of AidData’s Global Chinese Official Finance Dataset

Abstract

China’s annual global health aid has increased substantially since the 2000s. Unlike many donors, China has no official aid reporting obligations, nor does it voluntarily disclose detailed aid information. Because of this, several third parties have attempted to estimate China’s health aid footprint. Unfortunately, current estimates use varied definitions of health aid, geographic regions, and time spans. These distinct and differing methodological approaches make it difficult to compare Chinese aid to aid from other donors. Our study builds on previous tracking efforts and takes them further by creating a standardized estimate using commonly accepted definitions of aid and frameworks for categorizing health projects.
These findings enable a better understanding of Chinese health aid in the absence of transparent aid reporting. We believe such an understanding could lead to better coordination, collaboration, and resource allocation for both donors and recipient countries.

Keywords: Aid for health, bilateral aid, China, emerging donors, health aid, development assistance for health, foreign aid for health