South Korea increased its official aid for developing nations last year by more than any other advanced nation in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) committee for development aid, data showed Wednesday.

   The US$1.2 billion South Korea spent on Official Development Assistance (ODA) last year was 25.7 percent more than what it contributed in 2009, recording the largest rate of increase among all members of the OECD's Development Assistance Committee (DAC), Seoul's foreign ministry said in a release.

   The ODA is designed to help Asian, African and Latin American countries establish economic and industrial infrastructure. The assistance consists of concessional loans, grants and other support for multilateral cooperation business.

   South Korea joined the 23-member DAC in late 2009, marking its official transition from an aid recipient to a donor nation on the international stage.

   In total value terms, however, the country still fell behind most other nations to take 18th place. The country's aid as a proportion of gross national income (GNI) stood at 0.12 percent, or less than any other member state, the ministry said in the release.

   "Our government intends to steadily carry out its plans to expand its ODA to 0.25 percent of GNI (about $3 billion) by 2015 as part of its diplomacy of contributing to the international community," it added.

   Last year's top five donors were the United States, Britain, France, Germany and Japan.

Source: Yonhap News (April 6, 2011)