This diploma work analyzes two different approaches to "fight" poverty -- foreign development aid and self-help in communities. First part is concerned with international poverty and its dimensions. Second part concerns with ideas, background theories, goals and adverse effects of foreign aid. As an alternative to foreign aid, self-help in communities is analyzed in next part, with its advantages and shortcomings. The two approaches to development are tested on Kenya's example. Major task of this work is to compare the two concepts and try to decide which one conducts better in development. Outcome of this work suggests that foreign development aid fails to fulfill its goals and has many adverse effects on a recipient country (including Kenya). On the other hand, self-help has usually direct impact on conditions in which poor people are living, therefore is more effective in figthting poverty.

This thesis is the result of nine weeks fieldwork in Babati and Bukoba districts in Northern Tanzania during spring 2012. The purpose of this thesis is to study why development projects on fuel-efficient stoves have had a limited adoption in these two regions and what obstacles and opportunities there are for further spread of fuel-efficient cooking stoves. Semi-structured interviews were the main method used for collecting the empirical data, which was then analysed from a socio-economic perspective with help from the framework of Sustainable Rural Livelihoods. The Results showed that people’s perceptions of fuel-efficient stoves are positive but that projects face many obstacles connected to socio-economic conditions. Knowledge on how to get stoves and access to financial capital is main obstacles for further spreading. Social networks and organisations are channels for information, but to spread outside these networks will need complementing strategies from organisations promoting fuel-efficient stoves. Important are also finding ways of making the financial aspect of adopting stoves less, like using materials with lower costs, using stove-models with low costs and training people in building stoves so re-investments are unnecessary and dependency of funding from organisations less. Gender is a factor affecting the adoption of fuel-efficient stoves, regarding access to assets and generated benefits. There is therefore an importance of involving gender throughout the different stages of the projects.

La problématique du financement du développement dans les pays en développement se trouve au coeur de cette thèse. Cette dernière s'articule autour de quatre chapitres sur les questions liées au financement du développement. Le chapitre 1 explore les effets des épisodes budgétaires dans les principaux pays donateurs principaux de l'OCDE (Organisation pour la Coopération et le Développement Economique) sur leur offre d'aide au développement aux pays en développement. On observe que les épisodes budgétaires affectent significativement l'offre d'aide, avec une différence comportementale en termes d'offre d'aide du groupe de pays de l'Union européenne versus le groupe de pays de l'OCDE n'appartenant pas à L'Union européenne. Le chapitre 2 s'intéresse aux conséquences des transferts des migrants et de l'imprévisibilité de l'aide au développement sur la probabilité de consolidation budgétaire dans les pays en développement. Les résultats montrent que les transferts des migrants affectent positivement et significativement cette probabilité alors que l'effet est statistiquement nul pour l'imprévisibilité de l'aide. Ces résultats suggèrent en l'occurrence qu'une meilleure gestion des recettes issues de ces transferts durant les périodes de boom économique pourrait aider à éviter de telles situations et offrir une marge de manoeuvre plus importante à ces gouvernements pour la mise en oeuvre de politiques contra-cycliques pendant les périodes de basse conjoncture. Le chapitre 3 analyse l'existence ou non d'effet de la vulnérabilité structurelle des pays en développement sur leur dette publique totale. Les résultats suggèrent qu'un tel effet existe : en l'occurrence, on montre l'existence d'une relation en forme de 'U' entre la vulnérabilité structurelle de ces pays et leur dette publique totale. En focalisant dans le chapitre 4 sur les pays de la zone Franc CFA, nous examinons si leur vulnérabilité structurelle conduit les gouvernements à un endettement excessif. Les résultats suggèrent que plus ces pays sont vulnérables, plus ils sont enclins à un endettement excessif et qu'au-delà d'un seuil de vulnérabilité, leur probabilité d'endettement excessif diminue. Ces résultats obtenus aussi bien pour l'ensemble des pays en développement que pour les pays de la zone Franc CFA suggère que les Institutions Internationales telles que la Banque Mondiale et le Fonds Monétaire International (FMI) devront prendre en compte cette vulnérabilité dans l'évaluation des politiques de développement ainsi que leurs recommandations – en particulier sur les questions liées à l'endettement – pour ces pays. / The issue of financing development in developing countries is at the heart of this thesis. The latter revolves around four chapters on financing development related matters. The chapter 1 explores how fiscal episodes in the main traditional OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) donors affect their supply of development aid towards developing countries. Evidence is shown that fiscal episodes affect significantly aid supply, with a behavioural difference between European Union and Non-European countries in terms of aid supply. The chapter 2 deals with the consequences of development aid unpredictability and migrants' remittances on fiscal consolidation in developing countries. We find evidence that while migrants' remittances exert a positive and significant effect on the likelihood of fiscal consolidation in developing countries, development aid unpredictability does not. These results particularly suggest that a better management of the revenues derived from these private transfers during their booms could help avoid such situations and allow greater room of maneuver for governments’ recipients to implement countercyclical measures during bad times. The chapter 3 investigates whether the structural vulnerability of developing countries matters for their public indebtedness and evidence is obtained that it does. More specifically, we observe the existence of U-curve relationship between this structural vulnerability and the total public debt of these countries. Focusing on the specific case of CFA Franc Zone countries in chapter 4, we examine the relationship between the structural vulnerability and the probability of entering into excessive public debt. We also obtain evidence of a nonlinear effect of the structural vulnerability indicator with respect to the probability of entering into excessive debt: a rise in the structural vulnerability of these countries increases their probability to engage into excessive debt; however this probability declines after a certain threshold of their structural vulnerability. These results (both for developing countries and particularly for CFA Franc Zone countries) suggest that international development institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) should take into account such vulnerability in their assessment of the adequate development policies and recommendations - especially those related to debt issues -, to these countries.