New analysis kicking off US$4 million collaboration reveals a 124% increase in MDB financing, while Chinese finance began to flow out of developing countries, with Africa hit hardest

WASHINGTON, Jan. 27, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- At a time when international funding to developing countries is in decline, ONE Data announced the "Development Finance Observatory," with US$4 million total funding from Google.org and The Rockefeller Foundation, to help maximize the impact of every dollar. This first-of-its-kind, interactive data collaboration launching this year will improve the accessibility of development finance data and reduce data fragmentation, while integrating both financial inflows to and outflows from developing economies. The platform is being developed with technical infrastructure support from Google's Data Commons and produced by ONE Data. An initial analysis finds that over the last decade, China shifted from a net provider of finance for low- and middle-income countries (transferring $48 billion) to a net extractor (pulling $24 billion out). Meanwhile, multilateral lenders stepped up—boosting net financing by 124% and now providing 56% of net flows, or $378.7 billion between 2020-2024.

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