Small island states rate China as top development partner as West cuts aid

LONDON, Jan 28 (Reuters) – A survey of small island developing nations such as Mauritius and the Maldives showed China rated as the top bilateral development assistance partner amid U.S. aid cuts and Washington’s pivot away from climate change, a report by ODI Global found.

Data from an ODI survey to which officials from 29 small island developing states responded found that in the aggregate, governments saw China as the most valued bilateral partner – a view that has geopolitical implications, according to lead author Emily Wilkinson.

“These countries are important to different donors for geopolitical reasons,” Wilkinson told Reuters.

China’s showing among Caribbean countries – where Beijing historically had less involvement than the likes of the United States or the United Kingdom – was surprising, she added.

The survey, conducted between July and November 2025, includes countries spanning from the Caribbean to the South China Sea, including the Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Barbados, Cabo Verde, Mauritius and the Maldives.

Nations grouped under the small island developing nations moniker as defined by the World Bank also include some non-island states such as Belize and Guyana.

While small, some are strategically located for the world’s superpowers along key maritime routes.

A breakdown shows a more nuanced picture. The UK topped the list for half of the Caribbean respondents while Australia topped the list in the Pacific. China was number one for the Atlantic, Indian Ocean and South China Sea island states.

ODI’s analysis of finance flows capturing data between 2020 and 2023 shows Beijing provided $6 billion in developmental aid to small island states in the period, outstripping official development finance from Australia, at $4.78 billion, the United States at $3.17 billion and Japan at $2 billion.

Those figures came before U.S. President Donald Trump’s return to office in January 2025, when he largely shuttered USAID – the vehicle for most American aid spending – and has scaled back any funds for climate change.

The survey also found that while donor nations increasingly push innovative financing, such as debt swaps and debt pause clauses when climate disasters strike, there is limited take-up.

“The bigger vulnerability these countries say is the disproportionate impact on the extreme weather events have on their economies and the fact that they have, many of them, very limited access to concessional finance,” she said, adding the instruments do not get to the root of the problem because they don’t actually reduce the level of debt.

(Reporting by Libby George, editing by Karin Strohecker and Nick Zieminski)