CONFIDENTIAL & PERSONAL
8. Here again the needs and resources as well as the political circumstances of individual territories differ widely. The paper therefore recommends that individual studies should be set in hand on the needs and resources of each territory, to provide
a basis for the formulation of aid policy consistent with our political objectives for each. It will often be appropriate to combine these studies with those on the political objectives referred to in paragraph 6 above. It goes without saying that these individual studies on aid will have to be conducted against the background of the global aid strategy of the ODM and take into account, for example, such factors as the contribution towards the cost of aid to our dependencies which we may expect from the European Development Fund once it is extended to Dependent Territories by association with the EEC. It is already well established policy that the reasonable needs of Dependent Territories should be a first charge on the Aid Programme.
Follow-up Action
9. The geographical departments concerned have now been asked to initiate Territorial Studies as proposed in the paper, and in doing so they will naturally consult Officers Administering Governments as appropriate. The question whether, and if so to what extent, local Governments and Ministers should also be con- sulted will be for consideration in each case in the light of local circumstances, but the intention is that the paper itself and the Territorial Studies should be confined to the personal series. In principle, the format of the Territorial Studies will follow that of conventional ODM Country Policy Papers as closely
as possible.
10. A summary of factors which are likely to determine the frame- work within which each of the Territorial Studies will be drafted
is attached at Annex B to this despatch. From this it will be seen that for different but self-evident reasons no Territorial Study will be initiated in respect of Hong Kong, the Seychelles, British Antarctic Territory, British Indian Ocean Territory,
/Pitcairn
CONFIDENTIAL & PERSONAL