Question to the Department for International Development:

To ask the Secretary of State for International Development, what the cost to the public purse is for initiatives aimed at preventing female genital mutilation overseas since 2016; and which countries have received that funding.

The UK is proud to be a world-leader in our support for the Africa-led movement to end FGM. Our spending data is available on DFID’s Development Tracker. Our direct FGM programmes have a budget of more than £50m between 2013-2020. This includes our £35 million flagship programme working across 16 countries (Burkina Faso, Djibouti, Egypt, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Mali, Mauritania, Nigeria, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, The Gambia and Uganda), significant complementary bilateral investments in Sudan and Somalia and support to grassroots organisations working across Africa and the Middle East