In 2005, Vietnam had to host 791 separate missions from visiting aid bureaucrats, more than three every working day. You might think a developing country, particularly one with a very good record in reducing poverty, should have other priorities. You would be right.

Last week in Accra, Ghana, ministers met to discuss something of more importance to developing countries than any pontificating about aid in a Group of Eight summit – in fact, probably more important than all the G8 summits of the past decade put together. For once they were talking about the quality, not the width: specifically about how aid from dozens of different donors can be co-ordinated and delivered in ways that strengthen rather than undermine public finance systems in the recipient.