GENERAL ASSEMBLY BEGINS TWO-DAY HIGH-LEVEL DIALOGUE TO ASSESS PROGRESS IMPLEMENTING 2002 MONTERREY AGREEMENT ON DEVELOPMENT FINANCE
In Opening Address, Secretary-General Says World Community On Threshold of Breakthrough in Pursuit of Development, Human Dignity
As the General Assembly met to assess progress in implementing a landmark agreement reached at a 2002 development summit in Monterrey, Mexico, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said many years of hard work had brought the international community to the threshold of a breakthrough in its pursuit of development and human dignity.
The Assemblys High-level Dialogue on Financing for Development offered an opportunity for governments to consolidate or add to the development package that is being assembled internationally in support of the Millennium Development Goals – the set of development targets endorsed by world leaders at the 2000 Millennium Summit.
It takes place as the General Assembly proceeds with negotiation of the outcome document for the 2005 World Summit in September, and in the immediate run-up to the Group of 8 (G-8) meeting, where development finances head the agenda.
The two-day Dialogue brings together ministers of finance, foreign affairs and development cooperation, as well as leaders of the United Nations, the World Bank, International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Trade Organization (WTO) – the same combination that brokered a partnership against poverty in Monterrey in 2002.
Not long ago, stated the Secretary-General, many had feared that development in the worlds poorest countries could become a lost cause, with some stating that extreme poverty was a sad but inescapable aspect of the human condition.
That view was now seen as intellectually indefensible and morally untenable, and it was widely recognized that poverty must and could be defeated. Many developing countries had succeeded in lifting millions of people out of impoverishment and despair, and the international community had banded together in a sustained, unprecedented effort.
He said the decision taken this month by the finance ministers of the G-8 to write off debt was encouraging. For too long, some of the worlds poorest countries had faced an unpalatable choice between serving their peoples and servicing their debt.
It was also an enormous boost to know that the European Union had agreed to a clear timetable for reaching the 0,7 per cent target for official development assistance (ODA) by 2015, which would help to finally overcome resource shortfalls that had kept so many millions of people mired in squalor.
Assembly President Jean Ping (Gabon) said the 2002 Monterrey Conference reflected the growing awareness of the international community of the complex issues of development and the lack of financial resources in developing countries. The process begun in Monterrey was geared towards exploring the interdependent factors that affected States ability to manage and obtain the financial resources they needed for development.
The Millennium Goals were crucially linked with the Monterrey process, given the part to be played by financing for development, so people could emerge from conditions of poverty.
Speaking on behalf of the “Group of 77” developing countries and China, Jamaicas Minister of State, Delano Franklyn, said the international community was far short of mobilizing the level of resources required to finance the level of development envisaged in the development-oriented summits and conferences, including the Millennium Summit.
An unprecedented, multidimensional coherent thrust would be needed from the September Summit to generate the level and quality of resources in the time frame, even to meet the Millennium Goals.
The United Kingdoms Secretary of State for International Development, Hilary Benn, said that, at present rates of progress, several Millennium Goals would be reached far too late.
Primary education for all would not be achieved until 2130 – 115 years too late; poverty would not be halved until 2150, and avoidable infant diseases would not end until 2165. Those who died today, were ill today, did not go to school today and were poor today could not wait that long. To help, the international community must provide more and better aid, debt relief and trade.
Motee Ramdass, Minister of Commerce and Consumer Protection of Mauritius, highlighted the fact that international trade as an engine for development could only deliver if existing disparities were duly taken into account and specific concerns were adequately addressed.
From the perspective of a small island developing State, the only credible development option lay in outward, export-led strategies. Participation in international trade, therefore, was an inevitable option, but it could not compete on equal terms with the naturally endowed and more technologically advanced.
The only option, therefore, was to provide such countries with favourable market access conditions and allow them to maintain a certain level of export competitiveness.
Francisco Thompson-Flores, Deputy Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO), said that trade was not the answer to all the worlds problems and trade liberalization on its own was not enough to meet all the challenges faced by societies.
But trades importance as a driver of growth was clear, and a successful conclusion of the Doha development round could make an enormous contribution to global efforts for poverty alleviation and development.
That was why he supported the challenge the Secretary-General had placed before world leaders for September – to commit to complete the Doha round no later than 2006 and to ensure that the development promise of the round was fully realized.
A successful conclusion of the Doha negotiations would generate great trade opportunities. – It is a once in a generation opportunity, he said. Failure would be a setback for global economic management and contrary to the interests of the entire world community.
Noting that new sources of financing were needed to fund long-term strategies driving sustainable development, Thierry Breton, France’s Minister of the Economy, Finance and Industry, said that France, Brazil, Chile and Germany were calling for the rapid implementation of a pilot “solidarity levy based on airline tickets”.
Subject to the sovereignty of participating countries, the levy funds could be earmarked to finance the most urgent human development programmes, such as vaccination campaigns and the pooled purchase of HIV/AIDS treatments.
Kilde: www.runiceurope.org
