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Note: This document is from the archive of the Africa Policy E-Journal, published
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Africa: Call to Reverse Slide in Aid
Africa: Call to Reverse Slide in Aid
Date distributed (ymd): 011220
Document reposted by APIC
Africa Policy Electronic Distribution List: an information
service provided by AFRICA ACTION (incorporating the Africa
Policy Information Center, The Africa Fund, and the American
Committee on Africa). Find more information for action for
Africa at http://www.africapolicy.org
+++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
Region: Continent-Wide
Issue Areas: +economy/development+ +security/peace+
SUMMARY CONTENTS:
This posting contains a press release from the Economic Commission
for Africa (ECA) and brief excerpts from the Millenium Lecture
given in London by ECA Executive Secretary K. Y. Amoako. Dr.
Amoako's appeal for greater international public investment to
support Africa's development has been echoed by British leaders,
but has gained little response from the U.S.
The ECA web site also has available the text of "The New
Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD)," the latest version
of a policy document emerging from consultations among African
leaders. Documents from a Partnership Africa Canada Consultation on
"Africa and the G8: A Civil Society Planning Meeting," containing
analyses of an earlier version of NEPAD, can be found on the PAC
web site (http://www.partnershipafricacanada.org). A strong
critique of NEPAD as marred by African submission to Western market
ideology can be found in the editorial by Patrick Bond in
Kabissa-Fahamu-Sangonet Newsletter 45
(
http://www.pambazuka.org/newsletter.php?issuedate=2001-12-06)
+++++++++++++++++end profile++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Economic Commission for Africa
ECA Press Release No. 13/2001, December 17, 2001
G8 MUST MOVE TO REVERSE THE SLIDE IN AID TO AFRICA - AMOAKO
For more information or for the full text of Mr. Amoako's address,
please contact Peter da Costa on Tel: +44-7880-634-392, E-mail
[email protected]. The text can also be downloaded from the
'What's New' Section of the ECA Web site, at http://www.uneca.org
Addis Ababa, 17 December 2001 (ECA) - The G8 group of developed
countries need to develop a holistic response that can reverse the
slide in aid to Africa, Economic Commission for Africa Executive
Secretary K. Y. Amoako said today.
Speaking to an audience that included British Prime Minister Tony
Blair, Secretary for International Development Claire Short and
other leading UK policymakers, Mr. Amoako said that collectively
the G-8's record in development assistance to Africa in the past
decade had been less than impressive.
Mr. Amoako's address, titled "Fulfilling Africa's Promise", was the
latest in a series of lectures launched to mark the new Millennium
and hosted by the Prime Minister and Mrs. Blair. The Millennium
Lectures are delivered in Downing Street to an audience of
specialists and opinion formers, but they are intended to spark
debate much further afield. This is the first Millennium Lecture
devoted to Africa.
Mr. Amoako told the audience that overall aid to Africa has
declined from $19 billion a year at the beginning of the 1990s to
$12 billion today, a per capita drop of 40%. In the same period,
Africa's share of global aid had dropped from 37% to 27% at a time
when the quality of Africa's development had improved. "Shouldn't
better performance be better recognized?" he asked.
In the context of the G8's response to the New Partnership for
Africa's Development (NEPAD), and in anticipation of the next G8
Summit in Canada in 2002, Mr. Amoako called on the Group to come up
with a proposal for support that contained specific, time-bound
deliverables, towards three desirable ends: achieving the
International Development Goals, accelerating the process of
rationalization, and fostering peace and reconstruction.
In his address, the ECA Executive Secretary talked about a paradigm
shift in Africa's relations with its international development
partners, which had emerged from new thinking by many of Africa's
leaders, from ideas of civil society organizations, and from ECA's
work. All the ideas, he said, were crystallized in the NEPAD.
Among key elements of the new paradigm, Mr. Amoako cited:
- African leadership and ownership of its policies and programmes,
requiring good governance, a capable state with effective
institutions, sound economic management and the participation of
all sectors of society;
- A transformed development partnership, manifested by a joint
commitment to commonly agreed development goals, and mutual
accountability in progress towards these goals - moving away from
the past donor-imposed conditionalities and towards self-monitoring
and peer review among Africans;
- Long-term predictable partnerships underpinned by guaranteed
long-term, timely, stable and high quality resource flows to
countries that have a clear commitment to these shared goals; and
- Enhanced partnership with countries that will be the forerunners
of Africa's transition from high aid dependency to a more robust
development path led by the private sector, countries that can
"become beacons of excellence, models for their neighbours to
emulate, and engines of regional economic growth";
There were "strong moral reasons" as well as "compelling reasons of
common interest" for Africa's international development partners to
buy into the new paradigm, stressed Mr. Amoako.
Resource mobilization was key, particularly on the domestic front,
to financing Africa's development. "We know the levels of resources
needed to make the difference in reducing poverty," said Mr.
Amoako. "But most major donors have failed to meet the goal of 0.7%
of GNP for aid. And the overall level is now just 0.22%, the lowest
since the Marshall Plan of the 1940s. Gordon Brown's appeal for
doubling aid -- from 50 billion dollars to 100 billion dollars --
is well justified, towards meeting the target of 0.7% GNP. I hope
that we can accelerate this with clear benchmarks for progress in
the next five years."
Mr. Amoako stressed that there was also a need for the 2002 UN
Financing for Development Conference to address the financing
problems of Africa's most indebted countries, and made a number of
proposals in this regard:
- For countries emerging from conflict or past misrule,
consideration should be given to a programme to provide debt relief
on achievable terms for three years;
- A way could be found to marry debt relief and funding African
peacekeeping;
- A moratorium could be allowed of one or two years for countries
vulnerable to commodity price fluctuations when their income falls
below a certain level;
- A "pot of gold" could be provided at the end of the HIPC rainbow
in expanded relief -- or forgiveness -- at the end of five years of
good performance.
- A certain percentage of debt payments could be redirected to the
fight against HIV/AIDS.
(END)
FULFILLING AFRICA'S PROMISE
Millennium Lecture by K. Y. Amoako,
Executive Secretary of Economic Commission for Africa (ECA)
10 Downing Street, London, 17 December 2001
[excerpts only]
Sub-Saharan Africa, excluding South Africa, has a per capita income
of $326, about one seventy-fifth of yours. That leaves four of
every 10 Africans living in extreme poverty on less than $1 a day.
Fourteen years ago, about 200 million Africans lived in such
poverty. Today, 100 million more have joined them.
... While the world cuts the proportion of people in poverty from
22% today to 11% in 2015, Africa will likely be stuck at around
37%-more than three times the global average. ...
People often define our development crisis by the growing income
gap between Africa and the world. I will be more fundamental. Our
current life span of a mere 50 years will decline between now and
2015, because of growing poverty and the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Your
average life span, now more than 75 years, will grow longer. Equal
opportunity must start with the equal opportunity to live.
2. A brighter future for Africa
A new generation of Africans finds these trends intolerable. ...
Now, with the convergence of new progressive forces, of frustration
with so little progress, of revulsion for power with selfish ends,
there are mounting-even angry-demands for development that works
for the people. The demands are for peace. For reducing poverty
through growth and solid public services. For accountable,
uncorrupted governments. The demands are also for a viable future
for the unemployed and the young. And for inclusion in a
progressive world. There is momentum on all these fronts-but far
from enough. ...
4. A new paradigm for development cooperation
Over the past few years, some exciting partnership concepts have
been proposed by a number of us in Africa. Together, they imply a
paradigm shift in Africa's relations with its international
development partners. They emerge from different processes-from the
new thinking by many of Africa's leaders, from the ideas of civil
society organisations, from our work at the ECA. And they are
crystallized in the New Partnership for Africa's Development.
Experience shows that Africans must lead Africa out of poverty, and
that the most effective policies and programmes are those based on
domestic processes of consultation and decisionmaking. That
requires good governance: a capable state with effective
institutions, sound economic management, and the participation of
all sectors of society.
At the heart of our new paradigm is a transformed development
partnership. We seek a joint commitment to commonly agreed
development goals, and mutual accountability in progress towards
those goals. This moves us away from the past model of
donor-imposed conditionalities-and towards self-monitoring and peer
review among Africans.
Another part of this new paradigm is having long-term predictable
partnerships underpinned by guaranteed long-term resource flows to
countries that have a clear commitment to these shared goals-flows
that are timely, stable, and high in quality. The best quality
assistance is harmonized, predictable, and integrated within
national poverty reduction strategies, with low transaction costs.
This enhanced partnership entails supporting countries that will be
the forerunners of Africa's transition from high aid dependency to
a more robust development path led by the private sector. We must
let such countries become beacons of excellence, models for their
neighbours to emulate, and engines of regional economic growth.
But we cannot ignore those countries not doing so well. Different
treatment is required for those countries struggling to emerge from
past mismanagement. We must move them steadily towards the point
where they can benefit from the new enhanced partnership. Other
countries are recovering from conflict, and we need to identify and
implement means of ensuring the success of their post-conflict
reconstruction plans.
I also commend giving more consideration to the breadth of
partnership. Too often donors have based their relationships on a
charismatic leader. But I think that long-lasting partnerships
require a broader base, involving many constituencies. We have a
joint interest in building pluralism as a cornerstone of stability,
accountability, and more balanced growth. ...
If broader relationships and capacity building are needed for
countries, they are also needed for the region. ... Yet, some
donors have trouble helping us solve regional and subregional
problems. They have difficulty assisting supra-national
organisations and cross-border infrastructure because they justify
and score their funds on a national basis. I hope that future
partnerships will transcend this problem. ...
...
We in Africa are grateful that you, Prime Minister, kept Africa
firmly on the international agenda in the aftermath of September
11, when the new global agenda could so easily have focused solely
on the international coalition's war on terrorism. Poverty and
conflict breed frustration and alienation, the seeds of terrorism.
Our quest for stability and growth in Africa can thus enhance
international peace and security.
5. Advancing the partnership
The upcoming international calendar provides opportunities to bring
the international community along in meeting the challenges I have
mentioned. The first opportunity is to see that there is quick
follow-up to the trade meeting in Doha-to maintain the
pro-development momentum you helped establish there. There is a
need for real capacity-building to prepare most of Africa to engage
in trade and to be productive in trade negotiations.
The issues are complex, and there are few technical studies on the
potential impact of new obligations for our economies. That is why
Africa and other developing countries expressed strong reservations
at Doha about launching a new round of multilateral trade
negotiations that will encompass these new and complex issues.
Comprehensive impact studies are essential if we are to commit to
agreements, which in the words of Tanzania's Trade Minister Mr.
Idda Simba, are "matters of life and death for us." ...
There is also a critical need to further open OECD markets to
African products, particularly in agriculture. A decline of 40% in
Europe's agricultural subsidies by 2005 would produce annual gains
of $15 billion for developing countries and $55 billion for
Europe's consumers. A similar adjustment in fisheries policies
would be a major boon to both Africa and Europe.
The second opportunity is the UN's Financing for Development
Conference in Monterey next March. As Chancellor Brown's speech
emphasised last month to the New York Federal Reserve, major
resource mobilisation is essential. At the core of this is greater
domestic resource mobilisation, by far the largest source of
development finance, through better domestic policy environments,
the sine qua non for greater external finance.
We know the levels of resources needed to make the difference in
reducing poverty. But most major donors have failed to meet the
goal of 0.7% of GNP for aid. And the overall level is now just
0.22%, the lowest since the Marshall Plan of the 1940s. Gordon
Brown's appeal for doubling aid-from 50 billion dollars to 100
billion dollars-is well justified, towards meeting the target of
0.7% GNP. ...
There is also a need for the Financing for Development Conference
to address the financing problems of Africa's most indebted
countries. If we want to make a bigger dent in Africa's debt, we
need to put our minds together to think "out of the box." Let me
take a first step out of that box:
- For countries emerging from conflict or past misrule, we should
perhaps consider a programme that would provide debt relief on
achievable terms for three years.
- Perhaps we could find a way to marry debt relief and funding
African peacekeeping.
- Perhaps we could allow for a moratorium of one or two years for
countries vulnerable to commodity price fluctuations when their
income falls below a certain level.
- Perhaps we could provide a pot of gold at the end of the HIPC
rainbow by providing expanded relief-or forgiveness-at the end of
five years of good performance.
- Perhaps a certain percentage of debt payments could be
redirected to the fight against HIV/AIDS.
...
The third big opportunity will be the next meeting of the G-8 in
Canada.
With a focus on Africa, the G-8 is expected to respond to the New
Partnership for Africa's Development. The response could usefully
buttress three desirable ends: achieving the International
Development Goals, accelerating the process of regionalisation, and
fostering peace and reconstruction. There is also an opportunity
for the G-8 to move from segmented discussions of Africa's
development to a more holistic response. That might include
periodic leadership dialogues between the G-8 and Africa.
What is needed is to come up with something concrete by the end of
next year-with specific, time-bound deliverables. We very much hope
that the G-8 can sharply reverse the slide in aid to Africa.
Collectively, the G-8's record in development assistance to Africa
in the past decade has not been impressive. Overall aid to Africa
has declined from $19 billion a year at the beginning of the 90s to
$12 billion now, a per capita drop of 40%. In the same period, our
share of global aid has dropped from 37% to 27% - this, when the
quality of Africa's development has improved. Shouldn't better
performance be better recognised? ...
The fourth event on the calendar is the Johannesburg Summit on
Sustainable Development-scheduled (significantly) to end on
September 11, 2002. As a follow-up to the Rio Earth Summit 10 years
before, the event should be a chance to arrive at more
comprehensive commitments across many of our common concerns to
make a more secure world. The conference may well represent a shift
from Rio's more purely environmental focus to issues of
sustainability. ...
All this requires international cooperation on a large scale.
Consider the links between health and sustainable development. In
a few days, Gro Harlem Bruntdtland's Commission on Macroeconomics
and Health, led by Jeffrey Sachs, will release its final report
here in London. I have been privileged to serve on that Commission.
The report will emphasize strong connections between investing in
health and achieving sustainable development. It recommends quantum
increases in health investments, and for low-income Sub-Saharan
Africa the increases would be far higher than for any other region.
Dramatic expansions of health services in Africa will require
strong partnerships if they are to be achieved.
I have covered a lot of ground, identifying what I believe to be
the key challenges for Africa-and the key elements of a new
development partnership for Africa. In summing up, I should like to
spotlight five areas where we need to collectively come up with
time-bound deliverables and generate momentum for sustained
progress. ...
- First, we must promote good governance in both the political and
economic spheres. This includes strengthening financial management,
building the capacities of parliaments and judiciaries, and rooting
out corruption.
- Next, we must address our regional peace and security needs.
This requires coordinated action by the United Nations, OAU, and
subregional organisations, backed by well-implemented programmes
for post-conflict rehabilitation.
- Third is to invest in human capital at all levels-from basic
literacy upwards. We must support the application of ICTs to health
and development. We must strengthen regional centres of excellence
in science and technology. And we must tackle the diseases of
poverty, especially HIV/AIDS.
- Fourth, we must target farmers. We need to support agriculture
with more effective institutions for micro-finance and rural
infrastructure. And let's not forget that most farming in Africa is
done by women.
- Last and most critical, we must jointly secure adequate
financing for development by tackling what has been called the "new
trinity of debt, aid, and trade." ...
This material is being reposted for wider distribution by
Africa Action (incorporating the Africa Policy Information
Center, The Africa Fund, and the American Committee on Africa).
Africa Action's information services provide accessible
information and analysis in order to promote U.S. and
international policies toward Africa that advance economic,
political and social justice and the full spectrum of human rights.
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