Agreement reached in advance of UN forum on financing for development

28 January - Following 12 days of intensive consultations, the committee charged with negotiating a set of principles for the forthcoming UN International Conference on Financing for Development has reached informal agreement on the text that Conference will aim to adopt.

In the draft text, States express concern about expected dramatic shortfalls in resources needed to support the achievement of internationally-agreed development goals. They also warn that the global economic slowdown that followed the 11 September attacks has further reduced economic growth rates - making the need for greater cooperation between States to promote economic growth more urgent.

Much of the text, known as the "Monterrey Consensus," was agreed to by government representatives before the weekend, but disagreements about certain key paragraphs on international trade, official development assistance (ODA) and emergency financing remained.

On Sunday, meeting informally, delegations to the preparatory committee reached consensus on those outstanding issues. The panel now plans to meet formally this week to approve the text. Once approved, the text will be passed to the Conference for its consideration and eventual adoption.

The Conference itself, which will be held from 18 to 22 March in Monterrey, Mexico, aims to address the obstacles faced by developing countries in trade, aid, debt, investment, strengthening national capacities and coordination.

PRESS CONFERENCE ON FINANCING FOR DEVELOPMENT

Development must be a shared goal for all, said Shamshad Ahmad, Pakistan’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, as he and Ambassador Ruth Jacoby of Sweden, the two co-Chairs for the Preparatory Committee for the International Conference on Financing for Development, briefed journalists at Headquarters this morning. He added that development must be pursued in a coherent and consistent manner, with the participation of all stakeholders.

The two co-Chairs of the Preparatory Committee announced the conclusion of its fourth and final session. After having negotiated for nearly two weeks, agreement on the final outcome document, now called the Monterrey Consensus, had been reached.

The financing for development process had taken a big leap with the adoption of the Monterrey Consensus outcome document, said Mr. Ahmad. This document would now be presented to world leaders in Monterrey, and it was a real opportunity to build global partnerships in the pursuit of development. He stressed that the Monterrey Conference was not a stand-alone event, but that it was the first building block in a long and continuing process. Financing for Development was about building synergies, strengthening mutually supportive economic norms, enhancing mutually beneficial cooperation, and the sharing of the benefits of globalization in the pursuit of development.

Developing countries were expected to make every effort to bring about reforms of their economies; improve governance and the rule of law; follow pro-poor growth policies; invest in the social sector and poverty eradication programmes; strengthen workers' rights; environmental protection; and ensure macroeconomic stability through fiscal discipline. Developed countries were expected to take measures that ensured the transparency of the global trade regime and equitable market access to the products of developing countries. They were also expected to avoid linking trade with environment and labour standards; refrain from anti-dumping and countervailing duties; provide 0.7 per cent of their gross national product (GNP) for official development assistance (ODA); reduce the debt burden of developing countries; and assist them through capacity-building and technology transfer.

Ambassador Ruth Jacoby said it was extremely important to realize the uniqueness of this process. Throughout the preparatory process, the purpose had been to include the so-called stakeholders, in particular representatives of civil society and the private sectors. The institutional stakeholders, primarily the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the World Trade Organization, had been along in the process since the very beginning. It had been particularly difficult to ensure that there had been no trespassing of mandates and responsibilities of other institutions.

When asked about the significance of the word “doubled” having been left out in the paragraph concerning ODA targets (paragraph 34 of the final document),

Ms. Jacoby explained that there had been negotiations on this paragraph from 12 to 18 hours. Without naming names, she explained there were two aspects of the paragraph that had caused divisions between countries.

One aspect had been the goal of reaching 0.7 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) for ODA, she said. This target had been agreed upon 32 years ago, and at present there were only five developed countries that had reached it. One major donor had not even accepted the target and was not part of the consensus 32 years ago. The second concept concerned the doubling of ODA, and it had been difficult to reach an agreement here as well, she said. She stressed that the important outcome had been to try to send a signal, which showed the direction to which the world was committed, and she believed this had been achieved in paragraph 34.

When asked about the controversy regarding paragraph 64, calling for a follow-up international conference to review the implementation of the Monterrey Consensus, the modalities of which must not be decided upon later than 2005,

Mr. Ahmad referred to chapter 3 "Staying Engaged" which reflected that a long process had begun. In the view of the developing world, a time frame for when leaders would reassemble and take stock of the implementation process was important. The other view had been that it was too early to determine the date of the next stage. This was why there was a consensus compromise, as reflected in paragraph 64.

He concluded by saying that process must not only be seen in the context of ODA. It had a holistic approach and six main areas, domestic resource mobilization, external capital flows, trade, debts and ODA, and finally systemic issues. Official development assistance was just one of the six areas which were being addressed as a means of financing development.

This group of communists-socialists at the UN want to take over the world. This is what they wrote in their millennium charter. They want all guns turned over to the UN and all armies under their control. They want the Tobin tax on all international financial movement. They want open and free abortion.

North America has only 3 votes in the General Assembly.

Africa has 53 votes.

Which way do you think the votes will go.

Castro and Mugabe were both there in New York. They loved it. It was their kind of communist talk.

Close down the UN

A poem about the UN

From the US Agency for International Development (USAID) http://www.usaid.gov/environment/foriegn_aid.html:

The amount of money the U.S. Government spends on foreign aid, including in the environment sector, is associated with international agreements industrialized nations make to support development in less-industrialized countries. This includes United Nations agreements, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity or the Framework Convention on Climate Change .

The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC), of which the U.S. is a member, notes that "ODA [official development assistance] from G7 countries has fallen about $15 billion since 1992 – a reduction of almost 30% in real terms – and total ODA fell to a record low of 0.22% of DAC members' collective GNP." (OECD 1998)

The United Nations target for the ODA-GNP ratio is 0.7 percent, meaning that wealthier countries should try to contribute 7/10 of 1 percent of their total gross national product to helping develop their less-industrialized neighbors. This ratio amount would be analogous to an American citizen who makes $20,000 per year contributing $140 total to charity each year. As shown in the figure below, the United States and a number of other wealthy countries fall below this target ratio.The amount of money the U.S. Government spends on foreign aid, including in the environment sector, is associated with international agreements industrialized nations make to support development in less-industrialized countries. This includes United Nations agreements, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity or the Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Net Official Development Assistance in 1997 as a Percentage of Gross National Product
Table of Net Official Development Assistance in 1997 as a Percentage of Gross National Product

Table of Net Official Development Assistance in 1997 as a Percentage of Gross National Product

(Source: USAID Environment Information Clearinghouse)

Please note how misleading this is!

.007 x $20,000 = $140 and that is the analogy, but it sounds like it means a US taxpayer would only pay $140. Actually it goes like this:

.007 x GDP of 10 trillion dollars = 70 billion dollars. Divided among 100 million Federal income taxpayers in the USA = $700 per taxpayer.

Depending on how this would be paid for it might not show up directly in personal income tax rates, but the money has to come from somewhere, and taxpayers and consumers would ultimately pay for it.

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