Aid agencies and celebrities bet to ‘make poverty history’

By David Cronin

Date: 27/01/05

"Make poverty history" is the slogan of a new campaign supported by a coalition of relief agencies, church groups and celebrities.

Its aim is to make the leaders of rich countries honour the pledges they made at the United Nations in September 2000. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) agreed by the international community then were clear-cut. By 2015 the proportion of the world's population whose income is less than a dollar a day would be halved; all the world's children would complete a full course of primary schooling; infant mortality would be reduced by two-thirds; the rate of women dying in childbirth would be cut by three-quarters; the spread of AIDS and other major killers would be halted; the debt burden crippling poor countries' economies would be eased dramatically; and the rules of world trade would be rewritten so they are no longer skewed against developing nations.

Ten years from the 2015 deadline, there are indications that the MDG process is going off track.

Africa is a crucial battleground for the MDGs as it is the only country where some of the main poverty indicators - such as malnutrition - are deteriorating. Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown estimates that if present trends continue, the objective of cutting child mortality will not be attained in sub-Saharan Africa until 2165.

A key to achieving the goals for Africa is that all rich countries honour a 35-year-old commitment to allocate 0.7% of their national incomes to development assistance. The EU's then 15 countries reiterated their commitment to such aid levels at the 2002 international conference on financing development in Monterrey, Mexico. The European Commission has been tasked with monitoring whether member states are sticking to their promises. In a report issued last November, it concluded that some are having difficulties doing so, though without naming those concerned.

So far only a small number of European states are living up to what they promised. While these include the Netherlands, Sweden and Denmark, all three reduced their aid in real terms (taking into account inflation and exchange rate movements) in 2002-03, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Among those whose donations are below the 0.7% target, Austria, Italy, Portugal and Spain also slashed their aid budgets in that period.

Last week the UN issued a fresh strategy to reach the Millennium Development Goals. One of the advisors who helped draft the report, Guido Schmidt-Traub, says they are "utterly affordable and utterly achievable" provided the rich deliver on their commitments to the poor. There is ample evidence he believes, that aid can work provided it is focused on tangible projects like education and healthcare. For example, an immediate priority to reduce the number of children being killed by malaria is to provide them with bed nets that repel mosquitoes.

"Our generation is the first one that can actually achieve these goals because income in rich countries has risen so much," he says. "We are not talking about throwing money down a rat-hole. We are not talking about giving money to a corrupt [Sese Seko] Mobutu [the late Zairean president], that will end up in a Swiss bank account. We are talking about money for bed nets. Bed nets do not end up in Swiss bank accounts."

Article reports on a new campaign supported by a coalition of relief agencies, church groups and celebrities the aim of which it was to make the leaders of rich countries honour the pledges they made at the United Nations in September 2000. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), to be realised by 2015, and agreed by the international community then were clear-cut. Article says that progress on the MDGs was going off track and that Africa was the crucial battleground in their realisation.

http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/ http://www.un.org/millenniumgoals/

---