Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-04-12-Speech-2-050"
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".
Mr President, honourable Members, the Commission of course warmly welcomes Mrs Kinnock’s report on the role of the European Union in the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). I would like to congratulate Mrs Kinnock and the Committee on Development on this report, which ought to stimulate discussion and negotiation on the measures required to achieve the MDGs.
Finally, in addition to all our existing programmes, especially under the Cotonou Agreement, the Commission is proposing new commitments in fields with an obvious multiplier effect. I am thinking of governance, interconnection and equity.
Preparations for the New York summit are quickening apace. I also want to thank you for your contribution and I hope to continue working with you to ensure that Europe’s position is equal to the challenge of achieving the Millennium Goals.
Now, Mrs Kinnock, I would like to say a few words about the communications which I shall shortly be submitting to the College of Commissioners. The process of preparation for the September summit has shown the progress made in many poor countries and the importance of the efforts made by the international community, and by the European Union in particular, for achieving the Millennium Goals. All the reports, the Secretary-General’s report, the Millennium Project report written under the direction of Professor Sachs, also show that the goals that were set for 2015 can still be achieved if we want to. As you said, however, this will require major investment by the developing countries as much as, obviously, by the donor countries. As the poor countries’ largest international donor and largest trading partner, the European Union therefore has a particular responsibility towards our own citizens, who expect us to set an example at international level, because it is an imperative of human solidarity, but one which is also in our own interests. If we want a more stable and a safer world, we must invest more massively in development. The EU also has a responsibility towards partners who often see Europe as a model: consider the African Union, for example, which has taken the European Union a benchmark. I believe the proposals I will be presenting this afternoon are equal to this challenge.
Those proposals have three main parts: first of all, development finance and aid effectiveness; secondly, policy coherence and, thirdly, priority for Sub-Saharan Africa.
On financing – and this will answer your question – the European Union has stuck to its commitments, and in 2006 its aid effort will probably exceed the joint target of 0.39% of the Member States’ gross national income. Obviously, this effort will have to continue, and I am proposing that the Member States set themselves a new individual intermediate target of at least 0.51% in 2010, corresponding to a collective effort of 0.56%. That would allow us to achieve the rate of 0.7% in 2015; that rate was set by the United Nations a long time ago and the Millennium Project experts believe it is necessary in order to achieve the MDGs. In terms of annual aid, that would be an increase of no less than EUR 20 billion per year in 2010, with EU aid rising from EUR 46 billion in 2006 to 66 billion in 2010.
In addition, new sources of finance must also be encouraged. I forgot to say that I am going to suggest that the new Member States reach 0.17% in 2010; the difference is because they have much further to go; that should allow us to reach 0.7% in 2015. Additionally, then, new sources of finance must be encouraged, but that should on no account be a pretext for delaying or reducing the EU’s commitments for 2010.
The second aspect is improving aid effectiveness, another important task. The last few years have seen substantial progress in the management of Community aid. At EU level, the main challenge today is to implement the commitments given by the EU for better policy coordination, complementarity on the ground and procedural harmonisation. Europe must be much more than the mere sum of our States’ individual budgets.
The second aspect is the use of budget aid – to which I want to give priority – although aid effectiveness would gain much from it. It is not just a question of money, however. The real challenge is to contain globalisation by exercising a solidarity that will lay the foundations for a world social contract; that will involve not only an increase in public development aid but also global public policies that will allow the benefits of globalisation to be shared out more equitably.
Likewise, I am quite pleased to say that the Commission has for the first time agreed to talk about coherence and to identify, in competences other than development aid, no fewer than 11 areas that are development-related and may give it added value. I believe this is important. It is the first time the College has taken up this challenge and I think it is worth pointing that out.
The third component of our proposals is the priority given to Africa. There are three reasons for this. Sub-Saharan Africa is the most backward region. Europe is a weighty partner and Africa is a geopolitical partner that will assume increasing importance. The United States and China have already understood this, which explains their growing interest in that part of the world.
Your report, Mrs Kinnock, rightly emphasises the importance of the governments adopting strategies for achieving the Millennium Development Goals. It also stresses that the European Union’s development policies, the main objective of which must be the reduction of poverty, must be anchored in the Millennium Declaration and the MDGs.
I propose stepping up our action in areas that have an obvious multiplier effect. There are three lines of approach here. Firstly, in the area of governance, we must support the implementation of the reforms emerging from the African peer review mechanism. We must also provide refinancing for the peace facility, to support the African Union and sub-regional organisations in conflict-prevention.
I would describe this first line as the political line, in the general sense of the term. The second line is the economic line. Infrastructures and network interconnections must be supported on the basis of the African Union’s and NEPAD’s strategies to facilitate South-South trade. I am in fact thinking here of really getting the large Trans-African networks off the ground as we had to do in Europe with the large Trans-European networks. We must make the construction and implementation of these large Trans-African networks a definite priority objective. That is the economic line. I am thinking of all the infrastructures, of everything associated with communications, of technology transfer, and so on.
The third line is the social line. It is obviously the politics of equity. The European Union must develop incentives and support the African countries in their efforts to promote social cohesion, employment and environmental protection. I am thinking more specifically of education, health and culture. During my hearing, I said that culture was a far more important vector of development than people think and I would like to make the most of it.
This set of communications seeks to unite the Member States around a European vision that would give the EU the influence, credibility and visibility it needs in order to make an effective contribution to the September 2005 summit. At present, I am touring the capitals to mobilise the national parliaments and the Member States on this question.
I hope that in September these three communications will result in the complete redefinition of development policy, as I said, in the form of a new development policy statement, which I intend to translate into a common European development strategy. I see absolutely no reason why we cannot do for development what we have succeeded in doing for the common security strategy. I would also like to come up with a real plan of campaign for Africa based on the three lines of approach I have just mentioned.
That, Mr President, Mrs Kinnock, honourable Members, is the reply I wanted to give you. I hope I have been complete. If there are other questions or if I have inadvertently failed to answer any of your questions, do not hesitate to ask me. I am of course at your disposal to answer them.
The European Union’s MDG Synthesis Report outlines the progress that has been made in this regard. The European Union has on a number of occasions underlined that the review of the Millennium Goals at the United Nations summit in September 2005 will be crucial for accelerating progress towards the achievement of the MDGs. With a view to the European Union’s contribution to the summit, in November 2004 the Council invited the Commission to prepare specific ambitious proposals for action to be taken, in particular for development financing, the coherence of development policies and the priority to be given to Africa.
The Commission will today be adopting a number of communications constituting its response to the Council’s invitation. This global political package summarises the EU’s contribution to development and identifies the measures to be taken to accelerate the achievement of the MDGs.
In many respects, your report and our communications share the same concerns and the same recommendations. I would like to mention a few of your report’s conclusions which we believe are very important and which are key points in the package of communications we will be presenting.
First of all, as you underline, it is essential that we continue increasing development aid. The Commission is proposing new intermediate targets for 2010 in this regard; additional new sources of financing must be considered alongside the public aid budgets.
I also welcome the attention you pay to the coherence of development policies; it is in fact essential that we look at how policies other than aid can help in achieving the Millennium Goals. The communication on the coherence of development policies identifies no fewer than 11 priority areas where the challenge of achieving synergy with the development policy objectives is considered particularly relevant, in trade, for example – that goes without saying – in research, the environment, agriculture, fishing, to name but a few. Major synergies are possible with these different competences.
Many of your report’s recommendations are included in the EU Synthesis Report on the Millennium Goals, for example – as you rightly mention – the special attention that must be paid to the education of girls, to the necessity of meeting the needs of the most vulnerable groups, especially children, orphans, young women and the elderly.
In response to the challenges Africa has to face, it is essential that the development partners give that continent priority. The European Union must do more, and wants to, to enable Africa to achieve the Millennium Goals. Africa must be the focus of our attention and it is vital that aid resources for Sub-Saharan Africa be increased. The European Union must ensure that a major proportion of the additional public development aid is directed towards Africa. Our proposals in the matter of coherence must also apply first and foremost to the African continent."@en1
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