Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-05-22-Speech-4-038"
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"en.20080522.7.4-038"2
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"Madam President, first of all, I too would like to thank Mr Van Hecke and the Commissioner for this report.
Sub-Saharan Africa receives more international aid than any other region in the world yet poverty levels remain stubbornly high. Studies have shown that aid can and has been successful in reducing poverty in countries with sound economic management and government institutions. If allocated properly, aid has the potential to help millions of people escape a hand-to-mouth existence.
However, the reality is that corruption does exist in many developing countries and, while we must continue to promote good governance in these countries, we have a more pressing responsibility to help the many millions of people dying of starvation and disease in the world.
We must deliver on the commitments we have made to the Millennium Development Goals. How can we turn a blind eye to the three billion people living on the equivalent of three dollars a day or the five million children in Africa who died last year before they reached the age of five?
And yes, we do have a responsibility to the European taxpayers to ensure that their money reaches the most needy and is spent effectively. In this regard I believe that Europe should look at more targeted programmes, such as the Global Fund, which combats AIDS, TB and malaria, the world’s most devastating diseases, which kill over six million people per year. The Global Fund has been a highly effective organisation with minimum bureaucracy and maximum impact. It represents an innovative approach to international health financing.
Global poverty is predominantly a rural problem. Three quarters of the extremely poor people in developing countries live in rural areas. If we are to weather the storm of climate change and increasing food prices, we must improve agricultural production by targeting agriculture-specific programmes as they can have a powerful impact on poverty reduction. The presentation that Professor Jeffrey Sachs made to the committee recently was a great example of how that money can be targeted.
According to the World Development Report last year, GDP growth generated by agriculture is four times more effective in reducing poverty than growth in other sectors. Instead of shipping food aid to Third World countries, Europe needs to lead the way to help African farmers grow more food by providing small farmers with proper seeds, fertilisers and water management technologies. But of course there are many other ways and, as the Commissioner said, many of these need to be country-specific.
Time is running out for Africa. We need to learn the lessons from the past so we can save future generations from disease and starvation. I believe Accra is a political opportunity and I support what other speakers have said on that. It is not just a technical meeting to look at technical areas, it is a political opportunity. We have to see if we can get real take-off on fighting poverty.
We have made many many commitments; some of those commitments are not forthcoming. We are halfway through the Millennium Development Goals time-frame and it is time that we really pushed to try and deliver on all of these. We have to get aid back on track. We must work with African governments; we must fight corruption; we must improve governance and we have to deliver to the world’s poor."@en1
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