Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2011-07-04-Speech-1-262-000"
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"en.20110704.31.1-262-000"2
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"Mr President, the report which we will be voting on tomorrow is important for the future of the EU’s development cooperation. Why? In October, the European Commission will present a communication on future European Development Policy Priorities. Towards the end of the year, the Commission will also present a legislative proposal for a future instrument for development cooperation, and in Busan, South Korea, there will be another High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness. The Busan Forum is in fact one of the Polish Presidency’s development priorities. This is, therefore, a good time for Parliament to present its own expectations of future EU development policy.
The basis for discussion on this subject and for our report is the Green Paper on inclusive growth and sustainable development, presented by the European Commission last year. Within the Committee on Development we achieved a wide-ranging political consensus, and we agree with many of the proposals put forward by Commissioner Piebalgs and the Commission as a whole. We believe that development cooperation must concentrate more on outcomes and concrete results than has been the case so far. However, at the same time this does not mean that we want to convert indicators and measures into absolutes. We should avoid a situation where our attention is focused on ‘easy’ countries or sectors, those in which it would be easy to obtain results and not those where the need is greatest. We should not forget aid for those hit hardest by poverty and those who have had the bad luck to be born in countries which are very badly governed.
On the other hand, it is worth remembering that 72% of poor people throughout the world do not live in the world’s poorest countries, but in middle-income countries. Development cooperation cannot be interrupted as soon as a particular country emerges from being one of the poorest nations to being a middle-income country.
We also support efforts aimed at improving coordination. We support a proper division of labour and utilisation of those qualities in which individual Member States excel. We support the EU’s proposal to focus more on certain areas, such as renewable energy and agriculture. These are areas of relatively high potential in developing countries. We would like these priorities to be targeted at those hit by poverty and at their needs, for the methods of realising these priorities to allow for small and medium-sized enterprises to become involved, and for them to promote activities at local and regional level.
Two further particularly important subjects are sustainable development and climate change. However, the subject which provoked most discussion within the Committee on Development was the term ‘inclusive growth’. I believe that we should not be afraid of this idea. For me, personally, it means growth which is on the side of the poor, in the interests of the poor, growth which will lead to a reduction in social inequalities. In other words, growth is to be accessible to the poor, not just to those who are most active. We realise that this is not an easy task, that social inclusion requires the accomplishment of many difficult tasks: access to labour markets, better labour market standards, the creation of social insurance systems and tax systems. These are very difficult and important tasks. The Committee on Development has repeated many times and on many occasions that when we formulate new tasks or principles we should never forget our earlier obligations. This is the case on this occasion as well.
If we wish to rise to new challenges, old promises must be kept. This is a question not only of moral responsibility, but also of our credibility in the eyes of external partners. This is why an increase in the effectiveness of development aid cannot be a pretext for decreasing or freezing the amount of aid for developing countries. It is very important to be consistent in our earlier promises.
Thank you to all my fellow Members, to the experts and advisers and to the Secretariat of the Committee on Development for their help in drafting this report."@en1
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