Aiding Africa is good but 'Don't forget Asia'
Hera Diani, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta
With a variety of musical charity concerts such as Live Aid in the 1980s and the recent Live8, many heads of state have turned to Africa to assist the development problems there, which is a great thing to do.
However, half a world away from Africa, the region that comprises two-thirds of the world's poor, people are crying out "Don't forget Asia."
A working group on the second day of the ministerial meeting on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Asia and the Pacific reiterated the cry, demanding more innovative aid mechanisms and debt relief.
Indian State Minister for External Affairs E. Ahamed said that while the primary responsibility for the development lies with individual countries, many developing countries lack institutions and capacities.
Therefore, development aid should be integrated properly with development strategies of recipient countries.
"Approaches to international development financing should not only be about supply of resources, but should also explicitly take into account the nature of investment demand.
"Development of infrastructure and capacity-building are important not only for sustained growth, but also for providing institutional capacity to absorb inflow of resources," Ahamed addressed the discussion, which was focused on promoting a regional compact.
He also pointed to the harmonization of aid, which he said was still an elusive issue as most donor countries had their own aid packages with sets of conditions..
Also, while the official development assistance has increased to reach the MDGs, it has been concentrated in a few countries, and mainly for debt relief and emergency distress assistance.
In the period of 2001 to 2003, for instance, of the total aid increase of US$16.5 billion, $6 billion was for debt relief, $3 billion for emergency distress relief and $4.5 billion for technical cooperation. That left of only $3 billion for increased multilateral and bilateral aid.
The pre-condition of "clean society and good governance" for giving aid would condemn the societies trapped in the spiral of poverty and corruption to the same vicious circle.
There were also emphasis on trade access, infrastructure development, capacity-building and transfer to appropriate technologies to developing countries, rather than a simplistic approach focusing disproportionately on aid.
Aside from aid and debt relief, the working group also called for solid intra-regional cooperation, particularly as there are huge socio-economic disparities in the region.
The vice president of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) Geert van der Linden urged the countries in Asia and the Pacific to come up with more solid visions in order to narrow the gap between them.
"There is no agreed vision so far, as the actions have been fragmented," he addressed the seminar.
It is not clear whether the lack of internal vision was due to an absence of trust among the countries, a lack of a mechanism or a lack of modalities.
As there is unlikely any European Union (EU) style institution available in the short-term period, van der Linden urged them to seek other methods to agree.
"There's a need for future internal vision, otherwise it will be difficult for the region to step up."