Development must alleviate poverty

Many people wrote about the IMF policies mentioning that Kwik was against a collaboration with the IMF. Actually, Kwik is simply against the policies led by the IMF, because they are counterproductive.

Conglomerates supporting such IMF policies are even now supporting development strategies -- dating back to the beginning of the 1990s -- through business loans supposed to benefit the poorest and help them start their own microenterprises. In such projects, a foreign project director managing his staff efficiently must reach a repayment rate above 95 percent.

The IMF is more preoccupied by guaranteeing the debt reimbursement than by maintaining the health of the borrowing countries, while many development agencies wish to reduce poverty using those kinds of projects. However, their clients are very often not the poorest people. Therefore, besides these useful projects, we need to prioritize the sponsorship of projects distributing sound, small grants (i.e. US$100) to the poorest and delivering adjusted training, so that their business can be sustainable and help them to save money for their daily family needs or for further investment in their own projects.

Development business is and has always been very often a mere business and this is not like we are going to help the poorest. Even all the program officers (Indonesians and expatriates earn their living on that business) of international agencies know that very well, but they are powerless when facing the deciders in their own organization and even prefer to shut up to retain or get a higher position in their own organizational structure. We all know that these international public organizations -- using money from taxpayers -- need to be reformed deeply to be efficient. But who is really asking?

The IMF and the development agencies should have kept in mind their initial mission, which is respectively: support the economy of the developing countries through fiscal policies generating growth and to bring financial/technical support to projects that truly alleviate poverty. And, in that respect, both the government and the community-based NGOs have a real role to play.

YVAN MAGAIN

Tubize, Belgium