Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-02-16-Speech-3-024"
| Predicate | Value (sorted: default) |
|---|---|
| rdf:type | |
| dcterms:Date | |
| dcterms:Is Part Of | |
| dcterms:Language | |
| lpv:document identification number |
"en.20000216.2.3-024"2
|
| lpv:hasSubsequent | |
| lpv:speaker | |
| lpv:spoken text |
". – Mr President, I thank the Council and the Commission for their statements this morning, but I will concentrate on coherence policy because that is what the agenda says we are talking about.
Much as I agree with the requirement to hold a debate on the coherence of different Union policies and development policy, I question whether today is the time to be holding it. However, the Council statement gave me hope for the future. It is quite obvious to me, as someone who specialises in development policy, that there are many areas where lack of coherence is dramatically affecting developing nations. I will give some examples shortly. However, I remind this House that, back in June 1997, a Council resolution acknowledged the fact that there is a serious lack of coherence in some of the EU policies in relation to its development cooperation policy. This was followed by a request from the Council to the Commission to provide an annual report, the first of which was to be discussed in 1998. We still await the first report, and that is why I believe this debate was premature, as the Commission had little to say on coherence this morning.
The areas identified by the Council are specific areas where policy coherence is particularly important, such as peace-building, conflict prevention and resolution, food security, fisheries and immigration. Some of these issues have been discussed in depth. I personally feel that issues such as peace-building and conflict prevention and resolution are very much the domain of African Heads of State, with capacity support from the European Union and the OAU acting as arbiter.
The issues that are really affected by lack of coherence are in areas such agriculture, trade, environment and biodiversity, but herein lies the real problem: these are the highly sensitive areas of policy within the European Union as a whole and in this Parliament in particular. Members of this House will have differing views, even within the same political parties, depending on (a) which country they come from or (b) which committee they sit on.
There are areas of coherence I would like to see as a member of the Committee on Development that would probably horrify some of the members of the Committee on Agriculture or Committee on Fisheries. As a lack of coherence, one can cite as Mrs Sandbæk did, the exporting of milk products to Jamaica at prices far below production costs there which has almost ruined the Jamaican dairy industry. We have beef exported to southern Africa, to Namibia and South Africa, which then sell their indigenous beef to Swaziland, so that Swaziland can fill its export quota back to the European Union. Remember too, some countries blocked an agreement with South African trade for four years.
If we simply import raw materials from these developing countries, rather than allowing them the add-on value of producing their finished articles in their own country, we deny them the very poverty-eradication that we have set as our top principle in helping developing nations.
I am not surprised the Commission is having trouble producing a basic document for discussion on sustainable and social development. There is a natural resistance in the developing world to anything that would lower standards of living and create further unemployment. I wish the Commission well in its task of producing that basic document."@en1
|
| lpv:spokenAs | |
| lpv:unclassifiedMetadata |
"Corrie (PPE-DE"1
"co-president of the ACP-EU Joint Assembly"1
|
Named graphs describing this resource:
The resource appears as object in 2 triples