Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2006-02-14-Speech-2-379"
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"en.20060214.29.2-379"2
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".
Mr President, my group welcomes this resolution. There is broad consensus that under-financing and under-investment, in Africa in particular, have played a significant part in holding developing countries back. Economists like the American Jeremy Sachs admit that development assistance to Africa to date has been peanuts when measured against the scale of infrastructure investment that is required.
The title of this resolution is somewhat restrictive and mentions a new financial instrument as if there were only one solution to the problem, but the text is fortunately much broader. The nub of the problem is that we have to find ways to finance development over and above the national commitment to 0.7%.
The resolution floats the idea of a solidarity contribution on air tickets, but that should not be the only avenue, and like Mrs Kinnock I should like to suggest other possibilities. Firstly, Member States can simply decide to accelerate the timetable for reaching the 0.7% GDP target and indeed go beyond it. In Britain the Liberal Democrats have pledged to reach the 0.7% by 2011, two years ahead of the deadline set by the present UK Government.
Secondly, there is a role for foreign direct investment. No country has ever been lifted out of poverty by aid alone and countries which have enjoyed the most spectacular rates of development, such as China, have enjoyed high levels of FDI. The problem is that when foreign investment is negotiated via bilateral investment treaties or as proposed by the WTO at Cancún, it can involve exploitation of the weaker partner and the waiving of environmental and social protection. What is needed is a new international investment agreement under the auspices of the UN Commission on Sustainable Development.
In conclusion, we should explore as many ways as possible for levering extra investment into development, but the methods we choose must have public support and they must never be covert."@en1
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