August 2, 2000
Bangkok (United Nations Information Services) As a timely high-level UN finance meeting got underway today amidst the renewed financial anxiety in the region, Indonesian President H.E. Abdurrahman Wahid urged solidarity among the region's countries to tackle the problems that lie ahead.
Opening the meeting attended by over 152 delegates from 37 countries, NGOs, financial institutions and UN entities, President Wahid said that securing an common identity for Asians was important as "we can then tackle problems with our heads held high."
"This conference comes at a time when we wonder whether we have the financial resources to improve our lives. Let me say that one of our most precious resources are our people. If we do not have an identity that distinguishes us from other regions we may not be able to tackle problems with a common will,"said President Wahid.
A wide-ranging agenda covering trade, capital flows, development assistance, national external debt and national financial structure issues and international financial architecture will be tackled by participants at a High-Level Regional Consultative Meeting on Financing for Development being held in Jakarta from 2-5 August 2000.
The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) are organizing the four-day meeting.
"Although it had taken almost seven years of negotiations to hold this meeting , it is encouraging to see the beginning of the process with an emphasis on the multidimensional problems facing developing countries in their efforts to integrate themselves into the mainstream of the international economic system as well as indicating what sources might be available which could contribute to the process," said Mr Makarim Wibisono, Head of the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Indonesia to the United Nations and President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
The regional aspects of financing for development should not be lost, Mr Wibisono said, because regional issues have not been addressed in the process so far due to its focus more on global issues.
Mr Wibisono underlined two important points. Firstly that there was an urgent need for better reporting on private capital flows. Such data needs to be comprehensive. Governments and financial market participants deserve better data on private debt. Secondly, he said that private capital flows are not available to the majority of developing countries.
"The developing countries must rely on Official Development Assistance (ODA) but regrettably this has become a casualty of globalization and has sharply declined in real terms. Aid fatigue and fiscal stringency in the developed countries has also contributed to this downturn." Executive Secretary of ESCAP, Mr Kim Hak-Su in his statement at the inaugural session said that although the region appears to be firmly poised for a healthy recovery , many formidable constraints persist. "The experience of the region has led to paradigm shifts in development philosophy. Up until recently, the shift signified a greater role for the market and closer integration with the international economy through openness to foreign trade, direct investment, technology and financial inflows.
Following the crisis, Mr Kim said, there is an increasing emphasis on an enhanced role of governments in many areas ranging from ensuring the rule of law to elimination of corruption in all its guises.
He urged the meeting to come up with some clear regional perspectives and identify "actionable proposals for implementation in the future."
UNCTAD Secretary-General Rubens Ricupero stressed that promoting efficiency, complementarity, stability and appropriate burden sharing in financial arrangements at all levels should be an important objective of future reform efforts in the area of money and finance.
Mr Nitin Desai, Under-Secretary-General, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs said that development was a joint public and private sector responsibility and domestic resources, both public and private, continue to play a critical role in financing national development.
The development experience in the Region, particularly the experience with the recent Asian financial crisis continues to defy the simple notion of development as "catching up" with industrialized countries, said Mr Yoshihiro Iwasaki, Director Programs Department (WEST), Asian Development Bank (ADB). In a region where nearly one in three Asians is poor, financing for development must be about addressing the "overarching development objective of poverty reduction."
The meeting is taking place as part of series of five regional consultations in preparation for a global meeting on Financing for Development to be held next year. The Financing for Development meeting was authorized by General Assembly resolution A/54/196 to involve policy-makers at the ministerial level or higher in consideration of national, international and systemic issues relating to the availability of adequate resources to meet world development needs.
Interest in a global meeting on development finances crystallized and gathered momentum in the United Nations in the aftermath of financial contagion in 1997 and 1998. Concern with the heavy burden of external debt on poor countries, growing disparities between the rich and the poor worldwide, declining levels of development assistance and growing evidence of disruptive as well as positive features of economic globalization and liberalization were among the motivating factors in calling for the meeting.
More Information on the Financing for Development Summit
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