Global Policy Forum

By Stefania Bianchi

The European Union and its member states must spend more money on developing countries and draw up a "battle plan" for Africa, development commissioner Louis Michel said Tuesday. The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union (EU), announced a series of proposals Tuesday to raise EU spending and quality of aid in order to meet the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). The MDGs include a 50 percent reduction in poverty and hunger, universal primary education, reduction of child mortality by two-thirds, cutbacks in maternal mortality by three-quarters, promotion of gender equality and reversal of the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases. A summit of 189 world leaders in September 2000 pledged to meet all of these goals by 2015. A summit later this year will review progress towards the goals and set the development agenda for the next decade.

Michel called on the older 15 member states to increase spending to a minimum of 0.51 percent of gross national income (GNI) by 2010, and the ten new ones to 0.17 percent. This would be an interim target towards the pledge of 0.7 percent by 2015. This would result in an annual increase of 20 billion euros (25.64 billion dollars) until 2010. All EU countries have long been committed to spending 0.7 percent of their GNI on development aid. But only Sweden, Luxembourg, the Netherlands and Denmark have so far fulfilled the promise made in 1970 by the world's rich countries. Britain, France, Finland, Ireland, Belgium and Spain have fixed timetables to reach the 0.7 percent target before 2015, but other countries such as Italy and Austria are falling short of their long-standing commitments to fight poverty. "We have a responsibility of human solidarity, but it is also in our own interest," Michel told the European Parliament in Strasbourg Tuesday. "If we want a more stable and safer world, we have to develop more, we have to invest more in development now."

The EU proposals also provide for a special plan to combat poverty in Africa. "Africa must be the centre of our attention. We need more resources for sub-Saharan Africa...I shall be coming with a genuine battle plan for Africa," Michel said as he launched the proposals with European Commission president José Manuel Barroso. "Africa is a geo-political partner which is going to get more and more important. The United States and China have already understood this, which is why they are paying more attention to this part of the world," Michel added. Under the proposals, the EU will aim to improve governance in Africa, build infrastructure to boost trade on the continent, and improve education. Barroso also pledged his support to Africa and to other developing countries. "There is no reason why Africa should be underdeveloped. It is not wrong to help Africans as some people say. Africa is organising itself and we want to be a strategic partner. We want to convey a message of hope and commitment to Africa and developing countries," he said.

Michel said the EU could do more to reform its generous subsidy scheme for farmers. Aid groups have slammed these subsidies as one of the biggest obstacles to free and fair trade. "The European Union should go further in the reforms, but we cannot realise this at once. We have to find a balance between the needs of our own farmers and the problems (EU agriculture policy) causes in other countries," he said. Michel also said that new ideas for alternative ways of financing aid, such as special taxes on aviation fuel or airline tickets, should be used to produce additional revenue rather than to fill the existing aid gap.

The non-governmental organisations (NGOs) Oxfam International, Eurodad and ActionAid International said the new targets were "a step in the right direction", but added that the level of ambition was not far-reaching enough. "Rich countries promised decades ago to reach the United Nations target of 0.7 percent. The real tests will be in coming months as Europe faces key opportunities for decisive action to turn these proposals into action," the groups said in a joint statement released Tuesday. "The clock is ticking for the EU to sign up to a doubling of aid by the EU heads of state summit in June, as part of the development package which Europe will present for the UN summit on the MDGs in September," they added.

"In the long term, history will judge the European Union's proposals by their capacity to deliver genuine change. The proof of its level of ambition will be in the political will and energy it manages to drum up to turn its recommendations into reality," said Luis Morago, head of Oxfam's Brussels office. "It's now up to European leaders to rise to the challenge, to take long overdue action and make this a breakthrough year for poverty eradication," he added.

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