Eradicating poverty for the new millennium
Here in Ghana, as elsewhere, healthcare for the young is a top priority.
The primary and overarching objective of EU development policy is to eradicate poverty in a sustainable way. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are key to the policy. The eight MDGs were adopted by world leaders in 2000 with a 2015 deadline and range from halving extreme poverty and halting the spread of HIV/AIDS, to providing universal primary education. The EU has asked national authorities to set financial targets for development funding so as to demonstrate their commitment to the MDGs. A 2005 progress report found that all countries had made financial contributions, but that more were needed. The world is on track to halve poverty by 2015. 120 million people were lifted out of poverty between 2000 and 2005. But in other areas, targets will not be met by 2015. These include lowering child and maternal mortality levels and providing clean drinking water.
Trade and aid
Since 2001, the EU's Everything But Arms initiative has eliminated all duties and quotas for all products (except arms) originating from the world’s least developed countries. The EU was the first developed market bloc to do so. The special trading relationship between the Union and its 79 partners in the Africa-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) group has been a model for how rich countries can open their markets to poor ones. An Africa-EU strategic partnership, founded in 2007, marked a tightening of relations and further efforts to promote the MDGs in Africa.
One of the Gujarati women at work.
This is why the Union has designed a new series of economic partnership agreements with the ACP countries. These were due to be in place by the start of 2008, but not all were ready in time so interim agreements were drawn up. The idea is to help ACP countries integrate with their regional neighbours as a step towards global integration. At the same time, the EU will continue to open its markets and remove barriers to exports from the ACP group.
Deeper pockets
The European Union and its member countries paid out more than €49 billion in 2008 in public aid to developing countries. This was the equivalent of 0.40% of their GNP, and was higher than the per capita aid levels of the United States or Japan. The target for 2010 is 0.56% of GNP, rising to 0.7% in 2015.
Most of the EU’s aid is in the form of non-repayable grants. A limited amount of soft loans and investment capital is made available by the European Investment Bank (EIB), the EU’s long-term funding body. In 2006 the EIB made loans worth €5.9 billion to partners outside Europe, mainly developing countries.
Doing a lot with little
Over the years, the EU has funded thousands of development projects across the third world. Often relatively small amounts of cash go a long way. Recent success stories include help for a group of 250 women in the Indian state of Gujarat to export handicrafts to Europe, North America and Japan; support for a local firm in Belize to introduce sustainable logging and forest management techniques; assistance to farmers in central Cameroon to diversify production; and training for small firms in Uganda to share the cost of using essential business support services.
Controlling their own destiny
EU development policy aims to give disadvantaged people in the third world control over their own development, which means attacking the sources of their vulnerability. These can include poor access to food and clean water, to education, health, employment, land, social services, infrastructure or a sound environment. It also means disease eradication and access to cheap medicines to combat scourges like HIV/AIDS. EU policy aims to reduce the debt burden that diverts scarce resources from vital public investments back to rich lenders in industrialised countries.
The Union also promotes self-help and poverty eradication strategies which enable developing countries to consolidate the democratic process, expand social programmes, strengthen their institutional framework, expand the capacities of the private and public sectors, and reinforce respect for human rights, including equality between men and women.
