UN focuses on Africa

2008-09-23 12:00

Geneva - African leaders warned on Monday that a lingering global financial crisis coupled with the collapse of talks on a world trade agreement could significantly harm the UN campaign to improve life for hundreds of millions of the world's poorest.

But the head of the 53-nation African Union said that if rich nations really care, they will keep helping Africa in spite of the financial meltdown.

The financial storm clouds hovered over a high-level meeting on Africa's development needs ahead of the UN General Assembly's annual ministerial session which opens on Tuesday - and the grim international economic outlook is certain to be a hot issue for the nearly 120 world leaders and dozens of ministers attending the global gabfest.

At the start of Monday's meeting, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon urged the world's rich nations to spend $72bn a year to help Africa achieve UN goals to fight poverty, improve health and ensure universal primary education.

Ban said the price tag may be daunting but "it is affordable", pointing to the estimated $267bn that the world's richest nations spent last year just on agricultural subsidies.

"In this context, the cost of solving the food crisis, addressing global warming and pulling millions out of extreme poverty in Africa looks like good value," he said.

A new report from the secretary-general said not a single African country is likely to achieve all the UN Millennium Development Goals by the target date of 2015.

'Serious negative impact'

Those attending Monday's high-level meeting later adopted a political declaration reaffirming their commitment to addressing Africa's development needs and calling for the fulfilment of all official development assistance-related commitments.

Ban said last week he was deeply concerned that the current economic slowdown and turmoil on Wall Street could have a "very serious negative impact" on the ability of rich nations to help achieve the targets, first and foremost to cut extreme poverty by half.

Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete, who heads the African Union, added his concern, warning that "if the crisis is to continue, it will certainly have serious, serious implications". But he was hopeful that the financial turmoil will be short-lived.

"There may not be easy answers, but I believe the US will overcome, and the world will overcome this unfortunate situation," he said.

Kikwete said the ball is in the court of the 30 rich nations in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development known as the OECD. "Working together, the OECD countries can easily raise $72bn," he said.

Donald Kaberuka, president of the African Development Bank, said African economies grew strongly on the back of a strong global economy over the last five years and he touted the continent as a good place for investment - despite the current crisis.

"I think people ... say Africa was a risky place," he said. "But I think many more people have lost money in this city than in Africa over the last couple of weeks."

"Naturally, we're concerned about what we call the second-round effects of the crisis," he said. "This is a crisis which is serious and worries us, of course, but frankly, I hope that it isn't (going) to reduce the effort for developing countries, because that would be quite a big disappointment."

Kaberuka lamented that the Doha talks on a new global trade deal were supposed to help ease restrictions for developing countries in global markets, but when they collapsed in July "we had not even come to development issues".

World leaders arrived in New York as the US Congress started debate on a $700bn proposal to buy a mountain of bad mortgage debt in an effort to revive US credit markets. Whether world leaders are prepared to make fresh commitments to help the poor remains to be seen.

Keeping promises

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, speaking on behalf of the European Union, made no commitment but assured the meeting: "Europe as a whole is at the side of Africa."

Undersecretary-General Cheick Sidi Diarra, Ban's special adviser on Africa, said he was concerned about the global economic downturn, but he still expected developed countries to keep their promises of increased aid.

The General Assembly's annual ministerial meeting opens on Tuesday with speeches by Ban, Sarkozy and US President George W Bush, making his last appearance before the world body.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad - whose nuclear programme will be discussed on the sidelines of the session - is scheduled to speak on Tuesday afternoon along with Sudan's Vice President Ali Osman Taha.

- AP