Monday, May 25, 2015

Poorest nations, not just richest, must act to end extreme poverty - campaigners

<span id="midArticle_start"/><span id="midArticle_0"/>LONDON, May 26 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The world'srich donor nations must increase their overseas aid budgets andreverse the trend of declining funding for the poorest countriesin order to meet a global goal of ending poverty by 2030, anadvocacy group said on Tuesday.

<span id="midArticle_1"/>Yet governments of the least-developed countries must alsocontribute by committing to a minimum level of spending toprovide basic services, including health and education, foreveryone within five years, the ONE Campaign said in a report.

<span id="midArticle_2"/>As world leaders prepare to meet at a development financesummit in Addis Ababa in July, ahead of agreeing a new set ofdevelopment goals later this year, ONE said 2015 could be apivotal year for the world's most vulnerable people.

<span id="midArticle_3"/>The United Nations is expected to adopt 17 SustainableDevelopment Goals (SDGs) in September, which will replace theeight existing Millennium Development Goals and address issuessuch as healthcare, education, water, energy and climate change.

<span id="midArticle_4"/> <span class="first-article-divide"/>"Despite multiple summits to debate these issues, there's ashocking lack of global leadership to deliver genuine, lifechanging commitments for the world's poorest and hardest toreach," said Eloise Todd, ONE's global policy director.

<span id="midArticle_5"/>"New global goals which could set out the roadmap to endextreme poverty will be worth little if leaders fail to backthem with an ambitious financing plan," she said.

<span id="midArticle_6"/> <span class="second-article-divide"/>Official development aid (ODA) from the 28 member countriesof the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) was stable in2014, after hitting an all-time high in 2013, but aid to thepoorest countries continued to fall, according to the DAC.

<span id="midArticle_7"/>Less than a third went to the least developed countries,most of which are in sub-Saharan Africa, where almost half ofthe population live in extreme poverty on less than $1.25 a day,said ONE, which was co-founded by Irish rocker Bono.

<span id="midArticle_8"/> <span class="third-article-divide"/>Increasing that share of the aid to 50 percent would havemade an extra $26.5 billion available last year for the world'spoorest people, the report found.

<span id="midArticle_9"/>ONE also urged the DAC countries to meet the United Nationstarget of spending 0.7 percent of their national wealth on ODAby 2020. Only Britain, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Luxembourghave met the target to date, according to the DAC.

<span id="midArticle_10"/>Governments of the least-developed countries should increasedomestic revenues, by implementing fair tax policies and curbingcorruption, to help them address a funding gap of $34.5 billionto deliver basic social services to everyone by 2020, ONE said.

<span id="midArticle_11"/>They should also invest in agriculture and energy to supportsustainable growth, and focus on investments in women and girls,who are more effective at lifting communities out of povertythan men, the report said. (Reporting By Kieran Guilbert; Editing by Ros Russell)

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