[Global Poverty] Mandela calls for poverty relief

LONDON, Feb. 4 -- Former South African president Nelson Mandela called on the world's richest nations on Friday to give more aid to the world's poorest countries to help them out ofa mire of poverty and debt and strongly backed a British relief plan.

Mandela, who was invited to a meeting of finance ministers and central bank chiefs of the G7 wealthiest countries, told the finance chiefs of G7 ahead of a meeting in London that rich nations were able now to write of Africa's debt.

"We are here to claim justice," the frail 86-year-old told the G7 ministers. "Do not delay while poor people continue to suffer," he said, demanding a full write-off of African debt and 50 billionUS dollars extra a year in aid for the next decade.

"I urge you to act tonight," Mandela said.

He said he would accept no half measures. It was an outrage to let Africa sink further into disease and poverty.

Mandela urged the seven countries "do not delay while poor people continue to suffer."

Earlier Friday, John Taylor, US Treasury Under Secretary, rejected Brown's plan for what he calls an International Finance Facility (IFF) that would double existing aid by using rich countries' guarantees to raise money by issuing bonds in the capital markets.

He said the British plan was incompatible with US budgetary rules.

Italian Economy Minister Domenico Siniscalco also said in an interview with Reuters that he appreciated Britain's plan to cancel the debt of the world's poorest countries and open an International Financing Facility, but the proposals lack sufficient backing to pass here.

"If I can be brutal, I agree with Britain's proposal, but the problem here is we need to act now...this evening I will propose that we adopt the IFF on a smaller scale," he said adding that he would propose something more modest.

German Finance Minister Hans Eichel said it would be better to start with something less ambitious even though he backed the British idea.

British officials put on a brave face on the reluctance to stump up so much money so fast, something many say is the only way to meet a UN goal of halving world poverty by 2015.

Brown is hoping he would get support for his plan at the meeting of G-7 finance ministers.

Earlier this week, Brown said in an interview with The Guardian that he would be trying "to persuade America that debt relief and extra finance for development is in its interests not just because it is good economics and social policy but good for its security as well"

He also said that "if the US wants to separate the extremists from those that they are trying to influence, it makes good sense to show how industrial nations can implement a Marshall Plan for developing countries".

Brown said the issue is a key priority for Britain's presidencyof the Group of Eight industrialized nations.

The G7 includes the United States, Japan, Germany, Britain, France, Italy and Canada. Enditem

Source: Xinhuanet

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[Global Poverty] One Billion People Live in Absolute Poverty

by Jennifer Nakalema & Mahdi Ssenkabirwa
The Monitor (Kampala)

International efforts to reduce hunger and poverty have scored poorly and the world is not on track to meet global goals, a new Global Governance Initiative Annual Report 2005 has shown.

According to the press statement issued by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), a scale of zero to 10 global efforts to reduce hunger scored only three and efforts to diminish poverty earned a rating of four.

The statement is part of the report that was prepared by the World Economic Forum and present Aed at a meeting in Davos, Switzerland on January 25.

The World Economic Forum created the initiative that provides an annual assessment of the efforts being made towards achieving the world's goals by the governments, international organisations, the private sector and civil organisations.

The statement predicts that if current trends continue, there will still be about 600 million hungry people in 2015, far short of the target. To reach that goal, the current pace of reduction would need to be accelerated more than 12 times.

A panel led by Sartaj Aziz, former Finance and Foreign Minister of Pakistan, and Joachim von Braun, Director General of IFPRI, assessed global progress in the fight against hunger and poverty.

The statement, seen by The Monitor, says the number of people surviving on less than $1 a day has declined by 12 million in the last decade, leaving more than one billion in absolute poverty.

"Agriculture has a tremendously important role to play in meeting these goals. Half of the world's hungry people live in farm households, and three quarters of the world's poor live in rural areas," Braun said in the report.