As a group, we were very privileged to be asked by the committee to advise in this important matter. It was a great honour for me to work with such distinguished colleagues. I take this opportunity to particularly thank Ms Dympna Hayes and the Department of Foreign Affairs for all the assistance she gave us in the course of our work. We were fortunate in that we had very good co-operation and access in pursuing our investigations from the NGO community in Ireland, the officials of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Commissioners Patten and Neilson in the European Commission. We also had the opportunity to meet with Mr. James Wolfensohn, president of the World Bank, and with Mrs. Mary Robinson. In a relatively short space of time, due to fortuitous circumstances, we were able to consult a fairly wide range of people.
The terms of reference the committee gave us are set out in the report and I will not go through them again. However, we interpreted them as requiring us to seek to identify a small number of practical initiatives that would add value. In the construction of the report, chapters one to five seek to explain how the system for the delivery of development co-operation and development aid actually works in practice. The committee will probably notice in today's newspapers that in the work of the Convention on the Future of Europe there is a proposal to change that structure a little and to have one foreign minister in Europe where there are currently three commissioners to some extent involved in this particular area. That may or may not develop but it is an interesting point to note in passing.
In chapter six of the report, we try to analyse a wide range of options that we could consider as possible priorities that Ireland might adopt. We analysed a wide range of options because people looking at the report when it is finished might well ask whether we looked at this or that option. We felt that we should trawl as widely as possible, examine the options and then give the reasons we did or did not include each of those.
There were some obvious ones which people will look at and say should have been included - I am thinking particularly of the area of coherence of aid policy, with particular reference to agricultural subsidies. The reason that was not included in our final recommendations had nothing to do with any assessment of its importance but simply that the agenda at Doha and the World Trade Organisation would be so far advanced by the time that we entered the EU Presidency that it would difficult to approach it as a new initiative.
In chapter seven, we have attempted to set out a number of practical recommendations that we think the committee could usefully consider and might forward one or all of to influence Ireland's EU Presidency. We noted in that chapter that there is no magic bullet or single thing that can be latched onto it. We cannot say that if we pursued one particular thing vigorously it would make a huge difference. We would have liked to have been able to say that but felt it was not possible. There are, therefore, a number of recommendations.
I draw the committee's attention to a point which was made during our inquiries, which was that the period when Ireland assumes the EU Presidency will be one of great change. The accession countries will take up their positions and there will be a new Parliament and a new batch of commissioners. Commissioner Patten, who presumably has a reasonably good insight into how these things work, made the point that there might be marginal enthusiasm for new ideas. I suppose it is a restriction and a difficulty that Ireland might face when it assumes the Presidency.
The advisory group focused its recommendations on removing impediments to the achievement of the millennium development goals. I refer to about six development priorities - critical objectives that need to be achieved if we are to tackle seriously the problem of world poverty and deprivation - that were adopted two or three years ago, to be achieved over a period of 15 years. The group did not attempt to ask what would be a good thing to do, given that the objectives and goals have been agreed, but to examine the impediments to achieving the goals. It is no harm to note that the international development community works on the basis of the comprehensive development framework. Each country is supposed to develop poverty reduction strategy papers, which will form the basis of co-ordinated action on the part of all donors and NGOs acting in an individual country.
The first impediment to the achievement of the development goals identified by the advisory group was an obvious one - a lack of funding. All countries have had the goal of allocating 0.7% of GNP as overseas development assistance for over 20 years, but it has never been achieved, other than by certain Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands. The average contribution, generally speaking, is around 0.3% or 0.4%. I think Ireland is at the higher end of that scale. We felt it might be useful, as part of the Monterrey process, for the Government to place a particular focus on this area and to try to encourage and exhort our colleagues in other member states to increase funding to a level closer to 0.7%. It goes without saying that Ireland would not have much credibility in pursuing such an objective if we could not show convincingly that we are committed to meeting the target.
I am sure the committee is aware that the Government intends to achieve the 0.7% target by 2007, but interim targets or milestones are absent. The Government's promise lacks some credibility because if one does not significantly increase funding each year, one will have a balloon payment in the final year which will be huge and impossible to achieve. Ireland should strive to meet its goal, but the Government needs to make a more convincing commitment to that end.
The second priority that was identified is one that is specifically mentioned in the terms of reference - the question of HIV and AIDS. This matter was dealt with in considerable detail in the bulk of the report. The third appendix to the report sets out some of the key issues that affect this area and outlines some of the difficulties that may be encountered. The advisory group made two recommendations in this regard. The first of these was that the EU could usefully review its policy on this area with a view to mainstreaming it. HIV-AIDS is seen as a health issue at the moment, rather than as a broad development issue. We feel that a holistic approach to this area should be adopted by the Commission.
While HIV-AIDS is a particularly enormous and appalling catastrophe in sub-Saharan Africa, it has not been remarked on to a great extent that it is a developing problem in eastern Europe, India and China. As eastern Europe is on our doorstep, it is something of which we should be aware. The document we have distributed to the committee mentions, in a footnote, a report that was produced in a foreign affairs journal during the year. The report details the statistics associated with the HIV-AIDS phenomenon. Apart from the human impact, the economic impact of this problem on eastern Europe is also discussed. The advisory group felt, in the context of enlargement, that the EU should turn its attention to this matter.
The next heading considered by the advisory group was that of governance. Poor quality governance and bad governance are not necessarily the same thing. Weak governance can result from a range of things, but bad governance is what it implies. A combination of these forms of governance is a huge impediment to development and the fight against AIDS. Aid is effective only if one can ensure it is deployed and used properly and honestly in any country. The group suggested that this idea should be taken on board, considered and given some emphasis.
I jumped over the question of poverty eradication, which I should have discussed. The advisory group has made recommendations in that regard. People quote statistics about the focus of the European Union's approach. It can be shown that the amount of money expended by the Union is proportionately dropping in relation to its poverty focus, but our inquiries reveal that, in absolute terms, that is not the case. Although a considerable amount of money is dedicated to poverty reduction, expenditure has grown in other areas, such as common foreign and security policy. Ireland has always taken a strong stance in relation to this matter and we intend to continue to do so, by suggesting to the Commission that poverty eradication should be at the core of what we do. We are pushing an open door in some respects because the twin pillars of the Community's development policy are poverty eradication and the integration of developing countries into the global economy. It is useful for us to try to emphasise that as much as possible.
The group also made suggestions in relation to administrative effectiveness. It suggested specifically that the European development fund, which is the main means of funding the Cotonou agreement, which relates to ACP countries, should be a formal part of the EU's budgetisation programme. The fact that the fund is not part of the programme at present means that there is a drift from the scrutiny by the European Parliament. It is not treated by the Parliament with the same transparency as the rest of the funding.
There is another area, apart from budgetisation, which we did not have the time or resources to examine in great detail. It was suggested to us that the EDF programme is inflexible and that it is hard to effect changes to respond to changing conditions. It is possible, for instance, to respond in such a manner in the Tacis and Phare programmes in eastern Europe. It was pointed out to us at European level that the EDF fund is very rigid and that a great deal of negotiation is needed before changes can be effected. The fact that up to €10 billion has not been spent or, to be technically correct, has not been drawn down, is evidence of this.
It would be a useful administrative measure to bring the European development fund programme under the budget by making administrative changes. The Commission does not become involved in implementing programmes - perhaps it feels that the best thing to do is to use other people, such as NGOs and contractors, in that regard. We suggested that a limited implementation role for the Commission might be quite good, from an administrative viewpoint, as it would gain a great deal of useful knowledge. When one is expending the amount of money being spent by the Commission, it is important that one builds up an institutional knowledge of what works and what does not work. That is preferable to having the knowledge escape or being dependent on one's engagement with other actors.
The last specific recommendation is to increase global leverage. The Commission spends more than 50% of the total development assistance in the world and is very much the world's largest contributor of development and humanitarian aid. We were surprised to note that despite this and in terms of engagement with the Bretton Woods institutions, which are also key players in this area, the Commission does not have independent standing. Individual countries are part of the IMF and World Bank structures in different constituencies. Ireland, for example, is in the same constituency as Canada and Caribbean countries. However, the EU itself does not have a standing which constitutes a major political question in the context of the future of Europe. The practical effect of an engagement in its own right by the EU in these institutions would be an ability to exert a much stronger influence.
There are things Ireland can do in the context of the entry of the ten new countries to the EU. These countries do not, by and large, have a tradition of development assistance or programmes or policies in the area. Ireland is well placed to advise and assist these countries in that regard.
On completion of our report, we became aware of an information technology initiative which Ireland is engaged in at United Nations task force level. The e-schools initiative is very much based on the idea of using new technology to achieve development. The idea is very seductive because it has the potential to jump several generations of technology and to achieve great things in education. We were not in a position to make a definitive recommendation on the programme, but we noted that while it had great potential, there were practical matters which might impede its ultimate success. These issues are associated with the depleted state of infrastructure in many developing countries.
Making the initiative work would require a degree of sophistication in wireless technology which does not exist currently. It must be asked if money would be better spent on advancing the fundamentals of literacy, numeracy and basic education rather than on something like this. There is also the problem of managing the programme in the longer term as this would require a very significant commitment from its sponsors. The big challenge is to find a way to operationalise the concept rather than to say the concept itself is not viable. Much study of the initiative is required but it is worth watching and may go forward anyway.
There are a number of appendices to our report. I mentioned appendix 3 which deals with HIV and AIDS while others address the breakdown of the EU budget for external relations in terms of how it is spent in percentages. Appendix 1 deals with the joint statement of the Commission and the Council in November 2002 on development policy and appendix 4 outlines the mechanisms for political dialogue with Africa. Africa and south Asia are very much the focus of any strategy of poverty eradication.
The world has moved on since we submitted our report. Things have changed with the war on Iraq and it must be asked what it means for Europe's cohesion and for the United Nations. My distinguished colleague, Mr. Noel Dorr, is well placed to offer a view on the matter, but these factors were not at issue when the report was being compiled. It is as well to note that the report may be deficient from that point of view.
We are very pleased to have had the opportunity to complete this work for the committee and we hope it may be of some assistance in framing whatever recommendations it eventually decides to bring forward through the Government during the Presidency in 2004.
