G8 Summit to Look At African Poverty

from All Africa

New Era (Windhoek)

By Catherine Sasman
Windhoek

The 33rd G8 Summit commences today at Heiligendamm in the northern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on the Baltic Coast in Germany, and will convene until June 8.

One session of the summit will be entirely devoted to Africa, covering discussions on the continent's dire HIV/AIDS situation, its health systems, infrastructure, climate change, as well as inward investment on the continent.

According to the Global Call to Action Against Poverty (GCAP) campaign in Namibia, this offers a golden opportunity to address some of the root causes in Africa, as well as an opportunity to voice the concerns of millions of people worldwide who have been part of the growing campaign for poverty eradication since the GCAP campaign kicked off in 2005.

Anti-poverty campaigners believe the resultant summit communiqué should include concrete measures to alleviate devastating poverty in the South.

The G8 - consisting of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, UK and the USA - represents about 65% of the world economy.

In 2005, the G8 committed itself to increasing Overseas Development Aid (ODA) by an extra US$50 billion by 2010. Recent figures, however, show that aid from rich countries has, in fact, since fallen by five percent last year, which is contrary to the G8 Gleneagles, Scotland Summit agreement of 0,7% of national income to be made available in effective aid.

Nine civil society organizations in Namibia, spearheaded by the Nangof and the Namibia Development Trust (NDT), in an open letter to G8 urge that Heads of State be bound to timetables for delivery of this aid and show leadership in the donor community.

The worldwide poverty scenario is bleak. A conservative estimate is that up to 450 million people are trapped in absolute chronic poverty.

According to the Chronic Poverty Research Centre - an international partnership of universities, research institutes and civil society organizations - as much as 900 million people will be extremely poor by 2015, even if the Millennium Development Goals are reached, which aim at halving poverty in that time frame.

Chronic poverty, the centre says, is when people experience poverty over an extended duration, and always - or usually - are living below the poverty line, which is pegged at US$1 a day.

Sub-Saharan Africa, the Centre continues, is home to the most extreme and persistent multi-dimensional poverty. Chronic poverty in this region is particularly pronounced in areas that are remote, affected by protracted and violent conflict, suffering economic stagnation or decline, and where HIV/AIDS and other diseases are endemic.

The Namibian GCAP campaign charges that rich countries have fallen short on their promises of debt relief.

"While the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative is a positive example of the G8 doing what it said it would do in 2005, debt cancellation is needed for a much larger group of countries that continue to face a heavy debt burden."

Moreover, it calls on the G8 countries to redress barriers to trade and investment in poor countries by ensuring that the Doha Development Round and EU-ACP negotiations get onto a pro-development track.

It also urges the Summit to search for improved tools for health promotion.

The Namibian campaign further calls on the G8 Summit to reach a collective commitment to reduce their own carbon emissions by 80% to stem global warming and climate change.

"Let us not forget that the G8 countries bear particular responsibility as a major source of carbon emissions. Poor people and poor countries will in many cases be the first and worst affected by climate change, while having done least to bring it about," the Group notes.