Representatives from international advocacy groups and financial institutions Wednesday called on rich countries to stop paying US$1 billion per day in subsidies to their farmers and open their markets to products from poorer countries, providing the opportunity for impoverished farmers to sell their goods abroad and earn higher incomes.

Ending subsidies was one of a series of demands voiced by speakers from both governmental and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) at a public meeting in Washington, D.C. to discuss the implementation of Millennium Development Goals, which aim to reduce poverty and improve the lives of low-income populations around the world by the year 2015.

"The time to act is now," said Dr. Mamphela Ramphele, head of the World Bank's health and social protection division, urging NGOs at the meeting, organized by the InterAction development alliance, to form partnerships with institutions like the Bank and United Nations in pressuring rich countries to agree on a fixed timetable for the elimination of agricultural subsidies. "[Subsidies] cost $1 billion a day...imagine what we could do with that."

The Millennium Development Goals, agreed upon by 189 members of the United Nations at a "Millennium Summit" held in September, 2000, are a wide-ranging and ambitious set of objectives that aspire over the next 15 years to reduce extreme poverty and hunger, reverse the spread of AIDS and other diseases, assure that all children complete at least six years of primary schooling, work towards gender equality, and significantly reduce global rates of child and maternal mortality.

Panelists advised leaders of industrialized nations to uphold their commitment to the goals, not just by ending agricultural subsidies, but by continuing to provide funds that support development programs in poorer countries.

The administration of President George W. Bush, in particular, has come under fire for backing out of donor commitments in recent months, despite the creation of a Millennium Challenge Account which would increase the amount the U.S. provides to poor countries by $5 billion per year.

In August, Bush unexpectedly decided to block $5.1 billion in contingency funding already approved by Congress, including nearly $200 million in emergency funding for HIV/AIDS programs and almost $200 million more in disaster and refugee aid for Afghanistan and other humanitarian emergencies. In July, Bush also withheld $34 million from the UN Population Fund, which conducts reproductive health work in dozens of developing countries.

The Bush administration has repeatedly voiced concerns that too much aid money has been squandered in the past and that future disbursements should be tied to guaranteed levels of transparency and accountability by governments in receiving countries.

Mark Malloch Brown, head of the UN Development Programme, stressed that greater political will was needed to promote concrete, well-administered programs in poor countries and to mobilize the resources necessary from rich countries to support those programs.

"The real drive to action on the Millennium Development Goals," said Malloch Brown, "will come from raw political power exercised by civil society and exercised by voters at the ballot box."

The goals will also serve as a targets for measuring success, according to Malloch Brown. Data on national progress towards the goals will enable citizens to hold their governments accountable for spending decisions.

Taking a lead in accountability, the senior advisor for the Millennium Challenge Account at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) announced later on Wednesday that the organization would "begin monitoring and tracking all its investments through the lens of the Millennium Development Goals," and would open to public scrutiny all projects and spending.

Copyright 2002 OneWorld.net

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