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DEVELOPMENT: A Partnership Among Equals

Alejandro Kirk

UNITED NATIONS, Sep 19 2006 (IPS) - Developed and developing countries should work together as equal partners in strengthening local resources and values, rather than trying to reproduce the “distorted” model of northern countries, Italy’s Deputy Foreign Minister Patrizia Sentinelli told IPS.

“[The new centre-left government of Italy] and I in particular, think that we cannot promote the kind of development we have. It is a distorted development that costs us a heavy toll in destroyed environmental resources and poverty, which grows also in our countries,” she said in an interview.

Sentinelli is in New York representing her country at the High-level Midterm Review of the Implementation of the U.N. Programme of Action for the Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Sep 18-19.

Partnership is the paramount objective of Italy’s official development assistance programmes to LDCs, she stressed.

Italy is the world’s seventh largest donor but the third in terms of actual funding for LDCs, Sentinelli said.

In commenting on the discrepancies between relative macroeconomic success and growing poverty in most of the world’s 50 countries listed by the U.N. as LDCs, Sentinelli stressed that growth is “certainly a parametre for development to take into account, but not an absolute one: first come human and social rights”.

In a recent report, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan states that “even before the adoption of the Brussels Programme, most LDCs had begun to improve their macroeconomic management; these efforts resulted in reduced fiscal deficits, lower rates of inflation and reduced external deficits.”

“Governments in most LDCs have introduced a wide array of microeconomic measures, including the privatisation of state-owned enterprises and an easing of regulations on businesses, aimed at stimulating the private sector and improving efficiency,” the report adds.

However, it says, “The recent experience of LDCs provides evidence of the tenuous nature of the relationship between economic growth and poverty reduction. The limited data in recent trends in poverty in LDCs suggest that there has been a negligible decline, and even some increases, in income poverty.”

“At present, LDCs are considered the countries least likely to achieve the goal of reducing the rate of poverty by half by 2005.”

To reverse this trend, says Sentinelli, new approaches to development are needed.

“Sustainability within the framework of diversifying production is key. LDCs must be encouraged to produce the food their populations need instead of forcing them to produce monoculture cash crops for export to the North and later import their food. It makes no sense,” she said.

The right to basic aspects of development, including decent work, housing, food, education and healthcare, must come together with civil and political rights, Sentinelli added.

“The fight against poverty and the achievement of financial and social prosperity are fundamental to building peace, which will continue to be a utopian dream unless the basic conditions for decent living are established: food, housing, education, and health for all,” she stressed in her speech at the high-level meeting.

“We should be able to reconcile politics and economics, and not let the latter prevail over the former. Let us treat this midterm review not as a deadline to be met but as an occasion to rethink, if necessary, our priorities, goals and beliefs,” she added..

A long-time activist within Italy’s social movements, she underlined the need to define “good governance” not just as a demand for transparency, strengthened institutions and the struggle against corruption in developing countries , but also a policy of “support for local communities”.

“Good governance is about capacity-building, with full respect to local values and priorities. It is not a policy to be exported from the North to the South,” she told IPS.

“By appointing me, the new government has indicated its strong interest in development cooperation, recognising the fundamental role of development cooperation in foreign policy. This appointment was welcomed by all the organisations which focus on peace and solidarity,” Sentinelli said at the U.N. meeting.

“Development cooperation is a reciprocal exchange of what each country may have to offer – whether it be experience or financial-human resources – in order to identify together a way forward that will involve all countries, and that is able to protect the things we all share,” she added.

“Cooperation should take place among equals, and efforts should be made to eliminate the persistent distinction between donor countries and beneficiaries, by fostering territorial partnerships.”