Development should be placed "squarely at the forefront of the global agenda", the Group of 77 developing countries told UNCTAD´s Trade and Development Board (TDB) on Monday as the Board met in Geneva to prepare its contribution to the upcoming 2005 World Summit. "The critical message to be conveyed through this session is that any [UN] reform process should restore development to its rightful, pivotal place on the UN agenda and that the relevant funds and programmes of the UN system must be strengthened and empowered to support that priority", said Antoine Mindua Kesia-Mbe (Democratic Republic of Congo), speaking on behalf of the G77 and China.
The proposed expansion of that agenda - broadening the focus on development structured around the millennium development goals (MDGs) to more directly address security and human rights concerns -- represented both an opportunity and a challenge, Egypt´s Minister of Planning Osman M. Osman told the Board. "In general, there is no conflict between peace, security and human rights on the one hand, and sustainable economic development on the other hand", he said. "However, they should not all be tied together by an additional set of conditionalities imposable over the developing nations."
But moving too far away from the MDGs would be risky, according to several speakers. Mr. Osman warned that failure to stay on course with those goals, and to combat terrorism, disease and poverty, especially among the African least developed countries (LDCs), would damage the global objectives of peace and collective security. Would it take another tsunami for the world, the UN system and UNCTAD to renew their show of solidarity for development? asked Saeed Sheich Rizwan (Pakistan). At the same time, the UN´s traditional focus on development had not brought an end to human misery. The experience of the 60 years of the UN´s existence, said Ali Drouiche (Algeria), had led to a "triple crisis of confidence": confidence in the UN´s proposals for development policy; in North-South relations; and in the political leadership of developing countries, accused of failing to ensure the well-being of their populations. "It is the obligation of political leaders in both North and South to restore that confidence, to reforge that link, in order to give meaning to the noble concept of the ´United Nations´", he added.
Speakers welcomed the debt relief initiatives announced at the recent G8 summit, as the enabling international environment needed to support the MDGs had thus far been lacking. They called for good governance and transparency on the part of both lenders and creditors, and for reforming the international financial architecture. "The participation of developing countries in international economic and financial decision-making and norm-setting processes must be consonant with their growing importance in global trade and financial relations", Mr. Mindua Kesia-Mbe said. Other participants, noting the importance of trade for growth and development, urged enhanced market access to developing countries´ exports, and continued special and differential treatment.
The Board also heard several pleas for greater policy space to enable developing countries to cope with the challenges of liberalization. Policy space, said UNCTAD Officer-in-Charge Carlos Fortin, was one of four central issues in the ongoing discussions on development. Although still controversial, the need for adequate policy space did not imply "reneging on existing commitments, but quite the opposite: making them more precise and making them work for development". Policy space essentially involved developing countries retaining the ability to carry out their own development policy, the one they owned and negotiated with their development partners. An appropriate balance was also needed, he said, between commitments and flexibility for development policies, and related to that was the need to ensure coherence in governance.
But in urging developing countries to craft policies that would meet their own development needs, argued Melissa Kehoe (United States), the focus should be "not on policy space, but on good policy".
Strengthening UNCTAD´s role
In calling for a stronger UN role in development, TDB members vigorously advocated strengthening UNCTAD and regretted the absence of any reference to it in the draft document to be adopted by the Summit in New York. "The need to help developing countries exploit the opportunities of increased trade and investment has never been greater", said Edward Brown (United Kingdom, speaking on behalf of the European Union and the acceding countries, Bulgaria and Romania), and "UNCTAD has the potential to make a real difference to developing countries". He nonetheless cautioned that its resources were "not limitless" and that to maximize its contribution to achieving the MDGs would require "difficult decisions on priorities and maintaining high standards across the breadth of its portfolio".
"UN reforms must concomitantly deepen and enhance UNCTAD´s role as the focal point for the integrated treatment of trade and development", said the G77´s representative. UNCTAD could also contribute to "other development-related processes, including work on the right to development". The US disagreed, commenting that UNCTAD "has no mandate to work on any aspect of the human rights agenda".
Amr Aljowaily (Egypt), speaking for the African Group, said that UNCTAD had an "important" contribution to make to "raising the profile of trade in development in this year of development". Monday´s meeting was important because it "brought UNCTAD back to the UN work and debate on development in a year when it cannot afford not to have discussed it". A summary of the Board´s discussion should accordingly "enlighten" the discussions in NY on trade, development, and the interrelated issues of finance, sustainable development and technology - issues which must be an "integral part of any UN reform in the economic field".
The acting President of the Board, Sarala Fernando (Sri Lanka), will submit her summary of the meeting to the President of the General Assembly as the Board´s input to the Summit, to be held in New York from 14 to 16 September as a high-level plenary meeting of the Assembly. The Board´s members represented the same governments as those in New York, explained Mr. Fortin, but the Board, as a subsidiary body of the Assembly specializing in trade and development and related issues of finance, investment and technology, had a different perspective from its counterparts at Headquarters and could thus add value to the process.
Background documents
The Board had before it the secretariat´s contribution to the Assembly´s high-level dialogue last June on Financing for Development and a compilation of recommendations made at UNCTAD´s three Commission meetings this year as they related to the MDGs. It also had before it two documents stemming from the Second South Summit held by the Group of 77 and China in Doha, Qatar, from 12 to 16 June. The Doha Declaration contains a statement of principles relating to development, South-South cooperation, trade issues and the debt situations of developing countries, among other topics. The Doha Plan of Action summarizes activities to be undertaken to implement the declaration. It calls for strengthening South-South cooperation in science and technology; promotion of education and greater access to information and communications technologies; steps towards poverty eradication, sustainable production and consumption; and the protection and management of natural resources.
Monday´s discussions emanated in part from the São Paulo Consensus adopted at UNCTAD XI in June 2004 and the work done by UNCTAD since then. The Consensus stressed UNCTAD´s special responsibility to contribute to the achievement of the international development goals, and accordingly the Board will provide its input to the review and follow-up now under way in New York.
