Speech to the Diplomatic Corps
Parkveien 50, Oslo, 26 November 2001
Your Excellencies,
Distinguished members of the
diplomatic corps,
Ladies and gentlemen,
A week ago, when I attended the
annual World Bank meetings in Ottawa, I noticed a new attitude.
Horst Köhler, Kofi Annan, and Jim Wolfensohn – even Paul O’Neill –
the American Treasury Secretary – they were all marked by 11
September. Amidst all the talk of conflict, war and the clash of
civilisations - I believe there is another dimension appearing. The
global agenda has changed.
Prime Minister Tony Blair put it
this way:
" If globalisation works only for the benefit of the few, then
it will fail and will deserve to fail. But if we follow the
principles that have served us so well at home - that power, wealth
and opportunity must be in the hands of the many, not the few - if
we make that our guiding light for the global economy, then it will
be a force for good and an international movement that we should
take pride in leading."
We will sign up for that
international movement.
Poverty, disease, and environmental
degradation are global challenges that require a global response.
At the Millennium Summit of last Year we all agreed on the
Millennium Declaration as a way of responding to these
challenges.
Norway remains strongly committed
to the follow-up of the Declaration and plays its full part in the
joint efforts of the development community to achieve the ambitious
Millennium Development Goals within the 2015 timeframe.
In my mind, the most important of
the Millennium Development Goals is the reduction by at least half
the proportion of people living in extreme poverty in developing
countries before 2015. Poverty reduction is a pivotal goal of all
Norwegian development efforts.
The Norwegian Action Plan for
Poverty Reduction presented by my predecessor will be adjusted and
supplemented. It will be an Action Plan for Poverty Eradication.
Financial assistance is just one out of many factors. The Action
Plan emphasises developing countries’ own responsibility to reduce
poverty. Framework conditions like debt and trade are crucial
prerequisites for social and economic development. As for our
efforts as partners in development, national poverty strategies
will be the platform for what we will do from the Norwegian
side.
Sustainable poverty reduction also
requires that rich countries examine and adjust their policies in
all relevant sectors to support rather than impede poor countries’
struggle to escape the poverty trap.
One area which is crucial in this
regard - and where we got the first international break-through -
is debt relief. Norway was the first country to launch its debt
relief strategy last time I was minister. Now it will be extended
with two new "windows". For post-conflict countries we are thinking
in terms of immediate and short-term debt relief preceding HIPC
treatment, under the umbrella of multilateral support schemes. The
idea is to help foster economic stabilisation and, thus, help pave
the way for HIPC treatment. For middle-income countries we are
exploring whether it would be possible to undertake multilaterally
co-ordinated debt swaps. The idea is for several creditor countries
to join forces and undertake debt-for-development or debt-for
nature-swaps under one and the same umbrella arrangement for each
debtor country. Both in terms of impact and administrative workload
for both debtor and creditor countries, we think this is by far
preferable to each and every creditor doing more or less the same
thing on a purely bilateral basis. 23 countries have now received
extensive debt relief. Still, a lot remains to be done both with
the financing and with the flexibility in relation to
conditionality. These issues have to be addressed!
Trade is vital. We cannot achieve
systematic and sustained poverty reduction without increased
economic growth and trade. This government will improve market
access for developing countries and in particular the poorest of
them. As of July next year all products imported from least
developed countries will be given duty free and quota free market
access in Norway.
I very much welcome the outcome of
the WTO Ministerial and the so-called Doha Development Agenda. This
is another international breakthrough! I believe the outcome was
important for rebuilding confidence in multilateral trade policy
co-operation between developing and developed countries. It is also
a good platform for an improved trading system that can facilitate
the integration of the poorer trading partners into international
trade and multilateral trade rules. But also here we must be aware
that the job is far from done. It has just started, and we have to
follow it through.
To enable the poorest countries to
benefit from new market opportunities, great emphasis will be given
to the mainstreaming of trade into the poverty reduction strategies
or development plans of our partner countries, as well as to the
mainstreaming of trade into our own development policy. We all know
that there are no quick fixes here. Poor countries need assistance
on the productive side, the supply side of the chain to be able to
utilise market opportunities. Here, we have to do a much greater
job. We need trade and aid to achieve it.
The Indian scientist and winner of
the 1998 Nobel price in economics, Dr. Amartya Sen, has stated that
development must be about expanding peoples’ freedoms. The freedom
to live a life that each and every one of us has reason to value.
This corresponds very much with UNDP’s definition – development as
policies that expand people’s choices. Then the question becomes
what kinds of policies and interventions can contribute in this
regard?
Obviously, we need to create access
to basic education and health services for all, not least girls and
women.
We must ensure the freedom of
democratic participation for all citizens to engage in open, public
debate without fear of any kind of retribution.
And finally, we need to ensure the
possibility of all citizens to act as economic actors: to own, buy
and sell assets.
This is related to
freedoms – but not least to
rights. The right to education
and health services, to participation and to access to markets. A
rights-based approach to development will be an essential part of
our Poverty Eradication Plan.
One of the achievements for which I
got national and international recognition in my time as Minister
of Development and Human Rights in the former Bondevik government
was the extensive Plan of Action for Human Rights. Norway is still
among the very few countries to have presented a plan of this
nature and with parliamentary approval. It adopts a coherent
approach comprising both national and international measures to
strengthen human rights and is addressing both political and civil
rights as well as economic, social and cultural rights. The need to
focus on some of these fundamental rights and freedoms are not
least important in the times we are now going through.
In our present government human
rights will be based on the principle that each cabinet minister is
responsible for these issues in his or her field. Within this
general framework, however, I will co-ordinate the follow-up of the
Action Plan. Focusing on our national responsibilities is important
- not because Norway has such a bad human rights record, but
because credibility always starts at home. To voice your concerns
you have to keep your house in order.
National responsibilities are
essential also in a development context. As rich countries we are
committed to partnership and assistance, but we cannot do the
job.
We are therefore pleased to see
that several of our partner countries have put combating
corruption on their political
agendas. Administrative reform aimed at achieving greater
transparency and accountability is imperative. Independent
controlling bodies are also essential if corruption is to be
reduced. Democracy-building and independent media should be part
and parcel of such a policy.
On our side, we need to concentrate
efforts better. The geographic concentration has been steadily
reduced over the last years. This has implications for aid
effectiveness and not least for poverty reduction. We need to
concentrate our resources on the poorest.
We have identified seven main
partner countries, which we have submitted for parliamentary
approval - Tanzania, Mozambique, Uganda, Zambia, Malawi, Bangladesh
and Nepal. None of these are new acquaintances. They are all
classified as Least Developed Countries - LDCs. In addition we have
limited the number of other partner countries to 17; of which I
know many are represented here. So are most of our "allies in
development", both likeminded groups as the Nordics and the Utstein
Group and others.
As you all know the United Nations
represents a cornerstone of Norwegian development policy - as well
as of Norwegian foreign policy. This government is determined to
continue Norway’s longstanding support to the UN. This implies not
the least efforts of the UN to ensure economic and social
development in the developing countries. The post-September 11
th> situation clearly accentuates the importance of
the UN in dealing with the global challenges facing us.
There are three major events under
the UN umbrella next year: the Conference on Financing for
Development, on how to reach the Millennium Development Goals, the
World Summit on Sustainable Development (Rio+10), and the UN
Special Session on Children, which was postponed due to the events
of this fall. Each of these events provides an opportunity to
determine our common future.
We are at a crossroads. If one
conference fails in delivering on the commitments, we may see
repercussions influencing the others. What we have seen on debt
relief and in Doha should, however, give reason for optimism. It is
mainly up to us, as rich countries, to show that we will stand by
our commitments and deliver on them. We have been able to do so
several times now.
I can assure you that we from the
Norwegian side will do our utmost to do so now, too. We will put
results for the poor first.
Thank you all very much for your
attention.
I look forward to working with you
all. Thank you for coming.
