Millennium Development Goals and the G-8 summit

Eradication of extreme poverty and hunger, achievement of universal primary education, promotion of gender equality and empowerment of women, improvement of maternal health, stemming the spread of HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, ensuring environmental sustainability and developing a global partnership for development are the eight goals of this ambitious project. In September 2000 , 147 heads of State and Government and 189 nations accepted it in a joint declaration ( The United Nations Millennium Declaration) with a view to promoting a " a comprehensive approach and co-ordinated strategy , tackling the problems simultaneously across a broad front". A deadline ( 2015) was set for the achievement of these goals.

But according to Kofi Annan, the Secretary General of the United Nations, if urgent measures are not taken in the immediate future, none of these goals will be achieved before the target date. But who is supposed to take these urgent measures? Mr. Annan has invited 175 heads of government to a summit meeting to be held in New York on 14th September, 2005 to address this issue. This September conference, will no doubt, give a wonderful opportunity to leaders from different parts of the world to get to know each other and to exchange ideas. But how effective a conference of this size can be for the purpose of taking concrete measures? Actually two other meetings are scheduled to be held in the near future, whose deliberations will be of greater importance for the achievement of the millennium goals. A summit conference of the G-8 under the chairmanship of Tony Blair is going to be held next month in Scotland. The World Trade Organisation is also expected to meet in the near future.

After the Bretton Woods conference in 1944, the International Monetary Fund was set up in 1945 "for the expansion of international trade, the promotion of exchange rate stability and the maintenance of orderly exchange arrangements". One of the consequences of the Middle East crisis in 1973 was an unprecedented rise in oil prices, which played havoc with the balance of payments situation of most member countries including the powerful Western nations which controlled the IMF. This situation and the subsequent abandonment of the gold standard in 1976 put an end to the Bretton Woods agreement to restrict exchange rate fluctuations. Thus the IMF's role in "promoting international monetary co-operation" and in expanding "a balanced growth of international trade" was made somewhat redundant.

It was at this time (early seventies) that Valery Giscard d'Estang and Helmut Schmidt were finance ministers of France and Germany respectively. They used to get together informally to discuss oil prices, exchange rate fluctuations , world economic outlook etc. After reaching the highest executive positions in their respective countries, they invited the leaders of the United States, Japan and the United Kingdom to an informal week-end meeting in a country house at Rambouillet, a village close to Paris. Thus in 1975, the G-5 was born. Later Canada and Italy were invited to join the group, which came to be known as the Group of Seven or the group of the seven most industrialised nations of the world, who controlled most of its financial resources. In 1994, Russia was invited to attend the summits. The group is now known as G-7 plus Russia or simply G-8, which in effect, has become the new power centre of global capitalism.

Over the years, the role of these summits have changed considerably. These are no longer informal week-end chit chats of a few powerful friends. These summits have in effect usurped the role of major international bodies. The Group discusses all matters of international concern -- economic, political and social -- and work out common strategies, which affect not only the member countries but also most other nations of the world. The international institutions such as the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO pick up these guidelines and prepare their agendas accordingly. Hence the importance of the July meeting of G-8 for the achievement of Millennium Development Goals.

The issues of poverty, Africa and climate change are at the top of the agenda of this year's summit. Blair has taken up the cause of reducing poverty in Africa. According to some sources, "the number of Africans living in poverty , which doubled from 1981 to 2001, now totals about 750 million". More than 300 million Africans now live on less than a dollar a day. Besides obtaining a debt relief of a relatively small amount of money for 14 African countries, Blair is seeking to increase aid for Africa by $25 billion a year, which will be invested in four main areas: health, education, agriculture and infrastructure. Blair's Commission for Africa wants to double the current aid for Africa, from $25 billion to about $50 billion per year by 2010, and tripling of aid to $75 billion per year by 2015.

Britain, France and Germany have already agreed to increase their aid to 0.7 per cent of their national income by 2015. The United States, which gives only 0.16 per cent of its national income in aid has yet to make a firm commitment to bring it in line with other rich countries. Bush has also rejected Blair's proposal for an international finance facility for poor countries , which would facilitate borrowing for development projects. Instead, Bush prefers to cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans and wage war against faraway Muslim countries ( $140 billion corporate tax cut last year and $80 billion extra military spending in Iraq and Afghanistan , this year.) But it must be realised by the G-8 that no amount of debt relief or financial aid will alleviate poverty and foster development in poor countries on a sustainable basis unless farm subsidies are lowered in rich countries and access to their markets is given to products from poor countries. Detailed negotiations on this issue will take place at the next WTO meeting but what is urgently required is for the G-8 to give the green light to do so. Without this signal delegates to the WTO conference will simply beat about the bush and nothing positive for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals will come out of it.

"The threat humanity faces from accelerating, measurable changes taking place in the word's climate" will be the other matter which will be near the top of the agenda of this meeting of the G-8 in Scotland. Scientists from the G-8 countries , Brazil, China and India have confirmed that climate change due to global warming is already an unfortunate reality. They have urged the leaders to take immediate steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Stressing on the urgency of the situation, Lord May, the head of the Royal Society , said in a recent statement, " Make no mistake about it. We have to act now. The longer we delay , the more difficult it will be to tackle the problem".

Last year's Summit on Climate change, held in Buenos Aires once more highlighted the growing gap between the EU ( Tony Blair will preside over the EU from July 1, 2005) and the United States -- which in spite of being the world's largest polluter abandoned the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 -- on global warming. While the EU has taken up leadership position in fighting global warming and has felt the need to undertake further serious research work for the post-2012 period of the protocol (i.e. second- round of emission control regulations which will affect not only the current industrially developed group of nations but also others), Bush is insisting on pursuing his pro-business environmental agenda, which does not seem to acknowledge or appreciate this grave and growing danger and therefore does not favour mandatory emission control measures.

Luckily, things are changing in the United States as well. The National Academy of Sciences has just recommended aggressive action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Prominent members of Bush's own political party are openly criticising his greenhouse gas policy. Even the Senate's top Republican energy bill negotiator, Senator Pete Domenici now believes that there is overwhelming scientific evidence of climate change. A little more pressure at Gleneagles might finally persuade Bush to change his "anti-science head-in-the-sand policies".