Nepad needs extra funds, says Annan
October 6, 2004
Although African countries are making considerable progress in carrying out the programmes and projects of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (Nepad), they still need "firmer and more coherent support" from the international community to meet the serious challenges they continue to face, according to UN secretary-general Kofi Annan in his second annual report on Nepad's implementation.
This international support, he says, should entail more aid, debt relief, foreign investment and trade opportunities. It also should involve greater consistency in external policies so that advances on one front are not undercut by lags on another.
Annan's report cites progress in strengthening Africa's own peacekeeping capacities as well as in advancing the African peer review mechanism, the voluntary process by which African leaders agree to subject their standards of democracy, human rights, governance and economic management to review by other Africans.
So far 23 countries, nearly half of Africa's total, have joined the mechanism. Between May and July 2004, the mechanism's first support missions travelled to Ghana, Rwanda, Mauritius and Kenya to prepare for their reviews.
To develop Africa's physical infrastructure, Annan says Nepad's heads of state implementation committee has approved a list of 20 top-priority projects in energy, transport, water and sanitation, and information and communications technologies.
Although the World Bank and the African Development Bank have already earmarked some financing, about half of the estimated total cost of $8.1 billion (R52.36 billion) is expected to come from the private sector.
While the international community is now beginning to provide more support to Africa, the report emphasises that this assistance is sometimes not well co-ordinated, limiting its effectiveness. Moreover, international policies and practices on aid, debt, trade and investment are often inconsistent, with shortcomings in one area undermining progress in another.
Annan's report, for example, notes that the overall level of aid to Africa has increased during the past couple years. Total official development assistance to the region reached $22.2 billion in 2002 (up from just $16.4 billion in 2000). Preliminary UN estimates project that it may have reached $23.1 billion in 2003.
Yet this is still below the $26.6 billion in aid Africa received in 1990. And most of the financing won through aid inflows continues to be lost through high payments for debt servicing. In 2002, Africa paid $21.9 billion for external debt servicing, almost the same amount it received in aid that year.
So far, 23 African countries have received some debt relief under the heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) initiative. However, even for the 11 African countries that have reached the HIPC stage at which they are eligible for extensive debt cancellation, observes Annan, there is not much hope for "debt sustainability".
As a result, "there is now an increasing call for a new framework for debt sustainability" that goes beyond the HIPC initiative. Donor aid policies and international trade practices are also contradictory, the UN report emphasises.
Africa's share of the world market has declined dramatically since 1970, reports Annan, bringing estimated losses of income of $70 billion a year, almost five times what Africa receives in aid annually. - Nepad secretariat
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