Brussels, 30/11/2011 (Agence Europe) - Keeping things on an even keel at home is a credible way of bringing one's potential partners onboard. It was in this perspective that during the 4th High-Level UN Aid Efficiency Summit (29 November- 1 December, Busan, South Korea), Andris Piebalgs, European Commissioner for Development, presented the EU's new proposals to make its public development aid more efficient, more transparent and better coordinated. These proposals also seek to contribute to developing a new global development partnership that is threatened by Chinese misgivings in this connection. On the day before, China was far from keen about such a partnership, to the great disappointment of the development NGOs that were counting on the EU to provide leadership in these negotiations.
The commissioner stated: “the Busan conference comes at a crucial juncture - time is running out for us to meet the Millennium Development Goals by 2015. High impact of aid and transparency are top EU priorities. That's why I am putting forward the EU Transparency Guarantee and Joint Programming of aid; leading initiatives which are open to our partners.” EU Joint Programming, which will involve EU donors working together on aid delivery and then dividing the work needed in the most efficient way, and an EU Transparency Guarantee, which means that EU member states will publicly disclose all information on aid programmes so that it can be more easily accessed, shared and published. The fact that negotiations have stalled, is provoking European development NGOs belonging to the CONCORD federation to push for the EU to accept aid transparency reforms, to encourage aid without strings and commitments based on a timetable and clear objectives aimed at reducing poverty levels. Justin Kilcullen, the president of CONCORD, said that China has hesitations about committing to a global partnership but he also wanted to know why the EU had not seen this coming. He said that they had been deeply disappointed by the summit and that negotiations had stagnated because of the political machinations between the major powers dominating the discussions. Nonetheless, he said that this summit did aim to develop policies for putting a stop to poverty in the world. Given that despite the crisis, 84% of Europeans support development aid (Eurobarometer, EUROPE 10501), he stated that the EU could count on support from its citizens to push through ambitious reforms. (AN/transl.fl)