Brussels, 26/09/2013 (Agence Europe) - A boost will be given by the international community to reach the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) in the two years that remain for doing so. This boost will be in accordance with the principle of common but differentiated responsibility, and will be given by strengthening world partnerships. A roadmap for meeting this challenge met with consensus in New York on Wednesday 25 September, at the end of the special event on the MDGs organised by the Secretary General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon (see EUROPE 10929). The document agreed by the UN General Assembly (the Outcome Document) also gently paves the way for an integrated approach to the eradication of poverty and sustainable development for the future global framework for development after 2015. The document aims to establish new objectives to succeed the MDG and guarantee “a life of dignity for all”, to the great satisfaction of the EU.
“This outcome document, which sets out a roadmap to 2015, will be highly beneficial as it provides a clear signal on the next steps. It includes valuable clarification on how the currently-separated tracks of the MDG review and Rio+20 follow-up should converge into a unified track. The objective of such a roadmap is to have an overview on the process and establish a single set of goals and targets that should apply to all countries in the world. We are confident that a single set of goals and targets for sustainable development is the right way forward to address both poverty eradication and sustainable development”, said European Commissioner for Development Andris Piebalgs and European Commissioner for the Environment Janez Potocnik in a joint statement.
Both commissioners are aware that to reach a global agreement on the post-2015 programme will be “a huge challenge” but they say they are confident that an agreement can be found by the UN summit in 2015, and give assurances that “the EU will continue to play a strong and constructive role” politically, and also financially in maintaining the same level of aid in its 2014-2020 budget.
Piebalgs was able to announce that the EU will continue to support financially the Global Education First initiative, and will host the second Replenishment Conference of the Global Partnership for Education, in Brussels in 2014. The €1 billion available from the European Development Fund to help the countries of sub-Saharan Africa that are most behind in achieving the MDG continues to bear fruit.
At the start of this special UN event, European Commission President José Manuel Barroso presented his political vision for the EU for post-2015 by underlining the close link between the eradication of poverty and environmental, economic and social sustainability, and the need for “a genuine partnership including governments from all countries, international organisations, civil society and the private sector”.
Barroso also welcomed the establishment of a high level forum on sustainable development that is tasked with better integrating the three dimensions of sustainable development. He said that sustainable development should be at the centre of a better coordinated UN system, and that we have to guarantee that the post-2015 programme will truly lead to prosperity for all. From the EU's point of view, Barroso said, the fight against poverty and for sustainability are two sides of the same coin. Poverty is not only a moral heresy, it is also economically unsustainable. Degradation of the environment is not only an ecological heresy, he said, it is also detrimental to the economy - and poverty, like environmental degradation - are both politically unacceptable.
Filip Kaczmarek MEP (EPP, Poland) who led the European Parliament's delegation to the special UN event, was delighted that the international community had recognised “the need to redouble our efforts in order to accelerate progress (…) by 2015”. His colleague, Gay Mitchell (EPP, Ireland), who coordinates the EPP Group in the Parliament's development committee, stressed the importance of establishing a mechanism for increasing the coordination of aid from donors because “thanks to such a mechanism, billions of euro could be dedicated to saving lives”. In Mitchell's view, “we need to look beyond financial mechanisms for development that are already in place and move towards stronger involvement of the private sector”.
A joint approach to the future post-2015 framework is what the European Commission advocated in March 2013 so as to guarantee “a decent life for all by 2030” (see EUROPE 10874). (AN/transl.fl)