Brussels, 26/01/2004 (Agence Europe) - The General Affairs/External Relations Council has been informed by Commissioner Poul Nielson, and debated progress made in 2003 towards the greater efficiency of the EU's external actions (see Saturday's EUROPE, p.5). Its conclusions, adopted in the light of this fourth stage report on the Commission's reform of aid management and of a Presidency orientation document, stress the need to ensure coherence and balance in all external policies to ensure that the deployment of aid serves the EU's external objectives. The Council feels that in order to fulfil this requirement, three conditions should be met:
The EU should play a leading role in genuine multilateralism: this commitment should be concretised via better internal co-ordination, better visibility of aid (to which the EU's enlargement will contribute), and genuine dialogue with partners in developing and developed countries. As part of the UN's reform, the EU should work towards a more efficient and better-co-ordinated follow-up of the main world conferences, consolidate its guiding role in the forthcoming major conferences (especially Cnuced), seek greater coherence between the trade and development policies of the UN, WTO and the Bretton Woods Institutions (IMF, World Bank), and maintain its efforts in putting the Doha process back on track at the WTO. The Council stressed that it should, "as a priority, aim to ensure real advantages for the poorest countries by pushing forward the dossiers that count the most for them".
The EU should improve the efficiency of its aid: The Council calls upon the Commission to submit proposals to extend the application of standardised criteria on the allocation of resources to all the EU's external aid, based on needs and results, and taking account of the specific difficulties of countries prey to crises or conflict. The proposed budgetisation of the European Development Fund (EDF) will be examined by the Council in February. The annual debate of the efficiency of aid will take place each year in October from now on.
The EU should help to achieve the Millennium development objectives: The Council feels that the EU's commitment to these objectives in the fight against poverty should be reflected in all the EU's policies and in its decisions on how to allocate financial resources. It stresses the need to make serious efforts in 2004 to increase the level of State aid to the development of the Member States of the EU, under commitment taken in Monterrey (UN Conference on development funding, Mexico, March 2002). It will assess progress made in April, and in terms of policy co-ordination and standardisation of procedures (as per the conclusions of the Barcelona European Council), and will make sure that the EU can play a leading role once the balance of Millennium objectives is drawn up in April 2005 (the Council could, if necessary, call upon the Commission to play a similar role to that it took on in the follow-up to the Monterrey conference).