Brussels, 10/06/2004 (Agence Europe) - Development in African was on the menu a the Sea Island G8 summit on Thursday attended by Heads of State from six African countries: Thabo Mbeki, (South Africa), Abdelazis Bouteflika (Algeria), John Kufuor (Ghana) Olusegun Obasanjo (Nigeria), Yuweri Mouseveni (Uganda) Abdoulaye Wade (Senegal). These instigators of NOPADA, the initiative of Africans for development in Africa, supported by the EU, have attempted to raise awareness of the richest countries in the world about their development priorities.
In response to these priorities, the agreement on an international initiative to speed up the implementation of an anti-HIV/AIDS vaccine, via a global alliance of research and the setting up of an international clinical testing network, constituted the main advance of the summit.
The G8 also renewed its commitment to actively fight against polio and totally eradicate it by 2005, a priority similar to that of the European Union which has just announced the mobilisation of EUR 61.2 million to assist the WTO eradicate the illness in 14 African countries (EUROPE 5 June p 2).
The G8 has also approved an action plan for developing the private sector as an instrument in the fight against poverty (an idea dear to the heart of the EU which made it into a key element in the partnership agreement for development with ACP countries) in order to contribute to the Millennium objectives. G8 counties are therefore in agreement on working together to guarantee bilateral and multilateral aid for development, the mobilisation of capital and the expertise necessary for speeding up growth and freeing up the resources that people in developing countries could use productively. The objective is to facilitate transfer of funds to help families and small companies, to improve the environment for business men and investors, fund accommodation and access to clean water and support the development of local financial markets as well as providing entrepreneurs with access to micro-credit.