Foreign Minister Tuomioja: Development cooperation efforts must continue
The United Nations and the entire international community must find ways better than those applied now to respond to global threats, whether these relate to terrorism, the threat of military intervention, poverty or deterioration of the environment, said Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja at the annual meeting seminar of the Finnish UN Association in Helsinki on 20 April.
In his address Foreign Minister Tuomioja stressed a comprehensive approach with regard to the Development Agenda. Radical reduction of poverty and improvement in the position of women and children are priorities. Achieving the Millennium Development Goals requires that developing countries fulfil the obligations set for them, for example, as concerns correcting shortcomings in democracy and mobilisation of national resources. On the other hand, it is equally important that industrialised countries implement their own commitments. “The UN Secretary General sees the 0.7 per cent level as one indicator of a nation’s commitment to UN goals and global management,” Tuomioja stated.
Officially Finland is still aiming to achieve the 0.7 per cent level by the year 2010. Tuomioja says this is a difficult challenge also for Finland. “Measured in euros, we have raised our development cooperation input quite significantly, but in conditions of rapid economic growth this doesn’t affect the percentage of the gross domestic product very much,” he continued. Preliminary data indicate that the figure for last year will remain at 0.35 per cent. With the existing decisions, perhaps already this year Finland will fall under the average share of the gross domestic product for the EU countries, which has increased more rapidly than expected.
In Tuomioja’s opinion, the juxtapositions appearing from time to time in the Finnish development cooperation discussion are pointless. A more traditional juxtaposition is whether more should be invested in the quantity or the quality of development cooperation work. “Even effective development cooperation work remains without meaning unless its amount is adequate with regard to the need. On the other hand, an adequate amount is wasted unless funds are used for the right targets,” Tuomioja explained. A more recent juxtaposition is whether financing should be focused through various new instruments or whether we should rely on more traditional development cooperation based in budget funding. “Vanquishing global poverty and ensuring tolerable living conditions for everyone is such a massive challenge that all reasonable and functional financial solutions must be applied,” Foreign Minister Tuomioja emphasised.
Assessing the situation, Tuomioja said that the UN Summit in September will give the international community the opportunity to strengthen efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals. Achievement of these goals requires that the world organisation is able to revise its own institutions and operational modes. Finland’s departure point is comprehensive reform of the United Nations. This means reinstating the prestige of the General Assembly, increasing the efficiency of the work done by the Economic and Social Council, and reform of the Security Council.
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