Preparations resume for UN conference on financing for development
Regional, Economics, 10/17/2001

Preparations for an upcoming United Nations conference on financing development projects for developing countries resumed Monday at UN Headquarters in New York with a call for continued commitment and cooperation on the issue.

The Preparatory Committee for the International Conference on Financing for Development began its current weeklong session Monday morning with the consideration of several organizational matters.

In opening remarks, Committee Co-Chair Ruth Jacoby of Sweden said the current session was crucial in determining much of the substantial aspects of next year's Conference and urged everyone to maintain their commitment and determination in finding and examining all possible ways to finance development.

The other Co-Chair, Shamshad Ahmad of Pakistan, noted that the issue was not one of developed countries versus developing countries but that of building strong partnerships, maximizing cooperation and working for a system that was both equitable and participatory.

The Conference, slated for March 18 to 22, 2002 in Monterrey, Mexico, will seek to address broad development concerns, primarily, obstacles faced by developing countries in mobilizing the resources needed to finance their development and to fulfil the social and humanitarian goals set by global conferences of the past decade. Other key issues include cross-border investment, international trade, official development assistance, debt relief, and the international financial architecture.

The text under negotiation calls for international systems of finance and trade that fully support economic growth and social justice, and for "strengthened multilateralism" to ensure that national and international resources are available for fulfilling universally agreed development goals, such as those contained in the Millennium Declaration.

In the Declaration, world leaders pledged to cut in half by 2015 the proportion of people suffering from severe poverty and from hunger, ensure that all boys and girls equally would be able to complete a full course of primary schooling, as well as sharply curtail maternal mortality and under-five mortality rates and reverse the spread of deadly diseases such as AIDS and malaria.

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