Grant Chapman (SA, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Almost seven years ago, leaders from all 189 member states of the United Nations agreed on a vision for the future: a world with less poverty, hunger and disease; greater survival prospects for mothers and their infants; better educated children; equal opportunities for women; a healthier environment; and a world in which developing countries work in partnership for the betterment of all—all by the target date of 2015. This vision took the shape of eight Millennium Development Goals which are providing countries around the world with a framework for development and time-bound targets by which progress can be measured. The eight Millennium Development Goals form a blueprint agreed to by all the world’s countries and all the world’s leading development institutions. They have galvanised unprecedented efforts to meet the needs of the world’s poorest.

Since agreeing to make the eight Millennium Development Goals a key framework for international action and cooperation to reduce poverty, much progress has been made; however, despite the gains, most of our neighbours are struggling. At least eight of our 22 neighbouring countries are significantly off track in achieving many of those goals. This is especially so for goal 4 of reducing child mortality and goal 5 of reducing maternal mortality. There has been some progress in sub-Saharan Africa, but the region as a whole will not achieve any of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015 on current progress.

Australian government development assistance takes many forms and makes a significant contribution to working towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals. Our region is home to more than 700 million people living in extreme poverty and has 14 of the world’s least developed countries. It faces a range of significant development challenges, including HIV-AIDS, which must be tackled by working together collectively and effectively.

Micah Challenge is a global Christian campaign working to be a prophetic and powerful voice for and with the poor communities around the world. Micah Challenge Australia is part of a global campaign which aims to deepen understanding of justice issues and engagement with the poor as an integral part of Christian faith. Micah Challenge is a global coalition of Christian aid agencies, churches and other church based groups which seek to mobilise people to act for and with the poor.

In Australia, Micah Challenge is made up of more than 25 organisations, including Baptist World Aid, Caritas, Compassion, Opportunity International, TEAR and World Vision. A number of church leaders have endorsed Micah Challenge and joined the Micah Panel of Reference. It is a sister campaign to Make Poverty History and is a part of the Make Poverty History coalition in Australia calling on the Australian government to contribute to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.

The Howard government has indeed responded to the call. In agreeing to play our part to achieve these goals, the Australian government has made a number of key commitments: to provide increased aid, focused on poverty reduction; to support the cancellation of debt for countries requiring it to meet their Millennium Development Goal targets; to work towards a fair, predictable and rules based international trade system; to support good governance in development; and to ensure environmental sustainability. Taken together, these commitments offer a realistic and comprehensive approach to helping end the ongoing tragedy of extreme poverty.

In 2007-08, Australia will provide an estimated $3.155 billion in aid, an increase of $209 million over the 2006-07 budget—a 4.5 per cent real increase after inflation budget-to-budget. A new $2.588 billion package of initiatives was introduced, as part of the 2007-08 budget, to improve the lives, security and wellbeing of our neighbours in the Asia-Pacific region. The ratio of Australia’s official development assistance to gross national income for 2007-08 is estimated at 0.3 per cent, which matches the weighted average for all international donors in the 2006 calendar year.

Over the past seven years, the Australian government has consecutively increased its overseas aid allocation and has provided over $16 billion in that time. The Prime Minister, the Hon.. John Howard MP, announced in 2005 that Australia’s aid would double by 2010 from 2004 levels. This was the first time an Australian government had announced a multiyear increase in aid funding and it underlined the government’s commitment to fighting poverty and achieving progress towards the Millennium Development Goals.

Recently, the government has reinforced its commitment by announcing, as part of the 2007-08 budget, its expectation that development assistance will continue to increase to $3.5 billion in 2008-09, $3.8 billion in 2009-10 and $4.3 billion in 2010-11. This funding increase will be based on the principles outlined in the first white paper on Australia’s overseas aid program—Australian Aid: Promoting Growth and Stability, which the Minister for Foreign Affairs, the Hon. Alexander Downer, launched in April 2006.

Provision of aid alone is not enough. Trade liberalisation is just as important. The World Bank estimates that freeing all merchandise trade and abolishing all trade-distorting agricultural subsidies would boost global welfare by up to $US290 billion in 2015 and lift as many as 32 million people out of poverty by the goal target of 2015. Australia is at the forefront of efforts to secure a successful and ambitious outcome from the World Trade Organisation Doha Round negotiations that delivers commercially meaningful improvements in market access for the agriculture, industrial and services sectors.

The Australian government is also committed to providing debt relief for the poor to foster development in poor countries. On 12 September 2006, the Australian government contributed $136.2 million to the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative. Australia is one of the few countries to have fully met its obligations to the World Bank in this first decade of the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative. We have also committed $112 million to finance multilateral debt relief under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative. Under this initiative, debt relief is provided when a country has a proven track record of reforms, ensuring that debt relief is used for poverty reduction. In 2004, Australia also committed to forgive almost $1 billion of debt owed by Iraq through the Paris Club of bilateral creditors, including cancelling $334 million of debt in 2006-07. Humanitarian and reconstruction assistance also contributes to stability and security and fosters a defence against terrorism. We have complemented significant humanitarian assistance in Iraq, along with technical, government and economic reform and the enhancement of agricultural systems. In the Asia-Pacific region, where Australia is a major contributor of aid, significant progress has been observed in key poverty indicators, but serious challenges remain for meeting the Millennium Development Goals. The key to progress is sustainable broad-based economic growth. Experience from East Asia, where over 5,600 million people were lifted out of absolute poverty between 1981 and 2001, demonstrates that growth is essential to reduce poverty and is needed to generate the vast majority of resources required to reach the goals.

The world is making progress in the fight against poverty, but more is required to achieve the goals. The goals focus on food and income security, basic health, gender equity, environmental sustainability, water and sanitation and providing a framework for aid donors and recipients to coordinate their efforts to halve global poverty by 2015. The 2007-08 aid budget announced an increase in aid focused on basic education, which will mean that by 2010 we will be giving at least $200 million to basic education. This is our share of the global costs of achieving Millennium Development Goals 2: to ensure that every child can access and complete primary school. Over 1.5 billion people in our region—Asia and the Pacific—lack access to clean water and sanitation. A global lack of water and sanitation kills 1.8 million children each year. Despite this critical importance of water and sanitation, our aid program does not have any separate initiatives in this area and we could redouble our efforts.

Australia’s approach to the development goals underlines the need for an open, non-discriminatory trade and financial system supported by continuing improvements in governance and stability, sound investments in people, commitment to private sector growth and openness to trade and investment. The G8 countries have kept their promise to write off the debts of 18 of the poorest countries in the world. The proportion of people living in absolute poverty has declined from 28 per cent to 19 per cent in the 14 years from 1990 to 2004. In just four years, there has been a 1,000 per cent increase in the use of treated malaria nets. Primary school enrolments have increased from 79 per cent to 86 per cent between 1990 and 2004. There is need for an ongoing and genuine partnership between developing and developed countries to achieve the goals, and the Howard government is taking a holistic and comprehensive approach. It is half-time, if you like; half-time to the goal to halve global poverty. But much can change after half-time. Anyone who recalls the Adelaide Crows’ magnificent turnaround in the 1998 AFL grand final after half-time will agree that half way can be a significant turning point. (Time expired)