Ursula Stephens (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Parliamentary Secretary Assisting the Prime Minister for Social Inclusion) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to incorporate an adjournment speech on behalf of Senator Collins.

Leave granted.

Jacinta Collins (Victoria, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The incorporated speech read as follows—

The world is past the half-way point in the time allowed to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which set out an internationally agreed plan to halve global poverty by 2015. These goals have underlined the importance of improving health, and particularly the health of children, as an integral part of poverty reduction.

The Australian Government is committed to the MDGs and believes Australia should be a strong contributor to achieving these, in particular its commitment to Goal 4: Reduce Child Mortality by reducing child mortality by two-thirds by 2015.

Most infant and child deaths are caused by a combination of malnutrition and preventable or treatable diseases. Of the 10 countries with the highest child mortality rates, seven are in the top 10 for poverty. There is also a strong correlation between child deaths and how much governments spend on health, immunisation, and access to clean water.

Globally, child mortality rates have fallen to a record low - dropping below 10 million for the under fives for the first time. In 1990, the figure stood at 13 million.

The MDGs has a strong focus on addressing the priority health needs of children, including reproductive health, nutrition, and prevention and care measures for childhood diseases.

An effective response to address these priority child health needs requires a comprehensive approach to service delivery that includes strengthening the underlying health systems, supporting country-specific priorities to address high- burden health problems and ensuring health systems can reduce regional vulnerability diseases.

Progress towards MDG 4

Millennium Development Goal 4 aims to reduce the under 5 child mortality rates by two thirds from 2000 levels by 2015. Childbirth is a central event in the lives of families and the development of communities, representing the well-being of society and its potential for the future.

Far more can and must be done by both developing and developed countries to reduce child mortality. There has been some progress made to reduce child mortality rates.

Under 5 child mortality has fallen in developing countries from 200 per 1,000 live births in 1960 to 105 in 1990 to 88 in 2003. The number of children that died in the developing world before their fifth birthday was 10.1 million in 2005. In 2006 the number of children under five that died globally decreased to 9.7 million. Yet this means in the 21st Century we still allow well just under 10 million children to die each year, although most of these deaths are preventable.

18 out of the 29 countries in our larger region are not on track to achieve MDG 4. This means that 400,000 children in Australia’s region die every year from preventable causes. If we include South Asia the number rises to 3.2 million children.

One in every twelve children in Cambodia dies before their fifth birthday. The main causes of child deaths globally are: neonatal disorders (birth asphyxia (10 per cent) sepsis (8 per cent) preterm delivery (8 per cent) tetanus (2 per cent)); diarrhoea (22 per cent); pneumonia (21 per cent); malaria (9 per cent); HIV/AIDS (3 per cent); measles (1 per cent).

The interventions required to greatly reduce these deaths are almost all relatively low cost and can be delivered at the community and district health service levels. Fortunately a package of relatively simple interventions delivered as a continuum of care can reduce child deaths by around 60 per cent (or 6 million). As AusAID has pointed out:

“Interventions that can prevent most deaths of women and children are well understood, but weak health systems mean they do not reach those who need them - a challenge for all countries in the region”

For example, the UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre has estimated that the lives of up to two million babies could be saved each year if all babies were exclusively breastfed for six months. The World Bank has stated that exclusive breastfeeding for six months is the single most effective measure that could be implemented to reduce child mortality rates globally. UNICEF estimates that since 1990, six million lives have been saved by exclusive breastfeeding and global breastfeeding rates have risen by at least 15 per cent

However, despite the reported improvement in breastfeeding in the developing world, approximately 63 per cent of children under six months of age are still not adequately breastfed.

Cambodia is a positive example of how breastfeeding interventions have dramatically improved child mortality rates. A national campaign in Cambodia over recent years has raised breastfeeding from as low as 10 per cent in 2000 up to 60 per cent at six months of age. Simultaneously, child mortality dropped by one-third.

According to UNICEF Nutritionist, Karen Codling, this significant improvement “can only be explained by the switch to breast milk”.

Australia’s aid has made a significant contribution to health outcomes in many countries in the region and this is likely to increase with the improved AusAID health policies and initiatives by the Rudd Government. The objectives of Australia’s policy for development assistance in health are:

• Strengthening health system fundamentals that have an impact on service delivery;
• Addressing priority health needs of women and children;
• Supporting country-specific health priorities to tackle high-burden health problems that result in high levels of premature mortality or disability; and
• Ensuring that system can reduce regional vulnerability to HIV and emerging infectious diseases.

The current plan is to double aid to health to around $600 million in 2011-12.

The Micah Challenge and Make Poverty History movements in Australia, campaigns aiming to have all governments achieve the Millennium Development Goals, argue that Australia should increase expenditure on health in the aid budget to $1,030 million by the 2011-2012 budget as Australia’s fair share globally. They say this should include $350 million towards improving basic health systems in countries in our region, especially those services directed for child and maternal health. If Australia does its fair share we have the potential to save, on average, the lives of 75,000 children each year.

Further these campaigns are arguing for an increase in funding to UNICEF, the UN body that is charged with improving child health and well-being globally. In the 2008-2009 budget, Australia allocated $14.5 million to UNICEF, a significant increase. However, Australia’s per capita total contribution in 2007 was one quarter that of Ireland, a fifth that of The Netherlands, a twentieth that of Norway and 11 other donors had higher per capita contributions.

We have the ability to make a real difference in our region on saving the lives of children from easily preventable deaths and we should do our fair share in making sure that the target of Millennium Development Goal 4, to reduce under 5 child mortality by two-thirds by 2015, is achieved and preferably exceeded.

Background

Under the previous government, while Australia provided aid in various sectors, such aid, while relevant to MDGs was usually treated as sectoral expenditure. Under the Rudd Government, the MDGs are used as benchmarks to allocate and measure the effectiveness of Australian aid.

Australia recognises the critical role that United Nations agencies play in leading global efforts to progress towards the MDGs. The Rudd Government has committed to increasing Australia’s support for such agencies as part of a funding increase announced in the recent budget.

A concrete demonstration of this commitment was the 2008-09 Budget measure to invest an additional $200 million over four years in dedicated funding to key UN agencies. This commitment enables Australia to contribute directly to work on issues as diverse as increasing child literacy, improving maternal and child health and the empowerment of women in countries beyond our own region.

Australia will collaborate with effective UN agencies and like- minded donors to ensure the UN system and agencies work more effectively to reduce poverty. If we are to be serious about realising a fundamental turnaround in our immediate region’s long-term economic development and consequential political stability, Australia will need to increase its funding effort beyond 2010-2011.

That is why the Rudd Labor Government is committed to raising our official development assistance (ODA) to gross national income (GNI) contribution from 0.35 per cent in 2010 -2011 to 0.5 per cent by 2015- 2016.

The recent federal Budget laid the foundation for implementing this long-term commitment. Australia will provide an estimated $3.7 billion in ODA in 2008-09. We are committed to increasing both the quality and the quantity of the Australian aid program, and retain the target ODA level of 0.7 per cent of GNI as an aspirational goal.

Increased funding is only one aspect of the Government’s commitment that Australia plays a proper role in the fight to reduce child mortality rates and ending global poverty. Ensuring that aid funds are spent effectively on poverty reduction and achieve the maximum possible benefit is also essential.

To this end, reforms are underway to strengthen the effectiveness of our aid. The Annual Review of Development Effectiveness provides greater transparency on the performance of the aid program to the Australian public and will encourage greater debate on the development challenges facing our region.

Conclusion

The Rudd Government is committed to ensuring that Australia once again becomes a development leader by ensuring that an increased aid budget has a genuinely positive impact on those who need it.

The Government will continue to place a strong focus, within the development assistance program, on addressing the health needs of children and reducing child mortality rates in developing countries.