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Africa: Aid
The Earl of Caithness asked Her Majesty's Government:
- Whether they will make it a condition of any future agreement by the G8 to award aid to African nations that African leaders hold each other accountable for sound economic management, good governance, and human rights; and, if so, what evidence they have that such accountability happens now or has happened in the past.[HL5399]
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Amos): Each G8 member will decide for itself how to meet the commitments entered into at the Kananaskis Summit, including on the methods and criteria for awarding aid. The Department for International Development is considering how best to use the resources allocated to development assistance from 2003 to 2006 under the new Comprehensive Spending Review but, as the Prime Minister announced before the G8 Summit, bilateral assistance to Africa will rise to £1 billion by 2005–06. In setting our priorities we will take fully into account the extent to which developing country governments pursue effective pro-poor policies and implement reforms in governance. We encourage other donors to do likewise. Many African countries have already made commitments in the agreements that they have with the international financial institutions.
We are strongly supportive of African countries' efforts to set up the African Peer Review Mechanism that is being developed through the New Partnership for Africa's Development. These were endorsed at the recent African Union Summit and we look forward to seeing the mechanism become operational. It is intended as a mechanism for African countries to review each other, just as peer review in OECD is intended for OECD countries to be subject to review by their peers.
Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers
The Earl of Sandwich asked Her Majesty's Government:
- Whether they are giving priority to the monitoring of civil society participation in poverty reduction strategy papers; and how they will ensure that the international financial institutions take
- such views into consideration within the approval process.[HL5456]
Baroness Amos: DfID attaches great importance to the participation of civil society in the poverty reduction strategy (PRS) process, and we are tracking the extent and nature of civil society engagement through a number of channels.
One important channel is the UK representatives on the executive boards of the IMF and the World Bank which see the joint staff assessments (JSA) produced by the staffs of these institutions on completed PRS papers to assess whether they provide a credible framework for new lending programmes. The JSA includes a description of the country's participatory process.
A second channel is through DfID's country programme offices, which are in regular contact with civil society organisations. We have supported the consultation and monitoring process in several countries—Uganda, Honduras, Kenya, Rwanda, Tanzania and the Gambia. In several of our country programmes, we are also providing technical, human and financial support to poverty monitoring units, which encompass or have strong institutional links to civil society organisations.
A third channel is DfID's PRSP monitoring and synthesis project which was set up to collect information from a wide variety of sources—including DfID offices themselves—on the PRS process. Its recent report on participation in PRSPs in sub-Saharan Africa concluded that civil society participation had added much to the process, but work needed to be done to consolidate the gains made so far. DfID's country offices are also supporting a number of UK-based NGOs to work with developing country partner organisations to strengthen their capacity to engage in national debates and policy processes.
Zimbabwe
Lord Pearson of Rannoch asked Her Majesty's Government:
- Whether they have any plans to compensate white farmers in Zimbabwe for the loss of their land; if so, which channels they propose to use; and whether these channels are satisfactory.[HL5563]
Baroness Amos: Her Majesty's Government have no such plans. It remains the responsibility of the Zimbabwe Government to compensate for the land they are acquiring and leasing to others through their current resettlement and indigenisation programmes. The UK has repeatedly offered to provide development funds to support fair and well managed land reform, including land purchase, which contributes to poverty reduction. Sadly this is clearly not the case at present and an ill conceived programme is exacerbating the humanitarian crisis.
United Nations Population Fund
Lord Elton asked Her Majesty's Government:
- Whether, following the decision of the United States Government announced on 22 July to withdraw funding from the United Nations Population Fund on the grounds that "UN Population Fund monies go to Chinese agencies that carry out coercive programs", they will now withdraw British funding from the United Nations Population Fund.[HL5607]
Baroness Amos: UNFPA funds in China are used to implement its programme which is aimed at demonstrating to the Chinese authorities that there is a viable alternative to the current administrative family planning approach. Birth targets and quotas have been removed in the counties where UNFPA is operating. The US delegation which visited China in May found no evidence of UNFPA involvement in coercive abortion or sterilisation in China, and recommended that the US Government should continue to fund UNFPA. Following a visit to China in April this year, a cross-party group of MPs came to similar conclusions. It is disappointing that the US Government have decided to ignore their own delegation's recommendations.
Russia: EU Agriculture Assistance
Lord Jopling asked Her Majesty's Government:
- How much agricultural assistance has been given by the European Union to Russia in each year since 1991.[HL5632]
Baroness Amos: The European Commission has advised that under its TACIS Food and Agriculture technical assistance programme the following was provided:
- 1992: 20.67 million euros
- 1993: 12.27 million euros
- 1994: 15.91 million euros
- 1995: 15.88 million euros
- 1996: 10.60 million euros
- 1997: 12.98 million euros
- 1998: 8.40 million euros
- 1999: 6.24 million euros
- 2000: 0
HIV/AIDS Programmes: UK Funding
The Earl of Sandwich asked Her Majesty's Government:
- How they divided the £200 million 2001–02 budget for HIV/AIDS between prevention, care and curative medicine; whether it included a contribution to the Global Fund; and whether they intend to increase the United Kingdom contribution to that fund.[HL5694]
Baroness Amos: DfID currently supports programmes to tackle HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted infections in over 40 countries. Our support is largely dedicated to the development and implementation of effective national strategies to combat HIV/AIDS. Our focus is on a comprehensive approach which includes prevention, care and impact mitigation. It is not possible to disaggregate our expenditure in the manner requested.
Our contribution to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, TB and Malaria (GFATM) is in addition to our bilateral expenditure. The UK has pledged US200 million dollars to the GFATM and we are working to ensure the fund's work is successful. It is too early to consider further pledges.
Conflict Prevention and Management
Lord Moynihan asked Her Majesty's Government:
- How they will achieve the objective of improving the "effectiveness of the UK contribution to conflict prevention and management as demonstrated by a reduction in the number of people whose lives are affected by violent conflict and a reduction in potential sources of future conflict, where the UK can make a significant impact", as outlined in the HM Treasury document 2002 Spending Review: Public Service Agreements 2003–2006 (Cm 5571).[HL5755]
Baroness Amos: The Government are committed both to preventing violent conflict from emerging and to building peace in fragile post-conflict situations. The main global instruments are international development co-operation, political and diplomatic efforts and sanctions. We are working with the UN, EU and other partners to improve the effectiveness of all these measures.
In addition we created two conflict prevention pools on 1 April 2001 to improve the effectiveness of the UK contribution to conflict prevention and management. The Africa Pool (for sub-Saharan Africa) has been allocated £50 million per annum from 2001–04 to spend on conflict prevention programmes in sub-Saharan Africa. The Global Pool budget (for the rest of the world) was £60 millon in 2001–02, £68 million for 2002–03 and £78 million for 2003–04.
Both pools work towards the PSA target by combining the direct conflict prevention work of the three departments most directly involved in conflict prevention—FCO, MoD and DfID.
Most of the funds allocated to the Global Pool have been divided among a set of geographical and thematic priority areas:
- The Balkans
- Central and Eastern Europe
- Russia and the Former Soviet Union
- Indonesia and East Timor
- The Middle East and North Africa
- Afghanistan
- Belize/Guatemala
- Nepal
- Sri Lanka
- Small Arms and Light Weapons
- Strengthening the UN
- Security Sector Reform
- EU Civilian Crisis Management
- The OSCE and Council of Europe.
Ministers have agreed the following geographic/thematic priorities for the Africa Pool in 2001:
- Sierra Leone
- Great Lakes (DRC, Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda)
- Angola
- Sudan
- Nigeria
- South Africa
- Building African Peace Support Capacity
- Tackling the Economic and Financial Causes of Conflict.
A report on the activities of the pools in their first year will be published later in 2002.
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