Some underdevelopment challenges could only be met by a global transfer of resources from the rich to the poor, President Thabo Mbeki said on Wednesday.
”Those elected by the people… to pursue the public good have an obligation to ensure that such resource transfers take place,” he told the International Labour Organisation conference in Geneva, Switzerland.
”The war against poverty calls for global action.”
In a speech prepared for delivery — released in Pretoria — Mbeki said certain social problems could not be expected to be solved by those driven by profit.
The European Union (EU) subscribed to this approach with its European Structural Fund to support development among EU members.
”Quite correctly, the EU made the determination that there are certain regions within member countries that are so underdeveloped… that it would be incorrect to rely on the market to supply the resources to end such underdevelopment.”
Mbeki said the EU, therefore, decided to direct targeted official funds to the affected areas.
This was a deliberate process of resource transfers to ensure even and balanced development within the union.
”We must also make a determination that there are certain challenges of poverty and underdevelopment that can only be addressed through a conscious process of resource transfers from the rich to the poor, globally.”
Mbeki said the process of globalisation required that decisions in this regard be taken at a global level.
While globalisation brought faster growth in many parts of the world, most poor nations had become increasingly marginalised — sinking deeper and deeper into poverty.
Many were also stuck in a public debt spiral, Mbeki said.
An example was sub-Saharan Africa. The total amount it was paying to service foreign debt was four times the total spent on public health.
”As a result, these African countries could not provide jobs, adequate health services and nutrition, education, housing, clean water and sanitation… to their citizens.”
Mbeki said the capital needed to tackle poverty was mostly in private hands.
”Meaningful ways had to be found to mobilise this capital to help finance the eradication of global poverty, in its own interest, while keeping in mind the feature central to its nature — the maximisation of profit.”
Mbeki said governments, business and labour all had a material interest in solving the world’s problems of poverty and underdevelopment.
Progress would be faster if the three camps worked together as social partners, seeking to give the poor an opportunity to work themselves into a better position.
”All of us here do [know] that resources exist within the world economy and society to achieve the objective of the eradication of poverty, globally,” Mbeki said.
He added: ”The question we must all answer is why we are not using these resources to achieve this goal.” – Sapa