PRESS BRIEFING LAUNCHING HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2003

The “Human Development Report 2003” concludes that significant support was needed from the richer countries for the Millennium Development Goals to be met, David Stewart, co-author of the Report, told correspondents at a Headquarters press briefing today.

Joining Mr. Stewart at the launch of the Report was William Orme, Chief of the Media Section of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).  Without a doubt, stated Mr. Stewart, this year’s was one of the most important human development reports published by the UNDP.  The world’s attention had been unwaveringly on the war on terror in the past couple of years, and the Report sought to shift some of that attention on the war on poverty.

Specifically, he said, the Report was on the Millennium Development Goals –- eight goals agreed to by over 190 countries to radically reduce poverty by 2015.  On progress made towards achieving those Goals, he noted that the world was on track to halving income poverty by 2015, driven by the tremendous economic growth of China and India.

At the same time, the 1990s was a decade of human development crisis; 54 countries had ended the decade poorer than they began it.  Twenty-one countries had actually gone backward, which was unprecedented.  The implication of that on the Goals was that sub-Saharan Africa, for example, was not going to achieve the goal of reducing under-five mortality for 150 years.

The Report had identified 59 countries that were struggling to achieve the Goals, he continued.  Those were countries that were poor to begin with and failing to make progress or even moving backwards.  As to why they were failing to progress, he said that too little attention was being given to structural obstacles.  Many of those countries were isolated from world markets, had small domestic markets, were affected by unfavourable climatic conditions, and were dealing with high debt burdens.  Until those issues were overcome, those countries could not progress or generate the required resources.

On the question of what must be done and who must act, he said that central to the Report was the Millennium Development Compact between rich and poor countries.  The poorer countries, on the one hand, needed to institute policy reforms, fight corruption and, most importantly, put the Goals at the centre of their development strategy.  On the other hand, the richest countries had to fulfil the commitments made under the Goals, as well as the commitments made at the International Conference on Financing for Development.

For example, he said, aid had to be doubled for the Goals to be met.  Yet, aid to the poorest countries in the last decade had fallen by a third.  Trade was vital.  If the poorest countries were to find a sustainable way to develop and progress, they needed to be able to trade fairly in the global environment.

The Report, he noted, also calculated the Human Development Index for 175 countries, which was a rough measure of human development and included indicators for life expectancy, literacy, income levels and school enrolment.  At the top of the Index was Norway, as it was last year.  He also noted that 0.014 points separated the country in first place from that in tenth place.  Of the 34 countries at the bottom of the Index, 30 were from sub-Saharan Africa.  That reflected the message of the Report, namely, that dramatic efforts were needed for the poorest countries to progress.

As to where the data came from, he said that all the statistics in the Report came from international statistical agencies.  For example, the data on school enrolment came from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Institute for Statistics.  Data was not received directly from countries.  For the Human Development Index, if the international agencies did not have the required data, the UNDP would do its best to get it from another source.

Mr. Orme informed correspondents that the Report’s global release was marked by a ceremony today in Dublin, attended by Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern; Bono of U2, who is well-known for spearheading global debt-relief efforts; UNDP Administrator Mark Malloch Brown; Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, lead author of the Report; and Jeffrey Sachs, well-known development economist and adviser to Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who was also this year’s guest editor of the Report.

The fourteenth annual Report would also be launched at the African Union Meeting in Maputo, Mozambique, on Thursday, he continued.  It would be discussed in the formal agenda of that meeting, and several prominent African leaders were expected to respond to its findings.

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