Despite much talk of the private sector boosting growth to alleviate poverty, the UN Istanbul meeting on LDCs points up foreign aid as being of primary importance.

Rich countries should make more determined efforts to fulfill and even increase aid commitments to the world’s poorest countries, a UN conference will formally declare tomorrow.

Despite much talk of using the private sector as an engine of growth and a provider of jobs, the Istanbul programme of action makes clear how much the world’s 48 least developed countries (LDCs) rely on foreign aid.

“While the least developed countries have made considerable efforts to mobilise domestic resources for their development, most of them still face a huge financing gap,” says the 46-page action programme, “and ODA (official development assistance) continued to be the largest source of external financing for [their] development.”

The fourth UN conference on LDCs has set an ambitious goal of halving their number in the next decade, although only three have “graduated” since LDCs were established as a category in 1971. With a population of 880 million, the LDCs represent the poorest and weakest group in the international community.

Lees het hele artikel hier op de website van The Guardian.