NGO research backs up Kofi Annans’s warning: without debt cancellation, global poverty targets will become "a pipe dream"

All member states of the United Nations are meeting Geneva from June 26 – 30 to review progress towards the "ambitious but realisable" goals agreed in Copenhagen in 1995, such as reducing extreme poverty by half and reaching universal primary education by 2015. A recent World Bank report presented a pessimistic view of the patchy international progress so far, pointing out that despite improvements in areas of Asia, the African continent has seen a rise in poverty in the five years since the international commitments were made.

The General Assembly will also be discussing the obstacles to achieving the 2015 goals. New research from Jubilee 2000 "Cancelling Debt to Permit Development" released on the opening day of the summit, shows that without massive debt cancellation for the poorest countries, the goals can never be reached by the target year of 2015.

The Secretary General of the United Nations, Kofi Annan, highlighted the third world debt crisis as a massive obstacle to the 2015 targets in his 21^st Century Action Plan, published in April 2000. He writes: "Let us, above all, be clear that, without a convincing programme of debt relief to start the new millennium, our objective of halving world poverty by 2015 will be only a pipe dream."

New calculations by Jubilee 2000's policy advisor Joseph Hanlon suggest that if creditor countries are serious about meeting their commitments, they will have to cancel almost $500 billion in debt, and additionally increase aid by $28 billion per year – almost double what they currently give.

Jubilee 2000's research follows a damning report from Oxfam, which accused politicians of “criminal complacency” and “comprehensively reneging” on the international commitments. Its study found that child mortality was declining at less than half the rate needed to meet the target of cutting the number of child deaths by two-thirds by 2015. Kevin Watkins, Oxfam's senior policy adviser, said that there was no chance of hitting the 2015 targets unless there was redistribution in favour of the poor, and identified debt repayments as one of the obstacles.

Last year, the international community promised only $100 billion in debt cancellation for the poorest countries, and less than $13 billion of this has actually been written off.

Ann Pettifor, Director of Jubilee 2000 said: "This research puts the credibility of the rich countries' promises on the line. They are committed to halving poverty for the poorest people in the world, and yet they keep taking money from those same people in debt repayments. If rich countries are serious about their 2015 targets, they should agree to cancel these debts, and ensure that the money is ringfenced for the poor. That will give some meaning to their discussions in Geneva this week."