The ONE Campaign today confirmed that Bob Geldof will attend the G8 summit in Hokkaido to impress upon leaders the urgency of investing in agriculture and health in Africa – and to remind them that the G8 must fulfil their aid commitments to Africa.

Ahead of the summit, ONE calls for substantial new G8 investments in African agriculture and health. Detailed proposals have been sent to all G8 governments.

Japan must take the lead on new commitments in order to deliver a successful summit outcome for Africa. So far the Japanese government has made modest pledges to double bilateral ODA to Africa. In 2007 Japan actually cut multilateral support to Africa by 48%. A doubling of both bilateral and multilateral aid to Africa by 2012 would be more consistent with a global leadership role. This would mean increasing Japanese ODA over 5 years by $1.8 billion rather than current plans to increase by $900 million.

Bob Geldof said:

“It is tragic and absurd that people are still going hungry in the 21st century. I cannot stand the idea that a food crisis born out of high energy prices and increasing global prosperity is starving the super-poor in Africa. None of this is helped by bad trade and subsidy policies.

“Fukuda is the chair of the G8 group and Japan is the second largest economy on the planet. It is his and Japan’s responsibility this year to care for the hungry and ill.

“Given the resource crises of the world at this moment, we are dismayed at the low level of expectation emanating from the table of leaders of the wealthiest economies on the planet. It’s about time their actions lived up to their perhaps misplaced stature.”

 

INVESTING IN FOOD AND AGRICULTURE IN AFRICA

Rising food prices and climate change are already reversing progress in the fight against poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. 100 million more people now face the threat of extreme poverty and hunger.

The ONE campaign proposal on agriculture asks each G8 country, led by Japan, to increase the quantity and improve the quality of investments in African agriculture for the next 15-20 years.  Funds should initially (within 6 months) be directed to assistance for seeds and fertilizer. Within a year, longer term investments should be underway in crop development, roads, irrigation, climate change adaptation and reform of land tenure. The G8 should also identify an appropriate coordinating mechanism for existing funds and programmes.

Currently global ODA for African agriculture is around $2bn a year. Most estimates suggest that what is needed to substantially increase food production and improve rural infrastructure is an additional $9-13 billion per year over the next 15-20 years as well as policy quality improvements. African governments have committed to spending 10% of their national budgets on agriculture which will raise about $5 billion per year, leaving an external financing gap of $4-8 billion per year.

“More than half the population of sub-Saharan Africa depends on farming to survive, yet farming has been terribly neglected in economic development programmes,” said Oliver Buston of ONE. “Increasing food production is critical to saving lives as well as generating sustainable long term growth.

“The farming poor in rural Africa will be hit first and worst by climate change and have been most neglected so far by the G8, other donor nations and their own governments. This has to change if the Millennium Development Goals are to be achieved.”.”

DELIVERING ON HEALTH COMMITMENTS

While African countries have made mixed progress on a number of Millennium Development Goals and the fight against diseases such as HIV/AIDS and malaria, progress has been very slow in improving basic health indicators.

Disease-specific efforts are saving lives but in sub-Saharan Africa, lack of basic primary health care means that giving birth is still life-threatening and children under five face an inordinate chance of dying from diarrhoea or other easily treatable, preventable illnesses.

As summit hosts, Japan should press donors to honour the spirit of their commitment at the Heiligendamm summit in 2007 and agree to develop an action plan for delivering $100 billion for health over 5 years. At Heiligendamm, non-US G8 governments agreed to match the five-year, $30 billion US program to fight AIDS, TB and malaria. That program, known as PEPFAR, will soon be authorized at $50 billion over five years. Therefore, non-US G8 donors should provide a $50 billion match over the same five year period, and improve the quality of these investments. By the end of the Japanese G8 presidency, the G8 should provide a donor by donor time-table for delivering on this health commitment.

G8 leaders should also agree to fund an increase of at least 1.5 million additional health workers in Africa by 2015, with an interim target of at least 600,000 additional health workers by 2012.

According to the WHO, meeting major health-related MDGs, such as universal access to treatment for HIV/AIDS, is “very unlikely” unless countries reach a minimum threshold of 2.3 doctors, nurses, and midwives per 1,000 population. In sub-Saharan Africa, this ratio translates to roughly 1.5 million health workers, including more than 800,000 doctors, nurses, and midwives. The G8 should also agree to immediately scale-up assistance to countries that already have rigorous national health plans.

ARE G8 COMMITMENTS FALTERING?

The draft communiqué for the G8 summit currently does not fully reiterate commitments to double aid to Africa to $25 billion annually by 2010. It also does not articulate fully the commitment to provide universal access to AIDS treatment and prevention by 2010.

“Japan cannot claim a successful summit outcome if these promises are watered down,” said Oliver Buston. “Every G8 summit since 2005 has repeated the historic commitments made at Gleneagles. To dilute those promises would be a serious breach of trust and credibility.”