We have had the two world wars, the bombing of world trade center, the genocide in Rwanda, the killing of Sudanese women and children in their millions, and other catastrophic events we have allowed ourselves to be used against us; hence we could boldly say that war is a monster.
Today, chances are excellent that the UN obviously seems to be “our last and best hope”, towards the birth of a new world order, and we must obey them to have this monster (war) eliminated. But what might turn out to be the fate of all mankind if this great institution collapses under her peace building capacity as a result of distraction?
For instance, a country like Iran in recent times has launched a revolution campaign towards declaring herself a nuclear state, which thing is against the wish of our arch-conservatives.
Does it mean we could never attain world peace? Or are we still too young to practice a global democratic system of government? Where are we going with this?

Copy the following link and paste in your address bar for details on Iran’s revolution campaign: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1250127/Iran-Revolution-day-protests-Islamic-Republic-nuclear-state.html

How do we solve this problem without having to go through what Sudan in Africa went through before her referendum towards a peaceful Sudan just a few days ago? Truth is, any further world war will never leave us citizens with set of values any more.
We believe there must be a light for the birth of a universal metropolis along the path of critical thinking.Therefore we call on the United Nations to reach a consensus for another millennium development goal: UN International Day of Critical Thinking.

Visit our home page at : http://seatedchristianarts.blogspot.com/
[img]http://mixxcreative.no-ip.org/mdg.devex.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/chidi.jpg[/img]

AHKRC proposes to launch the programme RBD 2020 for the capacity development of citizens in Pakistan for Right Based Development using the network of CBOs in 120 districts of Pakistan. This will be done through offering an online training of local female and male community specialists and activists, young professionals, technical staff of government agencies and media professionals engaged in improvement of governance and service delivery for poverty alleviation.

This training will be conducted through a two week online course based on the cases of successful experiences in Pakistan. Course work will include presentation and discussion on modules, field assignments and end of the course assessment. As part of this work 120 Study Centres will be established at district level at the facilities provided by CSOs most easily accessible to low income groups. Further details of the course are given below.

Modules:

Identifying community preferences and developing plans
• Diagnostic Dialogue [3 step process to identify local priorities for claiming rights]
• Physical Mapping [participatory documentation of current conditions of service facilities and identifying needs for upkeep and improvement]
• Poverty Score Card [ identifying the poorest of the poor for targeting beneficiaries]
• Development of Micro business Plan [poverty alleviation plan at household level]
• Union Council Based Poverty Reduction Programme [poverty alleviation plan at community level]

Assessing and developing Local Organization’s capacity
• Rapid Self Appraisal [self capacity assessment of local organization]
• Account Keeping [training in financial record keeping and training]
• Proposal Writing [ converting ideas into business and resource mobilization plans]

Engaging and activating the Government
• Institutional Mapping [identifying local government departments and understanding their jurisdiction and SOPs]
• Governance Score Card [participatory capacity and performance assessment of government departments for engagement and activation]
• Tacking Budgetary Process [ finding entry point for introducing community preferences in local planning and budgeting process]
• Invoking PC-I Process [accessing government resources in collaboration with government departments]

Mission:
Enabling citizens to demand their development rights and participate in planning and development process at local level.

Objective:
To educate citizens about development programmes cycle for local development and effectively activate the nation building department to improve their services.

Strategy:
Build partnership with local CBOs and lead the process by mobilizing local communities

Target: Cover 2400 CBOs in the country

Approach: Get cascading effect: through developing master trainers who will train trainer and hold grass root level training programmes, 50 % population to be the folk women.

Expected Results: Citizens will participate in the country-wide movement for a democratic culture based on understanding of rights and raise voice for their legal, constitutional and human rights.

Those are some of the major pluses but there is one major weakness with the Millennium Development Goals, which has failed to produce major economic gains for the poor and the disadvantaged. From the start the Millennium Development Goals overlooked, what I consider to be the key to the eradication of poverty and it concerns the need to strengthen economic governance.

For close to 30 years I have worked as a specialist to acquire the expertise to advise the senior levels of government, business, the business institutions and civil society on the best governance policies and practices which promote enterprise and economic development, trade and investment and national competitiveness in Least Developed Countries (LDCs), emerging economies and nations which are in transition from state-run economies to market-driven economies.

In the past decade a great deal of work has been done in the area of economic development and trade, including the introduction and improvement of microfinance lending programs, strengthening of financial markets, trade capacity building, regional and multilateral trade initiatives. A small number of Ministries of Industry and Trade have recruited international experts to help them improve their national policy frameworks for enterprise and economic development and trade and business development and trade support programmes. While some gains have been made with the help of these initiatives, the general impact has been disappointing, which means that one of the major drivers for achieving the Millennium Development Goals has failed to achieve the results that are needed. The question is why?

There are several factors which are directly responsible for the failure to achieve the desired results. My views on these underlying problems has been influenced by my academic training and my international development experience. I approach the challenge of national economic and social development with a holistic approach due to my academic training which includes a Masters in Business Administration with a focus on marketing, business development and international trade; a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science and Economics; and a Bachelor of Social Work degree in Social Policy and Community Development plus my experience in the field. The issues identified here are not listed in any particular order because they are equally important.

1. LDCs, emerging and transitional countries do not have an integrated blueprint for governance reform, based on international best practice and real world adaptations that have been proven to work in the developing economies of the world, which are not the same as the advanced nations of the world. The solutions provided by the international development community have been piece-meal at best, often based on a stove-pipe mentality (the Sector Wide Approach) as if economic development could succeed without the proper development of education programmes or without the existence of a strong national health care system that provides basic health services and addresses specific problems such as the AIDS pandemic and malaria to mention a few. For example, the problem of AIDS orphans is a special challenge for nations which much help them acquire the social skills, the cultural skills and the academic training to become self-sufficient individuals as they reach the age when school graduates are entering into the economy as employees or self-employed entrepreneurs. Failure to deal with that issue means that a nation will face a future economic crisis having a large population of uneducated, unskilled workers who will become dependent upon the nation and civil society or who will pursue unlawful activities to support themselves to address their issues of poverty. These issues are linked. Development that pursues a stove-pipe approach will not succeed in the long-term.

2. Economic governance reform requires a fully integrated, comprehensive policy framework that applies to all levels of government (rural, municipal, local regional government, provincial/state government, national level of government and national trade policies and support programs), as well as efficient, effective, equitable and affordable national programmes of business support services.

There is a general failure among developing nations (and even developed nations) to recognise that all business development begins at the local level and as it matures and grows, broadens out regionally, provincially, nationally and internationally. There is a need to simplify the delivery of business support – the one-stop shopping approach not only to get services but also to help them comply with regulatory requirements (by the local/municipal governments, provincial/state governments and national levels of government.

Good economic governance provides a logical migration pathway of economic support services and policies that help micro- and small-enterprises grow into medium- and large-scale enterprises.

The other important factor is that the professional staff of the various economic ministries must have the required level of university education and specialised training which equips them with the policy expertise need to develop and implement policies and establish the type of business support programmes need by SMMEs and large-scale corporations.

3. There is a general lack of understanding in developing countries that medium- and large-scale enterprises cannot exist without a full-range of business to business services and products provided by the small business sector as well as quality business infrastructure that is needed to support all forms of economic activity and facilitate economic growth. Many developing countries are facing major competitive problems because of a lack of efficient transportation infrastructure and this problem can affect many countries. For example, a major port city like Dar es Salaam is facing major grid-lock problems which are impeding the efficient flow of goods and services in and out of the port facilities, as well as the movement of human resources. It is important for surrounding countries in East Africa and the international development community to recognise that fixing this major impediment to business efficiency is an issue which has an impact on several nations not just Tanzania.

4. The International Development community has to take some responsibility for the failure to achieve the Millennium Development Goals because of the inconsistent nature of their development support. Every nation which provides development support is democratically elected, which means that parties in power frequently change and with those changes come changes in foreign policy, which often result in major changes in development policy and support. This has led to a whipsaw effect, which has made it virtually impossible for developing nations to get consistent support, which is both logical, appropriate and fits within the framework of a large programme agreed to by the Development Assistance Committee. My own country, Canada, is a prime example of this type of change. The first time it occured was in 1995 when the Liberal government was forced to trim development spending, as it did with all government programmes to reign in the national debt of Canada which was ballooning out of control. That measure forced programmes to trim budgets by approximately 20% across the board (the haircut method). About six years later, there was a recognition by Canada, that given its available development budget it couldn’t afford to be all things to all people and that as tough as it was to make this policy decision it would achieve better results if it focused its development dollars on a limited number of countries that qualified because they were in the greatest need of help or they showed the most promise for marked improvement. This program shift met with some criticism from the countries that had program funding cuts – but in truth many countries didn’t deserve support because they had not made the effort to effect needed change such as dealing with problems of political corruption or failing to resolve political/cultural disputes. The focused program shift in many cases received praise in all quarters that received increased funding because it meant that the technical assistance would receive sufficient long-term funding to be effective over the medium-term. During this period many country programmes, especially in Africa began to show marked improvement, whether it was in education, support to deal with the AIDS pandemic, support to deal with malaria, technical trade support….the list goes on. But then as so often happens, a political scandal replaced the ruling party with the major opposition party and even though the new party in power was only a minority government it introduced major changes to development policy and financing which completely distrupted stable development programming that had been in place for almost a decade. From the point of view of many development partners it was disaster. From the point of many Canadian development practioners and NGOs the changes disrupted or ended the sound business operations of many suppliers who had worked in development for more than thirty years. To some the changes were shocking and made no sense….for example, funding was cut entirely for eight African countries and shifted to Latin and South America, with no explanation as to why the policy changes had been made. In the opinion of many, the Conservative government had lost touch or simply did not understand the type of role Canada was expected to play in the international development arena. As a result it came in for harsh criticism internationally and lost its ability to impact international policy as it had in the past, so much so that it was not able to win one of the seats at the UN Security Council. This is just one example, of the many political changes that happen which affect international development support on a continuing basis. And it is one of the reasons why the developed nations of the world and development institutions like the World Bank, the OECD, the UN agencies need to adopt a common approach of support for the developing nations as a whole and for individual nations on a case-by-case basis. The developed nations themselves need to do more to negotiate long-term agreements with all political stakeholders (ruling party, opposition parties) to come up with long-term development programmes with specific levels of funding over at least a ten-year period, which they can all agree to and support, so that regardless of who is in power, the development support provided by Canada or any other developed nation is consistent over time. It’s like building a house, you don’t want the plumbing contractor or electrician to leave the job-site before the work has been completed. But that’s what the developed nations are doing all of the time.

5. Some of the major development partners, particularly the United States and the European Union, say they are working to support LDCs, emerging and transitional nations to address the problems of poverty – and it is true they are doing positive things and investing large sums of money – but they are also continuing to support policies which make it impossible for many of those same nations to crawl out of poverty. The best example of this is in the area of trade policy. In spite of the fact that multilateral trade negotiations associated with the Doha Development Round have been going on for almost a decade, the United States and the European Union, continue to subsidise the farm operations of many of the agricultural producers, which has made it impossible for agricultural producers in the LDCs and emerging market economies to compete because they face subsidised prices in the marketplace for commodity goods such as cotton. sugar, meat products, etc. The subsidies run into the hundreds of billions of dollars over the period of a decade and are directly added onto the deficit accounts of the United States Government and the member nations of the European Union at a time when all of these nations are in serious financial trouble. This misinformed policies of the United States and the EU are not only detrimental to the economic well-being of the poorest nations in the world they are detrimental to themselves, if not immediately then in the long-term because the two are intimately connected. When the day comes, when the gross level of debt in the United States (currently standing at 14 trillion dollars) and the gross level of debt in the member nations of the European Union becomes unsustainable, those nations will have to dramatically reduce their development spending, the same as they would do for all of their other government programmes, until such time as they reign in their deficits and are able to pay down their outstanding debts. Surely, that day of reckoning can’t be that far in the future, say 2020 at the latest. In spite of these realities, one fails to see any major change in the negotiated trade positions by these major players at the WTO. It doesn’t make sense. One would think if the tax-payers of these nations really understood what was going on they would demand their governments to put an end to agricultural subsidies immediately. But the reason that nothing has happened probably has more to do with the nature of politics, who is involved and who has the money. The US case is the most obvious one. Since 1990, more than 25,000 family farm operations have shut down. In their place, large agricultural corporations have grown steadily. They are supported by a large contingent of corporate agricultural lobbyists in Washington, D.C. who also provide funding for the politicians who get elected, who in turn continue to support the agricultural subsidies. But all of this deficit spending it be placed upon the backs of the American taxpayers. It is they who will have to suffer the pain of programming cutbacks. It is they who will have to pay off the mountain of debt that has been accumulating since the beginning of the Second World War.

Things are likely to get much tougher in the years ahead and the developing nations need to begin thinking about what they can do to plan for the time when the money runs out. What can they do now, while the support is still there and what do they need to do in the future. My recommendation would be to focus a great deal of their resources on reforming and improving the economic (and social development) governance policy and programming framework and investing heavily in national infrastructure that facilitates economic development and trade. If the people can earn a living, they can pay for education and health services, etc.

6. If poverty is going to be eradicated and the best interests of the LDCs, emerging and transitional economies are to be served and put on an equal footing to compete with the advanced nations of the world, they must appreciate the bigger picture of how the major countries of the world are competing economically. The major economic players in the world – principally the United States, the European Union, China, India, and some of the smaller players like Brazil, Japan, and Russia all need natural resource inputs to keep their economies going. The United States and the European Union are “old school”. They have been using the powerful tools of the World Bank and the IMF to control governments. This is something that is never spoken of but has been reported in many detailed accounts and in some biographies. The President of the United States appoints the President of the World Bank. The European Union gets to appoint the head of the IMF, which provides loans to governments all over the world to help them with deficit financing. These two financial levers have been used in the service of the foreign policies of these large traders since their formation at the Bretton Woods conference. The nations have used “off the books” operations using the likes of the CIA and private contract firms to achieve political ends in other nations which favour American or European Corporations. They have used their diplomatic channels to secure economic favour and strategic advantages of various kinds. In a number of instances, the United States has chosen to engage smaller countries in one-on-one free trade negotiations. In other instances it has worked for the development of broader regional free trade agreements (most of which have yet to materialise – Asia Pacific Economic Community, the Free Trade Area of the Americas, etc.). The European Union for its part has entered into Economic Partnership Agreements with clusters of nations, which are usually close in proximity in the Caribbean, West Africa, East Africa, Central Africa, Southern Africa, etc. The negotiation of these agreements cannot be viewed as fair and balanced because the technical capacity of the European Union to evaluate its sovereign economic interests far surpassess the collective skills and knowledge level of the professional negotiating staff of the regional partners in Africa, the Caribbean, etc. And the reason that they use these tools and methods is to allow the corporations of the US and the EU to gain favourable access to the resources of the lesser developed nations of the world.

China for its part is buying its way in. It is currently putting up billions of dollars in infrastructure aid with a quid quo pro arrangement that permits to gain access to resources in the countries which they are assisting. On the face of it this may seem like a good deal for the lesser developed countries in places like resource-rich Africa but one has to study the small print. China demands that it be allowed to bring in all of the technical and support staff it needs to complete an infrastructure project. There is very little committment on the part of China to impart technical knowledge or experience to local African personnel. It is not clear whether their will be a cultural legacy associated with the influx of Chinese as happened in Botswana, with detrimental consequences for the future economic development of the nation by Botswana citizens. The Chinese in Botswana were permitted to stay. As a result they have taken over the majority of retail business and service enterprises and they completely dominate the construction industry. This has caused a crowding out effect for the African population of Botswana, which is not dissimilar to what happened in East Africa, when the Ismaili population which built the railroad was permitted to stay and proceeded to take over the only thing it was allowed to do….commercial enterprise.

Players like Brazil, Japan, Russia, Canada and Norway do not have the same leverage to compete with the Americans and the Europeans. They most come as businessmen and women, enter into business agreements and business partnerships and move on.

Clearly, these economic players are have a major impact on these economies but mostly for the short-run. They take their profits back home rather than invest in the partner nations for the long-haul.

7. For many of the lesser developed nations to compete they need to “think outside the box” and develop work partnerships with other lesser developed nations to underwrite the costs of mutually beneficial services, such as Standards Research and Compliance, Export Financing, the Development of Equity Markets (for example, the establishment of a pan-African stock market, to replace the small, illiquid national stock exchanges), international trade support services in major markets like Europe and North America, to mention a few.

8. The one place where national economic development programming connects up with the Millennium Development Goals is at the Local Development Level. There are many economic development initiatives that are targeted at the client population of poor rural and urban dwellers. There are many good models that are worth copying. Plus their are excellent university programs that teach professionals the skills and knowledge they need to become Local Economic Development and National Economic Development experts.

I hope these comments help for the public dialogue on what needs to be done to help nations achieve their Millennium Development Goals.

William Finseth
President
MarketPower International
Ottawa, Canada

I am particularly interested in learning more about the Gender based Governance Systems Projects and how it can target structural rather than practical gender needs in our countries. As the UN declares, if development is not engendered, it is endangered.

Most relevant to the discussion here is perhaps my comment on http://un-gaid.ning.com/forum/topics/position-paper-for-capacity .

There is much talk about reform of the multilateral development system (see for instance http://brookin.gs/Ki4T ).

At http://www.actor-atlas.info/country-map:tanzania I illustrate how structured wikis can help making accessible from a small screen a vast amount of (development actor) information. Having such access will make leaders think twice before establishing yet another actor, and if they don’t think, even a high-school pupil, and certainly also a journalist can pinpoint the harmful impact of the fragmentation of resources…

But beyond this, If development actors, supported by national governments, enabled by UN system actors would start putting their content in wikis, structured as explained at http://www.pragmetaknowledgeclout.be/crb-methodology,
this would provide the basis for a new development practice model, with content that is on average thousands time more productive than what we find in the glossy brochures and pdfs produced with so much public moneys, that in this way becomes waste.
Ref: http://www.atria.us/content/new-development-practice-model . Remember, communications .. engagement .. empowerment .. trust

How partnerships under more fit social architecture and with more productive content practices could look like, from the global to the local scale, is addressed for the healthcare sector in http://www.scribd.com/doc/29230535/A-multi-level-monitoring-and-evaluation-standard-in-health-care-systems-exploring-the-option