A discussion and three course dinner on
Australian International Aid
Accountability & Transparency
was held on
Wednesday 24 February 2016
At Taj Agra Indian Restaurant,
35 Woolley St, Dickson, ACT
Master of Ceremonies
Siobhan Heanue
Reporter, Presenter
ABC Television, Radio and Online
Speakers
Kathryn Elliott |
Emily Wilson |
Professor William Maley |
Sam Zappia |
Speeches began at 6:30pm, followed by a Q&A session.
Forum Australia thanks the ACT Office of Multicultural Affairs for its funding allocation to assist us build stronger inter-cultural ties within the ACT
Mr. Mirza Salman Babar Beg, Deputy High Commissioner of Pakistan commended the presentations made by the panelists and termed them informative. He stated that listening to Speakers, it was clear that Government of Australia puts a lot of emphasis on ensuring transparency and accountability in the delivery of aid to various countries. He also appreciated the quantum of resources that Australia commits annually in terms of foreign aid.
He shared a couple of observations thereon. Mr. Beg said that it is imperative to match needs of communities with projects so where a road is needed, a school is not built or where a school is needed, a road is not built. This necessitates allowing communities’ participation at the time of assessment of their needs. Such endeavours would ensure best value for aid spending.
His second observation related to global perspectives on aid and poverty reduction. He indicated that UN suggests a benchmark of 1% of gross domestic project in aid by the developed countries. In the current global economic situation, hardly any developed country is able to meet this target. Rather whenever any austerity/ budget savings are carried out, foreign aid budgets are the first to be slashed. Given this context, other vehicles to support developing countires like trade liberalization and investment assume greater significance. As the mantra went, “Trade not Aid”, a lot can be achieved by liberalization of trade for the benefit of all. He lamented the fact that WTO’s Doha Round is deadlocked since 1995 over issue of farm subsidies in the developed countries. Similarly in designing Bilateral Investment Treaties, there is a need to ensure that they should reflect perspectives of both investors and local communities. He cited Indonesia’s example which terminated over 50 Bilateral Investment Treaties over such concerns.