QUOTES
“It’s
quite possible to arrive in the year 2030 where people are no longer dying of
poverty. We could actually help lead a global end-not a reduction, but an end-to
absolute poverty…I have always found that a committed, powerful group of leaders,
can make a huge difference.”
"Currently,
the international system fails to meet the scientific and technological needs
of the world's poorest."
The
time has come to end this charade. The debts are unaffordable. If they won't cancel
the debts I would suggest obstruction; you do it yourselves. Africa should say:
'thank you very much but we need this money to meet the needs of children who
are dying right now so we will put the debt servicing payments into urgent social
investment in health, education, drinking water, control of AIDS and other needs.'
All
of the incessant debate about development assistance, and whether the rich are
doing enough to help the poor, actually concerns less than 1% of rich world income.
The effort required of the rich is indeed so slight that to do less is to announce
brazenly to a large part of the world: 'You count for nothing.' We should not
be surprised, then, if in later years the rich reap the whirlwind of that heartless
response.
The
rich do not have to invest enough in the poorest countries to make them rich;
they need to invest enough so that these countries can get their foot on the economic
ladder . . . Economic development works. It can be successful. It tends to build
on itself. But it must get started.
Our
interconnectedness on the planet is the dominating truth of the 21st century.
One stark result is that the world's poor live, and especially die, with the awareness
that the United States is doing little to mobilise the weapons of mass salvation
that could offer them survival, dignity and eventually the escape from poverty.
The
essence of Africa's crisis is fundamentally its extreme poverty and therefore
its inability to mobilize out of its own resources even the barest of minimum
resources to address any of the public health crises that Africa faces.
