Conor Lenihan (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)

I assume the Deputy is referring to the global monitoring report, which is subtitled From Consensus to Momentum, prepared by the staff of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Ireland attaches the greatest importance to the achievement of the eight millennium development goals, MDGs. I welcome the analysis in the global monitoring report as a valuable contribution to the preparations for the UN high level meeting next September which will review progress towards these goals.

The report's emphasis on putting country-owned and country-led poverty reduction strategies at the centre of all efforts to achieve the MDGs is very much in line with our approach to development co-operation. Every country is responsible for its development and the welfare and well-being of its citizens. I share the concern expressed in the report about the prospects for achieving the millennium development goals in sub-Saharan Africa and agree that more will have to be done by developing and developed countries to achieve them.

Ireland's development co-operation programme has its chief focus on sub-Saharan Africa. Some 85% of our bilateral programme country assistance is spent in the least developed countries of sub-Saharan Africa. It is our intention to maintain this focus and expand our assistance to the region as the aid programme grows in the years ahead. I agree with the analysis of the report that macro-economic stability remains critical, as does the need to strengthen public sector financial management and to promote good governance and the rule of law to create an enabling environment for investment. The report also stresses the need to scale up education, health and basic infrastructure services, such as water and sanitation facilities, a process which has to be integrated into country-led national programmes and systems.

I welcome the balanced approach in the report, which sets out the responsibilities of donor nations to fulfil their commitment to the 0.7% UN target for ODA, together with the responsibilities of partner governments and organisations to utilise additional resources to the best advantage. Efforts to increase levels of ODA allocated to developing countries must be firmly linked with efforts to improve its quality.

The Government remains strongly committed to achieving the UN target for expenditure on ODA. The issue of how best to meet the target, and in what timeframe, is still under consideration. I have launched a consultative process that will lead to a White Paper on development co-operation and I look forward to receiving views from interested groups and members of the public on this and other issues.

The global monitoring report should be read in conjunction with the UN millennium project report, prepared under the direction of Professor Jeffrey Sachs and, in particular, with Secretary General Kofi Annan's own report, In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security, and Human Rights for All. In his report, the UN Secretary General has put forward a carefully crafted package of policy commitments and institutional reforms that the world's leaders could adopt in September. These proposals deal with issues of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction, genocide and civil war, as well as extreme poverty, endemic disease and climate change.

It is important in the lead-up to September that work on all of these reports progresses in a coherent way and that member states adopt a coherent approach to the issues at the various international fora at which their representatives will meet.

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