Sir, – In two weeks, the Taoiseach will travel to the United Nations in New York, to join other world leaders in a review of the global strategy to tackle some of the world’s biggest problems.
That strategy was agreed in the year 2000, and is based on eight goals that the global community is set to achieve next year.
Now, with less than 500 days to go until the deadline, the verdict is that the recipe agreed 14 years ago is working, but that rich countries have not kept their side of the bargain.
While enormous progress has been made on the seven “Millennium Development Goals” for which developing countries are responsible, progress on the eighth target, which is the responsibility of the West, has been patchy.
Rich countries have by and large resisted the much-needed reform of the unfair trade rules that keep people locked in poverty, and have failed to deliver the increases in overseas aid that they committed to.
But it is not too late. Ireland has gained great global influence on the basis of our undeniable commitment to a fairer, more stable world and our willingness to invest in the policies and structures the United Nations are promoting. We do that, because we know that as a small, open economy, Ireland depends on its global reputation as a reliable partner and as a people that keeps its promises.
The Taoiseach now has the chance to announce to the world that Ireland intends to honour its commitments to the Millennium Development Goals and that we will reverse six years of cuts to the aid budget.
Such a decision would not just get our aid programme back on track, it will also help bring about the stable and fairer world that Ireland needs for its own prosperity. – Yours, etc,
HANS ZOMER,
Dóchas,
1-2 Baggot Court,
Lower Baggot Street,
Dublin 2.