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Conrad Rein
Joined: Aug 22, 2009
Posts: 38 (view all)
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Gender & Age: Male & 29
Country: Germany
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Keep your promises to the poor!
February 6, 2010 - 05:33 AM
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Keep your promises to the poor!
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/promises/
Keep your promises to the poor!
First citizen’s initiative under the Lisbon Treaty launched by EU-NGO Platform under the heading: Keep your promises to the poor! The aim is to collect 1 million signatures in a petition and thereby have the European Commission put focus on the fact that world leaders don’t keep their promises and use this attention to make a breakthrough on poverty.
Lisbon Treaty: The Lisbon Treaty gives a stronger voice for citizens: With the Citizens' Initiative 1 million citizens from a number of member states will have the possibility to call on the Commission to bring forward new policy proposals (Article 11.4 of the amended Treaty of the European Union). Together with the Lisbon Treaty entering into force on December 1 the Keep your promises to the poor!-initiative is launched. Here citizens in all 27 member states can give the poor a voice.
The European Promises: In May 2005 Council conclusions is was set out that EU 15 commits to give 0.51 % of GNI in official development assistance (ODA) in 2010 and 0.7 % by 2015. EU 12 have committed to 0.17 % by 2010 and 0.33 by 2015. These goals are also a part of the "The European Consensus" from 2005, which is a shared vision by the Council, the European Parliament and the Commission on European Union Development Policy. Problem is that it doesn't look like it's going to happen.
AidWatch: Since 2006 NGO's from all EU countries have come together to monitor systematically the discrepancy of what is said and what is done concerning development aid. This work is made under the umbrella of CONCORD which is the European confederation of relief and development NGO's and who represents 1600 NGO's supported by millions of citizens.
In a recent report it comes forward that, collectively, EU aid stood at 0.4% of GNI, meaning that, even at that stage, the collective interim target of giving 0.51% of GNI by 2010 is looking far out of reach unless significant efforts to increase aid is made. The report also showed that the tendency of many Member States to "inflate" their official aid figures with items such as debt relief, student and refugee costs which do not directly target poverty is continuing. Discounting these items, collective EU aid stood at only 0.34% of GNI in 2008.
Citizens do care: A Eurobarometer survey from October 2009 shows that even in the time of financial crisis the citizens support development aid. About 90 % of the European citizens find development important and 72 % of the Europeans think that the goals committed to should be kept or increased.
Birte Hald, President of EU-NGO Platform, states: “Aid is needed now more than ever. With our ‘Keep your promises to the poor!’ initiative we use a new tool and engage the citizens in calling on EU Member States urgently to deliver on their internationally agreed aid commitments and thereby defeat poverty.”
[link="http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/promises/"]
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