Candidates in election debate support more development aid

Climate change seen as greater threat than Russia in NGOs' panel discussion

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At an election panel discussion organised by the Service Centre for Development Cooperation (KEPA) in Helsinki, Finland's Social Democratic Foreign Minister Erkki Tuomioja gave the same answer to the question of raising development cooperation funding as Arto Välikangas of the right-wing populist True Finns party.
      Both were against a proposal to raise development aid by EUR 99 million each year by 2015, in order to raise the amount of such spending to EUR 0.7 per cent of GDP, which is the goal set by both the United Nations and the European Union.
     
However, Tuomioja and Välikangas opposed the proposal for opposite reasons. Välikangas asked what has been achieved in the developing countries with the expenditure of "160 euros per Finn". Tuomioja felt that the proposed spending increase was too slow.
      In addition to Tuomioja, representatives of government parties included Foreign Trade and Development Minister Paula Lehtomäki (Centre) and Christina Gestrin, chair of the Parliamentary group of the Swedish People's Party.
      KEPA organised the "global" election debate together with the Finnish Institute of International Affairs, and the Finnish UN Association.
      Lehtomäki, Tuomioja, and Gestrin insisted that the goal in the government programme to raise development cooperation funding to 0.7 per cent of GDP by 2010 is still in force. Currently, spending on development cooperation is 0.43 per cent of GDP. Gestrin proposed that the goal should be disengaged from the budget framework.
      Supporting a hike in aid were party leaders Jyrki Katainen (Nat. Coalition Party), Päivi Räsänen (Christian Democrats), as well as Green League deputy chair Anni Sinnemäki and Katja Syvärinen (Left Alliance.
      The panellists agreed on the need to lift export subsides on agricultural products, which hurt poor countries - even though Finland has sought to block such a change at World Trade Organisation talks. The European Union has agreed to lift the subsidies by 2013.
      "The real problem is that opening the markets will not help, unless the developing countries have something to sell",Lehtomäki pointed out.
     
Climate change was seen to be the greatest threat facing Finland. The panel placed its hope on comprehensive international climate treaties.
      Syvärinen and Sinnemäki also emphasised the threats posed by poverty and inequality, while Räsänen mentioned lifestyle-linked diseases, and Katainen warned about the threat of crime.
      Russia and NATO only came up when the moderator of the panel, magazine editor Tapani Ruokanen, nudged the group in that direction. Gestrin called for a special NATO report to be submitted to Parliament. Tuomioja, for his part, rejected "power politics".


Links:
  Service Centre for Development Cooperation (KEPA)

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