DOCUMENT No. 1 

Statement by Ambassador Munir Akram, the Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations at the High Level Segment of the Substantive Session of the ECOSOCJuly 2, 2002

Mr. President,

                It is a great pleasure for me to participate in this important discussion under your stewardship.

Mr. President,

                The nomenclature of our item, “Human Resource Development,” perhaps denigrates the profoundness of the objective, which these words are supposed to convey. Humans are the subject and the object of development. Humans are the instrument and the aim of development.

Mr. President,

                Education and health are obviously two of the most critical sectors in the promotion of human development and, indeed, balanced socio-economic development in any country. The developing countries need to allocate much larger resources to provide basic health protection and amenities to their peoples and to promote literacy and education. Relief from their huge debt servicing burdens – which in 1999 amounted to $78 billion i.e. more than the amount required to meet the Millennium Development Goals – can be one way to release resources to enable the expansion of budgetary outlays on the health and education.

                In the health sector, budgetary outlays and capacity shortfalls are not the only impediments. There is inadequate research into the diseases which traditionally afflict people in the developing countries because they are not as lucrative a market of the richer nations. Secondly, poorer countries are often constrained by the existing international rules and corporate practices from being able to provide drugs to their people at affordable cost. The Declaration on TRIPS and Health adopted at the Doha WTO Conference was a positive step in the right direction. It stated that the TRIPS Agreement “does not and should not prevent members from taking measures to protect public health.” The “agreement can and should be interpreted and implemented in a manner supportive of WTO members’ right to protect public health and, in particular, to promote access to medicines for all.”

                We would urge that greater attention be paid to the endeavour within the WHO to promote the rights of all countries, especially developing countries, to have access to essential and life saving drugs.

                The TRIPs Agreement and certain restrictions regarding access to and transfer of technology act as constraints for developing countries not only in the health but also the education sector in promoting their developmental goal.

                In the education sector, small investments can produce significant results, as we heard yesterday, particularly from the WFP.

                A New York Times Editorial published yesterday, stated: “The World Bank has identified 18 countries whose efforts to improve education qualify them for immediate outside help. These include Ethiopia, Mozambique, Uganda, Nicaragua and Vietnam. Five others, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Congo, which do not yet qualify, are home to more than a third of the children not in school. They need increased international help so that they can meet the standards and qualify for international assistance. Those countries already able to make good use of aid should not be left waiting.” We trust the world will heed these words.

                Mr. President, the development of human resources is the gravaman of the development policies of President Musharraf’s government. This policy focuses on health and education as well as poverty alleviation as essential elements for sustained economic revival and growth in Pakistan. The following elements of our strategy are notable:

First: Governance. We have promoted the concept of democracy at the grass roots and people’s direct participation in development. In accordance with the principles of subsidiary, local governments are responsible for health, education and other development activities. Subsidiary is accompanied by gender mainstreaming. Thirty-three per cent of seats in councils and legislatures are reserved for women at the local, provincial and national levels.

Second: The Eradication of Poverty in the Rural Areas. It is in these areas that 60-70 per cent of our population resides. We are placing special emphasis on expanding agricultural production through yield intensification, expansion of cultivated areas and increase in and efficient use of water resources.

Third: The promotion of employment opportunities for the urban educated as well as uneducated youth. For the educated, a massive programme for training and induction into the Information Technology sector has been launched with a view to creating fast track employment opportunities. The urban uneducated, jobless youth have been encouraged, among other things, to establish small and medium scale enterprises including through the utilization of small loans and micro financing.

Fourth: In the education sector, a three-pronged strategy has been adopted which focuses on:  (a) improvement in literacy rate and universalisation of primary education, (b) improvement in quality of higher education, better teachers, reformed curriculum and efficient examination system, and (c) introducing gender and area specific technical and vocational education at sub-District and District levels.  Special attention is being paid to girls’ education. This strategy would be aimed at raising the current literacy rate from 49 to 60 per cent by the year 2010 with primary focus on ensuring gross primary enrolment from 89 per cent to 100 per cent.   Adult education programmes, especially helping to improve literacy rates among women, are being launched.  The Government of Pakistan is also encouraging public-private sector partnership to improve the education system in the country.

Fifth: In the health sector, the Government has taken steps to raise awareness among the population on infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria.  Rural health programmes have been organized at the grass root levels.  Vaccination for children has been made compulsory.  More emphasis has been laid on training of the health workers. Special allocations are made to improve the doctor-patient ratio, especially in rural areas.  A close watch is being kept on the prices of medicines, especially medicines relating to the infectious diseases.

Mr. President,

                We are inviting international organizations such as World Food Programme, which has already conducted a programme for schools in Pakistan to join in our endeavour to create the new foundations to Pakistan’s socio-economic revival and growth. We invited international Non-Governmental Organizations as well as the private sector to join with us in creating the environment for sustained growth and sustained development.

                The renowned Pakistani economist Dr. Mahbub-ul-Haque, who initiated the Human Development Report, once said: “Development must deal with the entire society and people must be put at the centre of the stage.” However, it would seem that the more we have written about how to grow out the poverty, the more poverty has grown. Institutions devoted to development have proliferated, so has under-development. Despite the universal agreement on people centred development, the Human Development Report 2001 records that 1.2 billion people still live on less than one dollar a day and 2.8 billion on less than two dollars a day. Of the 4.6 billion people in the developing countries, over 854 million adults are still illiterate and 325 million children are out of school. Nearly one billion people do not have access to clean water and 2.4 billion people do not have sanitation facilities.

                Last year, speaking in this Economic and Social Council on African development, Mr. James Wolfensohn, President of the World Bank, stated that there was “a broad consensus and agreement on what needs to be done:”

First, improving governance and resolving conflicts;

Second, investing in people;             

Third, increasing competitiveness and diversifying economies in a globalized environment;

Fourth, increasing finance for development, and forging a new type of aid relationship – built on African ownership and African leadership.

To this list, three more elements should be added:

One, creating a genuinely fair and open trading which could address the priorities of the developing countries including unhindered access to major markets and commodity price stabilization;

Two, creating an equitable and stable international financial system where developing countries are able to secure a fair share of international liquidity for investment and growth and do not remain vulnerable to the volatilities of interest and exchange rate fluctuations in the developed countries; and

Three, ensuring good global governance, where international economic and financial decisions, by international financial institutions and the private sector, are made in a coherent, responsible and accountable way assuring common people, not only shareholders but also the poor in developing countries, that their destinies are not sacrificed to the dictates of profit, greed or the whims of the powerful.

I thank you, Mr. President.

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