The Jakarta Post, August 02, 2005
Ministers urged to deal with regional issues
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
Activists from some Asian countries began a two-day discussion on Monday ahead of
the Regional Ministerial Meeting on Millennium Development Goals (MDG) in Asia and
the Pacific, which is scheduled to commence on Wednesday here, in the hope of
pressing state leaders to produce concrete policies.
Coordinator of the Civil Society Network for MDG in Indonesia, Titik Hartini, said the
upcoming meeting was crucial to ensure that the real issues faced by the people at
the grassroots level are discussed.
"We don't want issues that are not the main problems faced by Asian countries to
dominate during the meeting, such as security. Sure it's important, but our real
problems are poverty, poor education, access to health services," she said on
Monday.
She said countries like the U.S., Australia, China and Japan might try to convert the
meeting into a discussion on subjects close to their own hearts, which would be
different to those of interest to most poor Asian countries.
"They need to go back to the root of the issue, which is the eradication of poverty and
the creation of a fairer world," she said.
The MDG were agreed upon during a UN conference held in September 2000 and
oblige the 189 signatory nations to achieve specific goals by 2015 in the fields of
poverty eradication, basic education, gender equality, infant and maternal mortality,
HIV/AIDS, environmental conservation, and the forging of global partnerships.
The countries are expected to deliver their reports on their progress in respect of the
MDG programs in September during the World Summit.
The Indonesian government published its first report in February last year, to the
criticism of activists for its failure to truthfully depict the real conditions at the local
level.
"A quick look shows that we are indeed well on the right track to achieving the
targets, but the figures are the macro indicators. You can't imagine the wide
disparities between regions here, which the report didn't reveal at all," said Titik.
Averaging growth and poverty eradication figures between more prosperous and
heavily populated regions, such as Jakarta, and underdeveloped ones like Papua or
Maluku was inappropriate and unfair.
"So the question is, are we really achieving the targets or just fooling the world with
our national figures?" she asked.
A similar situation is also taking place in the Philippines and other countries, where
improvements in one field are made at the expense of other fields.
Isagani Serrano from the Philippines Social Watch group said most reports by Asian
governments had failed to address the issue of sustainable development.
"Will it be sustainable if we create industries to reduce poverty by destroying forests
and contaminating the environment? Or improve the condition in one area but leave
others behind, thus widening the disparity?" he asked.
These, said Serrano, were the questions that this week's ministerial meeting had to
provide the answers to.
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