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Aid agency hails G8 aid pledge

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2009-07-11 00:58

L'AQUILA, Italy: An aid campaign group welcomed on Friday a food security initiative by the Group of Eight (G8) most developed countries to fight world hunger, while calling for clarity of their commitments to Africa.

In a press release, the ONE aid group hailed the pledge of the 20 billion-U.S. dollar aid announced at the end of the summit by the world's eight leading developed countries, which "includes significant steps to make progress on the effectiveness of aid for agriculture."

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"Of all the enemies of civilization, hunger is the dumbest, the most mocking of all we hold true, " said ONE co-founder Bono. "We are delighted President (Barack) Obama has returned to this, the most fundamental of rights, with a stimulus package for the agricultural sector that is smart and innovative."

"If there is real new money here backing these serious ideas then it is a great start to be built on in Pittsburgh," he added, referring to the G20 Summit to be held in Pittsburgh, U.S., in September.

But ONE called on all G8 nations -- Italy, France, Germany, Britain, Japan, Canada, Russia and the United States -- to clarify what their contribution would be to the initiative, and called for progress on a global mechanism to channel the funds by the time of the Pittsburgh summit.

"All governments should now come forward and prove the amounts they pledged here are new," said ONE's Europe Director Oliver Buston.

"They need to make clear what they will do, by when. Some countries have done this; others have not," Buston said, referring to the pledge the G8 countries made at the 2005 summit in Gleneagles, Scotland.

At that time, the G8 countries signed a declaration pledging to provide a total of 50 billion dollars in assistance to Africa by 2010.

But so far, several G8 members have failed to keep their promise, leading to a shortfall of 23 billion dollars.

Canada and Japan had imbursed more than they promised, while Italy and France performed the worst.

Italy, which hosted the 2009 G8 summit in the earthquake-hit central city of L'Aquila, only paid 3 percent of what it promised in 2005.

Leaders of G8 countries, five major developing nations and some African countries discussed issues including food security and water and sanitation on Friday, the last day of the G8 summit and its outreach meetings.