A/49/PV.64 General Assembly

As is indicated in document A/49/110 and Corr.1, the General Assembly is required, during the forty-ninth session, to appoint four members to fill the vacancies on the Joint Inspection Unit that will arise from the expiration of the terms of office, on 31 December 1995, of Mr. Andrzej Abraszewski (Poland), Mrs. Erica-Irene Daes (Greece), Mr. Richard Hennes (United States of America) and Mr. Kabongo Tunsala (Zaire). As is also indicated in that document, the President of the General Assembly, in accordance with article 3, paragraph l, of the statute of the Joint Inspection Unit, shall consult with Member States to draw up a list of four countries that would be requested to propose candidates for appointment to the Unit. Having held consultations with the regional groups, I should like to communicate to the Assembly the following information. The Chairman of the Group of Eastern European States has informed me by letter that the Group has endorsed Poland. As the Eastern European States have endorsed one country for one vacancy, that country — Poland — will be included in the list of countries to be drawn up. The Government of Poland will therefore be requested to propose a candidate. With regard to the African States, in the light of the information provided to the Secretariat that there were several candidates for one seat, I requested the assistance of the Chairman of the Group of African States, by letter dated 19 October, to secure an agreement regarding its candidature for one seat in the Joint Inspection Unit by 15 November. With regard to the Western European and Other States, I addressed a similar letter to the Chairman of the Group, requesting his assistance in securing an agreement regarding candidatures for two seats in the Joint Inspection Unit by 15 November. I call on the representative of Ghana as Chairman of the Group of African States.

The African Group was unable to select one candidate for the one Joint Inspection Unit post available to Africa. Therefore the African Group is submitting to the Assembly for decision the names of four candidates from Africa who are competing for the position. The candidates are Dr. Ahmed Mahmoud Yousif (Sudan), Mr. Ali Badara Tall (Burkina Faso),

I call on the representative of Denmark as Chairman of the Group of Western European and Other States.

In my capacity as Chairman of the Group of Western European and Other States, I have the honour to inform you, Mr. President, and, through you, the General Assembly that on 27 June 1994 the Group endorsed the candidatures for appointment to the Joint Inspection Unit of Dr. Wolfgang Münch (Germany) and Dr. Erica-Irene Daes (Greece). At a later stage the United States of America presented the candidature of Mr. John Fox. On 13 September 1994 the then Chairman of the Group of Western European and Other States communicated to the General Assembly and the other regional Groups the endorsement of Dr. Münch (Germany) and Mrs. Daes (Greece). This situation remains unchanged.

As the number of countries from among the African States and the Western European and Other States exceeds the number of remaining vacancies, I should like, in order to draw up a list of the three remaining countries, to consult with Member States through the procedure of holding an advisory vote by secret ballot to select one country from the African States and two countries from the Western European and Other States that would be requested to propose candidates for appointment to the Joint Inspection Unit. Although this advisory vote would not be an election, we would follow the Assembly’s rules of procedure governing elections. Are there any objections? As I see none, I take it that the General Assembly agrees to this procedure. It is was so decided.

In accordance with existing practice, the required number of countries receiving the largest number of votes, and not less than a majority of the votes of those present and voting, shall be included in the list of countries to be drawn up. May I take it that the General Assembly agrees to that procedure also? It was so decided.

I draw the attention of members to the fact that the following countries already have nationals serving on the Joint Inspection Unit: Algeria, for the African States; and Italy, for the Western European and Other States. The names of these States should therefore not appear on the ballot papers. Nor should the name of Poland which, as mentioned earlier, will be included in the list of countries to be drawn up. Before I request the Secretariat to distribute the ballot papers, I should like to remind members of the Assembly that we are now going to proceed to the selection of three countries: one from among the African States and two from among the Western European and Other States, which will be requested to propose candidates to fill the vacancies on the Joint Inspection Unit. The Assembly is not, I repeat, not appointing members to the Joint Inspection Unit at this time. It is only selecting three countries which will be requested to propose candidates. Therefore, names of countries, and not names of individuals, should appear on the ballot papers. I should like to repeat the names of the countries that wish to present candidatures. From the African States they are: Burkina Faso, Sudan, Togo and Uganda. From the Western European and Other States they are: Germany and Greece, which have also been endorsed by the Group of Western European and Other States, and the United States of America. Ballot papers marked “A” and “B” will now be distributed. May I request representatives to use only those ballot papers. May I further request members of the Assembly to write on the ballot paper marked “A” the name of one A ballot paper containing more than one name from among the African States and two names from among the Western European and Other States will be declared invalid. Names of States on the ballot paper which are outside the relevant region shall not be counted.

The result of the voting is as follows: African States Number of ballot papers: 174 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 174 Abstentions: 1 Number of Members voting: 173 Required majority: 87 Number of votes obtained: Burkina Faso 79 Sudan 35 Togo 33 Uganda 26 Western European and Other States Number of ballot papers: 174 Number of invalid ballots: 0 Number of valid ballots: 174 Abstentions: 1 Number of Members voting: 173 Required majority: 87 Number of votes obtained: Germany 127 United States of America 107 Greece 102

Since one seat remains to be filled among the African States, we shall now proceed, in accordance with rule 94 of the rules of procedure, to a second round of balloting, restricted to the two States from the African States that were not selected but obtained the largest number of votes in the previous ballot — namely, Burkina Faso and Sudan. Ballot papers for the African States will now be distributed. May I request representatives to write on the ballot papers the name of the State for which they wish to vote. A ballot paper containing the name of a State other than Burkina Faso or the Sudan, or containing the name of more than one State, will be declared invalid.

The result of the voting is as follows: Number of ballot papers: 176 Number of invalid ballots: 5 Number of valid ballots: 171 Abstentions: 0 Numbers of members voting: 171 Required majority: 86 Number of votes obtained: Burkina Faso 130 Sudan 41

I thank the members for their advice and assistance. In accordance with article 3, paragraph 1, of the statute of the Joint Inspection Unit, Burkina Faso, After holding the consultations described in article 3, paragraph 2 of the statute of the Joint Inspection Unit, including consultations with the President of the Economic and Social Council and with the Secretary-General in his capacity as Chairman of the Administrative Committee on Coordination, I shall propose a list of candidates to the Assembly for appointment. I thank the tellers for their assistance. We have thus concluded this stage of our consideration of sub-item (j) of agenda item 17.

Development has emerged as the most urgent and compelling challenge facing the United Nations and the entire international community. Development and peace are inseparable. In a real sense, development is the other name for peace. Thus, without development there can be no peace, and an agenda for peace is incomplete without an agenda for development. It is against this backdrop that my delegation welcomes the recent report of the Secretary-General and his recommendations on an Agenda for Development, contained in document A/49/665. We commend the Secretary-General for his clear and comprehensive recommendations following up on his report (A/48/935) on an Agenda for Development of 6 May 1994. We have noted that his latest report and recommendations take into account the relevant views and comments on that report, including the statements made during the general debate of the current session. Before presenting our comments on the Secretary- General’s latest report, my delegation would like to associate itself with the statement by Ambassador We concur with the Secretary-General that development should be recognized as the foremost and most far-reaching task of our time. It should therefore command the sustained support and concerned commitment of the international community. We acknowledge the multidimensional nature of development. We recognize the importance of the five dimensions identified in the preliminary report of the Secretary- General on an Agenda for Development: peace, the economy, the environment, social justice and democracy. At the same time, we must stress the complementarity of all those dimensions. Development must be viewed comprehensively. Moreover, for development to be sustainable, all its dimensions must be addressed. The consensus on the centrality of development and its significance for our common future should serve to revive and revitalize international development cooperation. Within this framework, the contribution of the multilateral system to development must be strengthened. In particular, the role of the United Nations system in development must be enhanced. In this regard, we concur with the recommendation that the United Nations must realize its original mandate in the social and economic fields and bring development issues to the centre of its activities. To this end, the United Nations should be further reformed and revitalized. We attach great importance to the role of the General Assembly in forging consensus on and providing political impetus to international development cooperation. We welcome the Secretary-General’s recommendations in this regard. We hope that they will provide an opportunity for constant assessment of development activities and other aspects of international development cooperation. My delegation would like to underscore the need for further measures aimed at revitalizing the Economic and Social Council in order for it to play the important role assigned to it under the Charter. The recommendations of the Secretary-General should be accorded due consideration in order to enhance the Council’s role and effectiveness in the areas of policy and programme coordination, as well as in providing intergovernmental oversight of operational activities for development. My delegation agrees with the Secretary-General on the need for adequate and predictable funding for United Nations development programmes on a scale commensurate with the priority attached to development activities. We note with serious concern that the impact of United Nations development programmes and activities is undermined by financial constraints and unpredictable funding. To ensure the effectiveness of operational activities for development, we, the Member States, must fulfil our financial obligations and demonstrate our commitment to the challenge of development. We support the recommendations of the Secretary- General relating to the establishment of a favourable international economic environment for the promotion of development in the developing countries, in particular the least developed countries. My delegation supports the recommendations that past commitments relating to development assistance should be fulfilled. In addition, we support the view that the overall level of development assistance should be increased in order to provide the new and additional resources required for peace-keeping, humanitarian assistance and environmental protection. The importance of a comprehensive and viable solution to the debt problem cannot be overemphasized. We therefore support the recommendations of the Secretary-General in this regard. In particular, the debts of the least developed and poorest countries should be cancelled outright. This has been our longstanding position. It is our view that the proposed international conference on the financing of development should address the debt problem in a comprehensive and action-oriented manner. The Secretary-General has identified in his report priority common goals, including Africa, the empowerment of women and poverty eradication, which could become the focus of the efforts of the United Nations funds and programmes with their agency partners. In this regard, we support his recommendations to provide greater momentum In conclusion, we wish to endorse the recommendation to develop a framework for the implementation of goals established in United Nations conferences. In particular, we support the suggestion that: “Goals and targets should be synthesized, costed, prioritized and placed in a reasonable time perspective for implementation.” (A/49/665, p. 17) That recommendation and other key recommendations of the Secretary-General should be considered in detail by an open-ended working group, whose establishment we support.

It is indeed a great pleasure for me to congratulate the Secretary-General on the preparation of his report “An Agenda for development: recommendations”. While this year’s high- level segment of the Economic and Social Council provided us with an exceptional opportunity to discuss some of the most relevant issues concerning the future tasks of the United Nations system in the field of development, the Secretary-General’s report will help us give these tasks the more specific shape of agreed guidelines and recommendations. We therefore are looking forward impatiently to working with other delegations in order to achieve a consensus on the role of the United Nations in the sphere of development, based on the Secretary-General’s report and the provisions of the Charter. Two years ago, we focused in the General Assembly on another agenda — “An Agenda for Peace”. Poland is of the view that the document before us should be on an equal footing and have comparable rank with the previous one, once it is approved, and perhaps further improved, by all of us. As we stated during the debate in the Economic and Social Council, Poland fully supports the concept of development in its five dimensions, as outlined by the Secretary-General. The United Nations, in promoting the goals of development in this light, is in a unique position, as a universal forum, to facilitate a better understanding of emerging problems and to draft norms and standards in response to the constantly changing global No one should question or challenge those key tasks in the area of development. Their implementation requires an integrated approach, which, as my delegation has proposed on various occasions, in its institutional form should be translated into the merger of the Second and Third Committees of the General Assembly. We are also of the opinion that the development agenda of the United Nations requires further streamlining. The proposal that the goals and targets of United Nations conferences be synthesized, costed, prioritized and placed in a reasonable time perspective for implementation will serve this purpose. Turning to the operational aspects of United Nations activities, we acknowledge that the system has many strengths but also many weaknesses. The assets are, inter alia, its global network of representation, its expertise in many specific areas and its neutrality in action. Some of its weaknesses derive, paradoxically, from the same characteristics. That is why there is an urgent need for more focused operations by the part of the United Nations, which should concentrate on the areas where it has comparative advantages — and the Secretary-General has rightly pointed out some of them. The mitigation of natural or man-made disasters and a requirement for immediate assistance to refugees are the best examples of cases for which operations of the United Nations, with its global network and political neutrality, are best suited. Those assets would be strengthened also by better coordination among all United Nations bodies and organs. In thematic areas, the recent attempts to coordinate United Nations agencies’ activities in the field of HIV/AIDS require further encouragement and should serve as an example in other areas. The United Nations has vast possibilities for forging links between peace-keeping, humanitarian assistance and development. Indeed, quite often the world community is confronted with a situation where a smooth transition from military conflict to sustained growth is needed. We wish to reiterate here our position on the need for the interaction of the Security Council and the Economic and Social Council. This would provide the United Nations with better prospects for carrying out preventive diplomacy in the economic and social spheres. Poland has been advocating We noted with satisfaction that in the Secretary- General’s previous report on the Agenda for Development special attention was placed on the link between development and human rights. We reiterate our proposal that the Secretary-General prepare an agenda for human rights. The observance of human rights is no longer considered as a moral imperative only. As His Excellency Mr. Julius Nyerere, the former President of Tanzania, said during the World Hearings, “If I were a donor country, I would never give aid to a dictator”. This is also an important factor conducive to development. Our own experience in this respect, based on a unique simultaneous transition towards a democratic and free-market society, definitely would be worthy of careful examination by the United Nations. Therefore it is with a certain regret that we note that the problem of transition — probably one of the most fascinating political processes and social phenomenon of the current decade — is considered only from the standpoint of additional resources for international assistance to countries undergoing this transition. Not only is an imaginative approach needed that would enable these countries to rapidly integrate into the world economy, but this process must also be seen from the perspective of its impact on the state of the world economy. This impact has two dimensions. First, it provides opportunities for new economic expansion, new markets and new investment possibilities. Secondly, on a political level, it ends a long era of ambiguity over modes of development. There is no longer any doubt that sustained growth and, consequently, sustainable development can be achieved only on the basis of sound macroeconomic policies that are conducive to the flourishing of free One of the major issues in our debate on the Agenda for Development is the interaction between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions. The Secretary- General proposes several areas in which joint initiatives could take place. It is of great importance that this cooperation be developed also on the country level. Indeed, United Nations Resident Coordinators should develop cooperative arrangements with representatives of the Bretton Woods institutions in order to identify areas of comparative advantage for all the represented agencies of the United Nations family and thus achieve, in the most efficient way possible, the best results when assisting each individual country. We note also, with much satisfaction, that some cooperative arrangements between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions are already in effect at Headquarters level. What I have particularly in mind is the functioning of the Global Environment Facility, which is operated by two United Nations agencies and the World Bank. It will be fascinating to watch more closely how this cooperation develops and what results are achieved. The particular way in which the Facility functions is due to its mixed system of representation, voting power and financial responsibility. This is an interesting compromise, and it might be worth considering if this kind of solution might also better serve certain United Nations organs as well. At this time of rising globalization the United Nations provides us with a unique forum to build a feeling of coherence in the global community so as to avoid, as was brilliantly noted during the World Hearings by Jean Marie Guehenno, Permanent Representative of France to the Western European Union, the creation of a world in which individuals would feel crushed by a world community that they could not control. We hope that it is our common wish to let the United Nations play this role, and we need an Agenda for Development to help us achieve this goal.

The present consideration of “An agenda for development” is, in our view, one of the most relevant issues in the work of the forty-ninth session of the General Assembly. At the outset, allow me to express my delegation’s full support for the statement made by the Permanent Representative of Algeria on behalf of the Group of 77. We appreciate the efforts made by the Secretary- General in the preparation of his report (A/48/665), which summarizes the debate and presents a set of recommendations that deserve our attention. As we have said on previous occasions, the end of the cold war and the lessening of the danger of global conflict, which until recently consumed a large part of the resources and potential of the international community and of this Organization, offer a new and urgent opportunity for the United Nations to devote itself more energetically to the promotion of international economic cooperation for development as one of its high-priority objectives. Nevertheless, the emphasis placed on the implementation of the concepts contained in the report, “An Agenda for Peace”, and of related ideas still diverts most of the Organization’s efforts. In this regard, we view with equal concern the idea of considering United Nations activities in the field of development as a mere extension of its functions in the political, military and humanitarian fields. The concepts of preventive and curative development place the global problem of development in that restricted dimension and sidestep the need for long-term action to eliminate the causes of structural underdevelopment and create an international climate that would complement national development policies and strategies. In fact, taken as a continuous and multidimensional process, development is an indispensable condition for peace. Hence, the preparation of the United Nations “An agenda for development” should not be oriented as if it were a mere supplement to “An Agenda for Peace”, but rather a fundamental instrument to articulate concrete proposals for efforts towards the necessary development of the countries of the third world. Neither is it necessary or appropriate to try to “reinvent” development. We must resist the temptation of succumbing to a sterile and counterproductive debate that Cuba supports the efforts to continue improving system-wide coordination as a necessary element for ensuring the attainment of development goals. In addition, it is still essential for that process to be implemented in a way that preserves and respects the independence and the mandates of United Nations organs, agencies, funds and programmes, in conformity with the Charter and the legislative mandates derived from the restructuring process in the economic and social sectors. All of this is essential, with regard both to the different intergovernmental mechanisms and the restructuring of the Secretariat itself. Measures taken in the context of the restructuring process in those sectors and falling within the framework of resolution 48/162 underscore the role of the organs of intergovernmental machinery, while also being geared towards the revitalization of their work. Hence, we consider it neither necessary nor proper to continue an institutional restructuring exercise with ideas that have already been rejected by the majority of Member States. Persisting in such efforts would only divert us from our central priorities in the field of development. In our view, “An agenda for development” must focus on the search for ways and means of making it possible to give impetus to long-term economic growth and the sustained development of the developing countries, thus creating the bases for ensuring an environment of stability, security and peace at both the national and international levels. On the basis of the existing international consensus, the Agenda must contain effective proposals that foster the implementation of commitments undertaken. It is also indispensable to establish the parameters for a new type of relationship between developing and developed countries in which the former would also be dynamic agents of the development process. Moreover, elaboration of the Agenda must also involve issues of trade, finance, the transfer of resources The United Nations is in the best position to deal broadly with this range of issues and to provide general policy guidelines to make development its top-priority issue. This is even more important because of the urgent need to make United Nations development activities long- term in nature, enabling them to go beyond the limited framework of the struggle against poverty or emergency assistance. The commemoration of the fiftieth anniversary of the Organization gives it an exceptional opportunity to adopt a coherent development agenda, which would be primarily a platform of practical measures and would renew the international commitment to establish a truly just and non-discriminatory form of cooperation for development. We can countenance no further delay in finding a solution to the desperation of peoples who see the gap growing ever wider between the affluent and developed societies and that other world, that of the majority, of impoverished and underdeveloped societies. The voice of the United Nations must be heard once again in a field in which it has remained silent for too long. This debate, and the process that it inaugurates, should give us that opportunity. That is our will and our hope.

My Government would like to take this opportunity to express its thanks to the Secretary-General for the diligence with which he has pursued the General Assembly’s mandate to prepare an Agenda for Development. The report which is now before us is the product of a lengthy series of discussions and debates in this body, in the Economic and Social Council and at the innovative World Hearings on Development, and of the input of specialized agencies and other members of the international community with an interest in development. The report and its predecessors deal with both the conceptual and the practical aspects of development. The challenge for the international community has always been to find the appropriate institutional framework to bring together diverse perspectives on development and to provide a forum in which they can continue to be discussed. The United Nations has, as the report makes clear, a unique role in this enterprise, for it is the only organization in which all countries — rich and poor, large For New Zealand a number of principles must underlie the international approach to development, and these will underpin the approach we take to the specific proposals for change set out in the Secretary-General’s report. Any change must improve the capacity of the international system to deal with development issues. This means that we must avoid adding new layers of institutions without a clear understanding of the additional contribution they would make. Secondly, any change must strike an appropriate balance between efficiency and representation in the bodies which govern development programmes or give policy direction to the Secretariat. This means that there is no point in compressing the governing institutions of the Organization still further if that will reduce the authority with which they speak. Thirdly, any change must reflect the likely availability of resources to fund new programmes or arrangements. There is little point in elaborating new structures, dependent on significant increases in the funds committed to development, if such funds will not be readily available. The Secretary-General looks at three levels of international cooperation for development in his report. I should like to say a few brief words on each of these. First, on revitalizing international development cooperation, in his May report the Secretary-General set out five dimensions of development. These provide a useful guide to assessing the extent to which development policies are achieving their desired ends. Growth cannot be an end in itself. It must give rise to a more equitable and sustainable society if it is to continue. And that means that all sectors of society, not just Governments, must have a commitment to the development process. In the international context, preference must be given to policies which support this outcome. We agree with the Secretary-General that a favourable, growth-oriented international setting for development is vital. Within that framework, we have to work to ensure that those resources which are committed to development assistance are delivered effectively, taking into account the variation in nature and scale of the development needs of recipient The Secretary-General identifies the Economic and Social Council as by right having a central role in the articulation of a new international consensus on development. Many of the proposals he puts forward for the further revitalization of the Council would repay examination in more detail. We would be sympathetic to the idea of an international development assistance review committee which he sets out. Associated with the recent decision to reduce the size of the governing bodies of the United Nations operational programmes was the commitment that the broad strategic overview of those programmes would be provided by the Economic and Social Council. The Secretary-General’s concept would go some way towards realizing that ideal. We can see merit in providing the Economic and Social Council with some continuity of existence outside its regular session. But we would need to look carefully at the advantages of adding another limited-membership body to those which already exist in this field. We certainly agree that if the regular functioning of the Economic and Social Council was to change in this way, the Council itself would need to meet more regularly to be able to discharge its responsibilities effectively. In considering proposals for closer cooperation between the United Nations and the international financial institutions, we need to bear in mind that these institutions are fundamentally different from the United Nations in their nature, governance and core business. This of course does not relieve either side from the need to cooperate. Clearly, both sides should seize and create opportunities for substantive consultation. There are some limitations on the character of that cooperation, but in the establishment of the Global Environment Facility, the international community has demonstrated that it can develop novel ways to take advantage of the strengths of three different organizations. This is an encouraging precedent. There is also scope for cooperation at the country as well as the regional and global levels. Cooperation between the international financial institutions and the United Nations could provide a basis We welcome the Secretary-General’s proposals aimed at improved programme coordination through regular meetings of senior officials in the economic and social sector. We may not yet be at the end of the road in finding the best structure for the Secretariat, but this proposal will facilitate coordination in the meantime. We also welcome the emphasis the Secretary-General places on the empowerment of women. The inclusiveness which should be at the heart of development cannot be taken very far if women do not have the central role which the Secretary-General identifies. But fine words are not enough. The United Nations itself must show the way by giving practical application in United Nations programmes to the principles of women in development. We welcome the Secretary-General’s acknowledgement that the visibility, coordination, programming and accountability of the United Nations on these issues must be improved. The Secretary-General has completed his half of the bargain. He has given us an Agenda for Development. Now it is for the Member States to respond, and in responding to develop a new consensus on development issues that will take us into the twenty-first century.

The delegation of Bolivia wishes to share with members some of its thoughts on the Agenda for Development and the Secretary-General’s report on the subject. We note that there is a broad consensus in the Assembly to the effect that “development should be recognized as the foremost and most far-reaching task of our time” (A/49/665, para. 4). There also seems to be no major differences with regard to the affirmation of other general principles. None the less, problems arise at the stage of project implementation and assessments, which are carried out after a certain time, and which almost invariably lead to dissatisfaction with the results. Bolivia considers that, like the maintenance of peace, cooperation is a fundamental duty in the international life of States. It is the corollary of the total global interdependence and the recognition of the common origin and destiny of the human race. Although in the past cooperation and solidarity were confined to expressions of a moral, religious or philosophical nature, in our day, the Charter of the United Nations and innumerable bilateral and Cooperation is, therefore, both an obligation and a right of States — hence the importance of arriving at solid agreements for the implementation stage. Insecurity, hunger, disease, illiteracy, poverty, environmental degradation, drug addiction, discrimination and injustice — all are problems common to all peoples and they therefore require urgent and coordinated action by all Governments and their specialized agencies. World public opinion should be very clear on the fact that by international cooperation we do not mean the magnanimity of the developed countries towards the rest of the world, but the duty to meet common interests whose satisfaction is essential to ensuring survival on all sides and making possible a brighter future for all. In this endeavour, the United Nations is the universal body created for the purpose. On this occasion, we shall not invent totally new formulas with regard to what has already been said in the past about cooperation for development. Nor would it be possible to change or replace what has already been affirmed on the matter. We all agree that the ideas and documents emanating from the United Nations since its inception contain a valuable collective heritage that must now at last be implemented. On the basis of that premise, it is my delegation’s understanding that the Agenda for Development proposed by the Secretary-General has made it possible to further our understanding of these problems, which we urgently need to do, and that it will become yet another point of reference, in addition to the ones already in existence but appropriate to the nature of the problems and the shape of the new international order in the post-cold-war period. In the case of Bolivia, our overall approach to cooperation is complemented by the importance we attach to the participation of the people. We believe that in the final analysis, the future of peoples and their material and spiritual well-being, depends only on their own endeavours as the subjects and the objects of development. As the President of Bolivia, Mr. Sanchez de Lozada said in this Hall, participation by the organized community is not only necessary but vital for the success of our programmes. It must be the community itself For this reason it is extremely encouraging for Bolivia to see that within the United Nations system there is also a trend rightfully towards giving pride of place to organized individual and collective participation as a vital factor of creative and positive change. This conviction is not in contradiction of the importance we attach to international cooperation; rather, it gives cooperation a new life. Ultimately, all societies in the world, large or small, have needed external transfers of resources in order to launch their own development process. No country in the world could totally do without external cooperation, since an input of material and human resources from outside is always indispensable. However, cooperation — rather than being based on exogenous factors — should be geared, with special emphasis, towards those countries that are best able to ensure that the cooperation is put to productive use, with the greatest multiplier effect and free of mismanagement or waste, thanks to the participation and control of the organized community. Those countries that implement participation by the people will be able to progress effectively and ensure that resources are not misused or squandered on absurd projects or misdirected along the channels of corruption. These criteria for participation should be incorporated into the policies of the main institutions for cooperation and multilateral credits for development. My country trusts that the United Nations 50 years of experience in the field of international cooperation will serve to correct the errors of the past and improve the standards achieved for the benefit of all. The Agenda for Development should fulfil that mission.

I should like to thank the Secretary-General for his report on an Agenda for Development, in keeping with the General Assembly’s request to submit his recommendations on this important sphere of international relations. Many observations have been made about development: what it is; what affects it; and how to address the dilemmas that progress creates. Given the variety of views, we are pleased that the report of the Secretary-General recognizes the primary responsibility of each nation for its own development and the concomitant responsibility of Governments and the societies they represent to direct their efforts. National policies should be the focus of all multilateral development efforts, not vice versa. Development models have often revealed their limitations and even their errors. But with experience it has also been possible to identify the factors that are critical to every contemporary development process. Two elements seem relevant in this respect. First, the sustainability of development as a dynamic process seems to be increasingly dependent on whether or not a national economy can adapt to global interdependence. At the same time, it is obvious that multilateral cooperation must facilitate and improve the way we manage factors that are beyond the capacity for national action and define its efficiency. This is indispensable in particular with respect to the world-wide macroeconomic context, to the permanent redistribution of comparative advantages, and to rectifying the imbalances associated with these forces in the areas of trade, finance and technology. Secondly, because of that, reaching agreement between developed and developing countries on efforts in these areas is an imperative of the contemporary economy and a determining factor in development. Development is not merely a matter of cooperation or assistance in the traditional sense of transfers of resources or special treatment. Even though such policies will continue to be necessary, the long-term viability of development requires that the international economic system itself be organized to minimize the need to use such corrective or compensatory mechanisms. In this context, we agree with the Secretary-General that the United Nations system must make full use of its technical capacities and its status as a political forum. In future, designing a new framework for cooperation for development should be its primary function. In our view, its central role in this process is beyond dispute. Clearly, the machinery of the entire United Nations system for consultation and for forging agreement needs to be adapted to these responsibilities. The tasks of the Organization in the operational area seem to us to be different. International cooperation and assistance can relieve problems of the most varied kinds. While necessary, they have been shown to be insufficient to bring about the structural changes associated with economic development. We agree that the United Nations has a special responsibility in this sphere, so as to support national development programmes. Yet we feel that neither financing nor coordination of operational activities are really the crux of the problem of development. We see the most significant contribution of the United Nations as fostering what the Secretary-General calls “a more effective management of global interdependence and the promotion of an integrated approach to economic and social development”. (A/49/665, p. 17) In conclusion, I wish to endorse the views of the Group of 77 on how best to follow up the report of the Secretary-General. We are certain that the intergovernmental process on which we are embarking will prove fruitful and constructive. The agenda for development that emerges from it will set a course for the Organization.

The United States warmly welcomes the Secretary-General’s excellent report containing recommendations on the Agenda for Development. It is a model of clarity, succinctness and comprehensiveness. More important than its commendable form, however, is its substantive stress on the absolute necessity of country-driven, bottom-up development that is propelled by national priorities worked out through a partnership involving Government, civil society and strong private-enterprise sectors. Accordingly, we agree that the focus of an Agenda for Development must be on building national capacities to plan, manage and implement development programmes in each country, recognizing that it is each country which bears primary responsibility for its own development. This is the principal message the Secretary-General’s report conveys. We applaud it, and regard as particularly notable the Secretary-General’s insights in identifying the five essential dimensions, or pillars, of development and describing the critical interconnections between them. We fully endorse both the conceptual and the practical underpinnings of these elements — peace, the economy, environmental protection, social justice and democracy — as basic for development. We also concur with the special emphasis on empowering women and reducing poverty as major objectives of development. The Secretary-General has provided a worthy complement to the Agenda for Peace, and we hope it can provide the basis for agreement on realistic, practical proposals for United Nations reforms and other initiatives that we can begin to implement promptly. To accomplish this, however, we must avoid becoming distracted by controversies over proposals that, while attracting strong feelings, both pro and con, do not as yet reflect the basis for broad consensus needed for their adoption and effective application. Among these problematic issues, I call attention to four which continue to present difficulties to my delegation: an international conference on financing development; massive permanent debt reduction; deadlines for development-assistance targets; and funding United Nations development assistance with assessed contributions. These issues are marked by substantial The suggestions most deserving of our consideration cluster around four main concerns: the coherent implementation of major United Nations conference recommendations; further reform of the Economic and Social Council to make it an effective governor of United Nations activities; strengthened United Nations inter-agency cooperation; and enhanced effectiveness of United Nations operational activities. From this perspective, the report’s recommendations that are of greatest interest to the United States are those that address the following issues: coherently implementing United Nations conference recommendations by synthesizing, costing, prioritizing and scheduling their goals and targets within a common framework; further reforming the Economic and Social Council to enable it to serve as a unifying governing body for United Nations operational programmes and activities and as a mechanism for reviewing development assistance and identifying impending humanitarian emergencies; creating an expanded Bureau of the Economic and Social Council to meet between Council sessions — a de facto executive committee; using the Administrative Committee on Coordination (ACC) to strengthen the coherence and impact of United Nations agency work — a de facto “cabinet” to drive coordination, cooperation and collaboration; and creating a more integrated, efficient and effective structure for United Nations development activities, with frequent meetings of all senior United Nations officials in the economic and social sectors — a de facto operations coordinating committee for development activities, chaired by the Secretary-General and organized by the Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme. Important related suggestions contained in the text of the report, but not listed separately, include: a call, in paragraph 55, for better donor collaboration through aid consortiums, consultative groups and round tables, especially in regard to compensatory and complementary efforts accompanying structural adjustment programmes; the recommendation, in paragraph 82, that consideration be given to a global watch system to provide early warning of impending emergencies and to lay down guidelines for The United States hopes that there can be quick agreement in principle on amplification and planning for implementation of these suggestions, which would go a long way towards our mutual goal of further enhancing the effectiveness of the United Nations in the economic and social fields. It is particularly important, at this juncture in world affairs, with examination of the international economic architecture just getting under way, that the United Nations show itself to be a real contender with regard to major, long-term contributions to the global economic development effort. It is critical that the United Nations pursue this objective without appearing to instigate unproductive controversy about the long-established assignment of roles and responsibilities among international organizations and institutions. Rather, the United Nations must be seen as promoting practical cooperation, coordination and collaboration within the main body of the Organization itself, between the Organization and the specialized agencies and programmes, between those agencies and programmes themselves and between the Bretton Woods institutions and the rest of the United Nations system. The suggestions that I have highlighted are those that the United States believes are most likely to help bring this about. The unifying theme in bringing about practical collaboration among the diverse organizations and institutions engaged in supporting development lies in reliance upon the national sustainable development planning process first recommended in the Earth Summit’s Agenda 21. Major donors, organizations and programmes — bilateral as well as multilateral — can best work together by cooperating in support of well- defined national strategies that arise from sound, responsible, democratic processes at country levels. Such an approach should be the basis for a spectrum of support from development assistance organizations. The United Nations Development Programme, other relevant United Nations agencies and other appropriate donors would contribute to building the national capacity necessary for initiating and maintaining national development planning processes; the World Bank and other multilateral development banks would preferentially select, for financing, projects that fall within these Throughout the text of the Secretary-General’s report there is language that speaks strongly of the intrinsic value of the country-driven, bottom-up, domestically created and maintained national sustainable development planning processes. This serves as the report’s organizing principle. We believe that it would serve well as the organizing principle of environmentally sound, socially equitable, economically sustainable development.

My delegation regards the debate that is taking place in these high-level plenary meetings to consider ways of promoting and giving political impetus to the Agenda for Development as the culmination of the efforts in the first stage of the collective development of a new conceptual approach to a future, more pragmatic agenda for an international partnership in the economic, social and related fields, based on integrated goals and harmonized long-term priorities in the area of operational and other, broader activities. This task must be undertaken in the interests of worldwide development in the context of the ongoing institutional reforms and the forthcoming financial reforms in the United Nations system. We commend the participation in this dialogue of the Bretton Woods institutions and of scientific and business circles and non-governmental organizations. This increases the chances that the principles, the concrete recommendations and the proposals that we hope will be developed on the basis of consensus will be supported outside the United Nations system — and this is important with regard to implementation of the Agenda for Development. Our delegation, in its participation in the discussions on the first, conceptual, report, “An agenda for development” (A/48/935), welcomed the broad vision of development in its five main dimensions — peace, the economy, the environment, justice and democracy — and in their interrelationship. We note with satisfaction that that concept is fully reflected in the recommendations contained in the Secretary-General’s second report. We believe that the principles, the essence and the tasks of the emerging Agenda for Development should be set out in a more In the case of Belarus, this would foster an appropriate direction for reforms in the country and would encourage correction in our national strategies and methods of switching to sustainable development and development on the basis of an open, competitive and socially oriented market economy, where questions of employment, social security, social integration, justice and the assurance of other human rights were the foundation of democracy and stability in our society. In this connection, we cannot but put it on record that in both of the Secretary-General’s reports on the Agenda for Development there is inadequate reflection of national policy and its influence on the international conditions for worldwide development. In the case of document A/49/665, I refer to Chapter II A. We agree with the conclusions that national development can succeed only if it is driven by national priorities, that each State bears primary responsibility for its own development, and that development requires competent governmental leadership, a coherent national policy and strong popular support. We agree with the overall thrust of the recommendations concerning the important role of Governments, non-governmental organizations, the private sector and other social movements in new approaches to development. However, each country and its State structures and people are entitled to decide their priorities and their development models. All the actors — not just the State — should bear their share of responsibility for the social and environmental cost of economic progress. They should also be partners in the efforts, undertaken in conditions of democracy and sustainable development, to enhance the well-being of the people and the country as a whole and to protect the poor and the deprived. We fully support the position that the main asset of any country is its people and that the individual and his well-being should be the object of development. This gives development its meaning, and justice is one of the main pillars of society. Unquestionably, sustainable development is possible only where there are favourable internal and international conditions. Both factors are necessary for the implementation of a national development policy in conditions of growing interdependence, pragmatic approaches and an active State role in those areas where the market, especially when it On the other hand, we support the argument that national economic problems and successes have a global dimension. In this context, the success of international cooperation for development is inseparable from a responsible macroeconomic policy, especially in those countries with major economies and in international business circles. It is also inseparable from democratization of the machinery for harmonizing the economic policy with the economic policy of countries that have more vulnerable economies. The new vision of the future Agenda for Development, which appeared during the course of the earlier discussions in the Economic and Social Council, in the course of the World Hearings, and during the general political discussion and debates in the Second and Third Committees at the forty-ninth session of the General Assembly, strengthens our conviction that no single international institution or no single country can by itself achieve new global and national development goals. What is necessary is a new partnership, a new spirit of cooperation and new pragmatic approaches based on solidarity, common interests, a joint but differentiated responsibility, and a mutually profitable division of labour. We welcome the fact that it is precisely in the United Nations that the development of an integrated approach to the problems of peace and development was initiated, and that it has been precisely in the United Nations that the formation of new frameworks of international cooperation for development has begun on the basis of a genuine global partnership. However, as we see it, neither the awareness of a new development paradigm nor the formation of a new paradigm for international cooperation for implementing the future Agenda for Development is possible without taking into account the new realities, and without having an optimistic view of the future. That is the first requirement, on the basis of which we shall be participating in the future negotiations on the Agenda for Development. The second extremely important requirement is that the framework for the new partnership should not be based on the theory of “three worlds” current during the period of East-West confrontation. It should not inherit the conflictual relations between the North and the South, that is, donor and recipient, which arose during the period of the early post-colonial period and the cold war, nor should it make use of outworn clichés, politicized terminology and the On the basis of these two requirements, I should like on a preliminary basis to make what we consider to be important conceptual and specific observations. First, our delegation notes the presence of a link between the United Nations International Development Strategy for the 1990s, the emerging Agenda for Development and Agenda 21, as well as other special interregional, regional and sectoral United Nations development programmes. However, the obligations agreed to and the policy for implementing them, including those that are contained in the Declaration on International Economic Cooperation, in particular the ones concerning the revitalization of economic growth and the development of developing countries, should be corrected in the light of more universal principles of new, just, global partnership. In particular, I have in mind the principles embodied in the Rio Declaration that was adopted at the Earth Summit — the Conference on Environment and Development — as well as other principles and obligations agreed at the recent Vienna and Cairo Conferences and those that will emerge from the Copenhagen and Beijing World Conferences. The Agenda for Development should take into account to a far greater degree the new positive trends and the potential of all regions and countries to achieve national and international integrated development goals. This refers in particular to the growing potential for self- development and the cooperation between the developing regions demonstrated by a number of newly industrialized and rapidly developing countries in South-East Asia and Latin America. Expanding interregional cooperation, not only along South-South lines, but also in other interregional directions, the emerging machinery for transcontinental and open intraregional cooperation can, along with donor assistance and the new development strategy, facilitate the solution of the problems of the least developed countries, including small States and the poorest countries, especially in Africa. I wish to emphasize that the implementation of the Agenda for Development will be possible only when the interrelationship and the joint responsibilities involved have been acknowledged. The lessons of the implementation of the three International Development Strategies show that the donor-recipient model leads to a strengthening of the creditor-debtor relationship, which in the long term leads nowhere. At least, our country would However, the realities of the new world are such that the poorest and smallest States, the least developed countries and some new States must request international support and assistance. If these and other countries are willing, or are forced, to continue to rely on the international community for traditional donor and creditor relationships, then the principles of those special relations should not extend to the future strategy for the implementation of all the components of the Agenda for Development. A more attractive concept is the Japanese strategy, combining differentiated and integrated approaches on the basis of the acknowledgement of the growing variety and increasing differences between countries and regions of the South, as was indicated not only by the delegations of Japan and Germany, on behalf of the European Union, and several other donor countries, but also by delegations from the traditional recipient countries. Secondly, we cannot fail to agree with the argument contained in the Secretary-General’s report that “Countries in transition to a market economy face special problems stemming from the need for rapid but sensitive transformation in fundamental economic organization, lack of competitiveness in international markets, economic depression and other factors.” (A/49/665, para. 29). However, the only recommendation, namely that the international community should support these countries with additional resources — and, I would add, support them in a timely fashion — seems to us to be one-sided. It does not resolve the foregoing problems, not to mention the long view of the roles of the countries. We are firmly convinced that the list of priorities for implementing the future Agenda for Development should definitely include this threefold task: the full and profound integration of the countries in transition into the world economy; step-by-step assistance at the earliest possible stage of their efforts towards an irreversible shift to sustainable economic growth and development; and development of the potential for cooperation with all regions of the world. These three interrelated tasks are no less important than resolving the extremely acute global problems that face the developing countries. However, in the case of countries whose economies are in transition, this requires considerably less expenditure because of the potential they have in human and natural resources for their self-development. It is also very clear that these countries are making huge efforts to overcome the painful period of reforms carried out within extremely tight time-limits. They are also working to ensure their economic growth and to integrate themselves into the world economic system in order to make a contribution of their own to comprehensive world-wide development that is in keeping with the enormous potential for self-development in that region. In some of these countries the first signs of economic rebirth can be seen. Already today there are growing efforts to expand and deepen cooperation, not only with the industrially developed countries, but also with many developing countries on the basis of the principles of a new partnership for jointly bearing the costs of solving long-term aspects of development. It is clear that the growing participation of countries in transition with the new emerging multilateral system for development will even further strengthen the potential of that system, including within the framework of the United Nations. In the long run, assuming the success of the reforms and the full integration of the world economy, these countries will become major economic partners of both the industrially developed countries and the countries of Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean basin. In this context, we feel that the Agenda for Development should adequately reflect the global dimension of the long-term consequences of the radical transformation of almost 30 countries in Central and Eastern Europe. These countries are not simply a new factor in a changing world economy that creates special problems. To consider the countries of the region of Central and Eastern Europe, including the countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States and the Baltic States, as mere recipients or mere competitors for resources would be, to say the least, short-sighted. It would be even more short-sighted not to assist these countries in achieving mutual cooperation or to deny them support in their further integration into a multilateral development system. In our opinion, the task of reducing and eliminating poverty should include efforts aimed at preventing poverty and avoiding its further spread in all countries. As the representative of the country where the World Summit for Social Development will take place has so vividly stated: poverty is no longer the exclusive privilege of developing countries. Unfortunately, in the West and, in recent years, especially in the East, poverty and inequality have not decreased; rather, they have increased. Future guidelines for preventive and rehabilitative activities should, if required, ensure access to the potential of existing international machinery for all needy countries, regardless of whether or not they belong to a given country or region. In the area of strengthening operational coordination — chapter IV C of the Secretary-General’s report — the tasks should be broader in terms of their geographic scope and should be universal in terms of their overall interest. In particular, United Nations machinery should deal not only with humanitarian assistance and assistance for development, but with other forms of development activities in all five dimensions of development. There needs to be much greater involvement of the five regional commissions in the area of sustainable development as well. In our view, a conceptual inadequacy of the recommendations of the Secretary-General and others is that there is too much emphasis on global machinery for assistance and an underestimation of the interregional and intraregional potential for a more comprehensive partnership as an extremely important precondition for establishing an open, balanced and broad multilateral system for development. At this stage, when approaches for specific negotiations on refining the Agenda for Development are being identified, the main role, in our view, should lie with the General Assembly and with the Economic and Social Council — in particular, with the main negotiating groups of countries participating in the development of multilateral policies and recommendations for future development cooperation, including within the United Nations system. We call upon the Group of 77 and the Non-Aligned Movement to follow to a greater degree the principle of the universality of our Organization bearing in mind the legitimate interests of other countries as well. We also welcome the more balanced approach to dialogue on development cooperation which has been demonstrated by the delegations of States members which has been demonstrated by the delegations of States members of the European Union, of the Nordic countries, of the Alliance of Small Island States and of other interregional and subregional groups, and also has been demonstrated by individual delegations from developing and developed countries that have advocated more constructive, universal positions, in the interests of all countries and not just individual groups, in the multilateral dialogue on various We express the hope that the high-level open-ended working group that it is proposed to establish at this session will achieve consensus on the Agenda for Development, as well as on the new strategy and the new partnership methods for implementing it. This will promote the consideration by the General Assembly at the fiftieth session of the matter of developing the kind of realistic machinery for development cooperation that mobilizes all Member States and also international institutions, organizations, programmes and funds within the United Nations system and those outside it in order to achieve — through agreed upon, coordinated efforts — the different, but nevertheless shared, development goals of all countries, in the name of progress and growth for all peoples and for mankind.

Lack of development constitutes a threat to the stability of nations and consequently to international peace and security. Tragic events witnessed in many countries over the past years provide ample confirmation of this sad fact. The Agenda for Development complements the Agenda for Peace, and my delegation welcomes the pragmatic recommendations in the report of the Secretary-General. These recommendations are bound to generate further discussion. Action, however, is as critical as it is urgent. If the continued suffering and degradation of so many peoples is to become a memory of the past and not remain a reality only in the minds and hearts of future generations, the international community must renew and reinvigorate its efforts to address this issue through an integrated, global approach. The right to dignity of all human beings is our starting point, and indeed the end point of collective action to overcome lack of development. Enhancement of the quality of life for all peoples should be and should remain the major focus of attention at the United Nations. An injection of effectiveness is required as we strive to translate our words into actions. This is what the Secretary-General’s recommendations tend to underline. A changed international environment has enhanced cooperation between and among States. Notwithstanding our diversity, as nation States, we view ourselves as independent, aware that the immensity of issues decided upon at the United Nations are integrated, affecting not only present but future generations. We realize that policies affecting human society are as intricate and as intertwined as nature itself. The United Nations system can and often does provide the institutional framework wherein such development action is made effective and beneficial to the overall goal of peace and security. My delegation welcomes the recommendations of the Secretary-General calling for a revitalization of the Economic and Social Council so that it may better fulfil its role as envisaged in the Charter. The General Assembly has a major responsibility in identifying those issues critical for international cooperation and policy development and hence should remain the major forum for the discussion of development issues. An ongoing dialogue and substantive partnership between the Bretton Woods institutions and the United Nations is essential for enhanced cooperation. My delegation welcomes the expansion of World Bank lending into the social, environmental and other sectors. We view capacity-building, decentralized planning and participatory lending schemes as a means towards the achievement of increased development that addresses grass-roots concerns and needs. The sectoral and technical agencies of the United Nations already provide a substantial degree of support to development activity. Their efforts to achieve sustainable solutions should continue to be integrated fully into the economic and social plans and priorities of the United Nations system. When properly integrated into the overall framework of the United Nations system they provide a valuable source of expertise and information to implement effective action and follow-up to the major global conferences held in past years. The need for development is no longer a matter of debate. It is a recognized goal and an urgent task of the United Nations. Two years ago this Assembly discussed the merits of preventive action in the field of the maintenance of peace. International action aimed at the Preventive and curative development is the basis of a peaceful and sustainable national and international system. Just as we realize that post-conflict peace-building necessitates the development dimension, so should it be a key component in our analysis of pre-conflict situations. An international solidarity based on the intrinsic value of the human person and a dignified existence for all is essential in ensuring a global, full respect for fundamental human rights. Nearly 50 years after the setting up of this Organization, “We the peoples of the United Nations” have learned that to give true expression to the hope of peace, the international community must base itself on the principles of social justice and solidarity; that is a principled pragmatic approach, which forms the basis for action in the recommendations of the Secretary-General.

The Secretary-General’s report on an Agenda for Development, so eloquently introduced yesterday by the President of the General Assembly, undoubtedly represents one of the most important initiatives on the agenda for the forty-ninth session of the General Assembly. An Agenda for Development, with its recommendations for carrying forward the goal of economic and social development through enhanced international cooperation, is central to the vision expressed in the United Nations Charter. We would like to extend to the Secretary-General our appreciation of his efforts in preparing document A/49/665, and we look forward to his continuing to play his constructive role in developing an effective framework for future development cooperation. The dynamic global environment clearly calls for a regular reassessment of both strategic and operational issues. In this respect, the Secretary-General’s report serves a valuable purpose by focusing attention on emerging priorities. In commenting on the report, I should like to support previous speakers who rightly pointed out that time for evaluation of the latest report was limited. Considering the importance and scope of the subject, the ultimate value of the Secretary-General’s contribution will require thorough My delegation wishes to join other members of the Group of 77 in supporting the views which were articulated by the Ambassador of Algeria, speaking on behalf of the Group of 77. Throughout history, all mankind’s endeavours have been small steps on the development ladder. The initiatives behind these steps were inspired by those who displayed the creative spirit and vision needed to address the challenges of the day. This would support the proposition of the Secretary-General that the primary responsibility for development lies with each individual sovereign State. At the same time, the value of regional and global interaction cannot be underestimated, and my delegation would like to express appreciation for the continuing commitment of donor countries operating within the United Nations system to provide assistance to developing countries in addressing the considerable development challenges facing them. In the Agenda for Development we find a much needed initiative to reformulate the approach and priorities of the United Nations. South Africa supports this initiative, and sees distinct parallels with the South African Reconstruction and Development Programme, which is responsible for a similar conceptual mandate. Participation at all levels, governmental, non- governmental and the private sector; the enhanced role of women; sustainability; the necessity for economic growth, peace and democracy — these are all concepts South Africa is seeking to promote at a national level. Human development forms a cornerstone of this programme. From 26 to 28 October this year an International Donor Conference on Human Resource Development was held in South Africa in cooperation with the Commonwealth Secretariat and the United Nations Development Programme, giving practical expression to our resolve to address this crucial issue. South Africa wishes to express its appreciation for the support received with this vital initiative. Recognition of the sovereignty of States to determine their own national priorities is fundamental to the success of an effective development strategy. While supporting the notion that funding could be diverted from military applications to those in a rational development The emphasis placed on the empowerment of women and the need to reach agreement on measures to promote the advancement of women is to be welcomed. These are issues currently receiving attention in my country and are recognized as an important part of the national strategy of reconstruction and development. South Africa looks forward to the Fourth World Conference on Women as an opportunity to demonstrate the progress achieved in this regard and to reaffirm its commitment to enhancing the role and status of women. The necessity for financial resources to implement United Nations development efforts must be addressed at an early stage to ensure the timely implementation of the programmed initiatives. We have taken note of the proposals made by the Secretary-General in this regard. We have also taken note of the growing value and prominence of South-South development cooperation and the fact that such cooperation may successfully include both financial and technical cooperation. South Africa feels that this is an area requiring further attention. Development has indeed become the central theme of our time. South Africa stands ready to participate in the debate on an effective Agenda for Development and to contribute constructively towards achieving development which is both human-centred and sustainable.

My delegation would like to begin by congratulating the Secretary-General on all the efforts he is making to enhance the prestige and credibility of the United Nations system by strengthening its efficiency and the coordination between its bodies. The report on an Agenda for Development before us today and the note on the World Hearings on Development are part of that effort, which is aimed at establishing a harmonious balance between international peace and security, on the one hand, and economic and social development, on the other. Proper implementation by the international community of the documents’ wise recommendations would undoubtedly, we are convinced, contribute to solving the majority of problems that beset our world, particularly the foreign-debt crisis, endemic poverty, My delegation would like to express its full support for the integrated approach to development that the Secretary-General has laid out in his two reports, for, like him, we feel that any real development must be economically effective, ecologically sound, socially fair, respectful of human rights and focused on improving the well-being of the population. We are of course aware that the implementation of such a development model is a long-term undertaking requiring resolute action at the national level and above all, real international cooperation based on respect for shared interests and the pursuit of common goals. The end of the cold war and of the East-West division that marked international relations for so long offers us a historic opportunity to achieve the purposes enshrined in the Charter of our Organization since its creation, namely: “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war” and “to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom”, while preserving, of course, the natural environment for the benefit of present and future generations. The post-bipolar era that we are entering should not go down in history as the era of the end of competition for the development of the third world. On the contrary, it should be a period when mankind comes to terms with itself in a spirit of solidarity and compassion towards the poorest in our world. In an increasingly interdependent world, the challenges confronting the developing countries necessarily have international repercussions, while trans- border problems like illegal drug-trafficking, terrorism, extremism of all kinds, international migration, the proliferation of communicable diseases and the degradation of the global environment are making international cooperation all the more essential. In other words, no country, whatever its power or means, can any longer deal with these problems by itself, Some feel that aspirations to a better world, aspirations born of the end of the ideological and military East-West conflict, have, unfortunately, rapidly been dashed owing to the combined effects of the economic recession and the dwindling strategic value of the developing countries in a world in which the weight of vital security concerns has been lifted from the developed countries. The cumulative peace dividend is now estimated at nearly $1 trillion, whereas the reinvestment of the resulting savings in the conversion of military industries and job- protection is not enough to explain the reduction in official development assistance. Indeed, the official development assistance agreed to by the countries of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development was reduced by more than 10 per cent between 1992 and 1993 — from $60.8 billion to $54.8 billion — and now represents no more than 0.29 per cent of their combined gross national product, while the goal agreed to at the international level since 1970 is 0.7 per cent of gross national product, a commitment honoured by only four countries. To emphasize the disproportion, we note that in the developed countries social welfare alone accounts for 15 per cent of the gross national budget, while one fifth of the world population is living in absolute poverty. It is true that direct foreign investment in developing countries rose to $70 billion in 1993, but its distribution seems to favour newly industrialized countries, and other developing countries, particularly in Africa, continue to suffer the appalling effects of economic crisis. We pay attention to any policy aimed at transforming the cold-war economy into one of peace or at reorienting the philosophy of cooperation towards a partnership for humane and lasting development. The Agenda for Development rightly stresses the consensus that has emerged on the multifaceted nature of development, while recognizing that it cannot be merely an imitation of some imported model of production and consumption. That being the case, if the Agenda is to be an outline for universal development, new policies and new institutional arrangements must be defined to adapt the means to the ends. We must realize that the developing world is suffering from a scarcity of resources at both the world and national levels. Furthermore, most developing countries confront structural unemployment, which affects large sectors of their work force and causes considerable social backwardness in the areas of health, education, the environment and various infrastructures, essential for stimulating the private sector, promoting the status of women, protecting the natural environment and, of course, strengthening democracy. The conclusion of the Uruguay Round negotiations at Marrakesh last April will, according to experts’ forecasts, have beneficial effects on the world economy, estimated at $500 billion when measures to free international trade have been implemented. In this connection, we hope that the international community will spare no effort to set up the compensation mechanisms provided for in the Marrakesh agreements to benefit the least developed countries and countries that are net importers of foodstuffs. The restructuring of the Global Environment Fund and the replenishment of its resources by $2 billion is another initiative that we can be proud of, even if neither lived up to the hopes created by the Rio Conference nor met financing needs in the area of protecting the world environment. The Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development, adopted in Cairo last September, will, thanks to the financial commitments it contains, make it possible to reduce the growth in the world’s population to levels compatible with the quest for sustainable development. We hope that the conferences on social development to be held in Copenhagen, on women and development, to be held in Beijing, and on human settlements will lead to positive results and make a substantial contribution to the efforts of the international community to promote development in all its dimensions to the benefit of all mankind. We are pleased to note that reflection by the international community, taking into account these world changes, is pursuing this path. This is why the Kingdom of Morocco supports the idea of creating a high-level body for the development and coordination of economic policies. Indeed, we expect a good deal more from the work of this body than from reduced assistance, granted parsimoniously, in an unfair economic environment. Thus, in conformity with the position of the Group of 77, Morocco is in favour of setting up a working group of the whole aimed at turning the agenda for development into an operational plan of action, including a code of conduct for the financing of development on an assured and predictable basis, in order to allow for the effective implementation of the consensus decisions arduously reached in our universal Organization.

In his report (A/48/935) entitled “An agenda for development”, prepared at the request of this Assembly, the Secretary-General set forth his concept of development as a fundamental right of the human person and one of the component elements of a comprehensive whole — peace, the economy, environmental protection, social justice and democracy. In these elements, peace is presented as a foundation of development; the economy, as the engine of progress; the environment, as a basis for sustainability; social justice, as a pillar of society; and, democracy, as good governance. In this development process, the Secretary-General clearly laid out the role of the Organization in identifying the agents of development and in providing an information centre and enhancing understanding, and as the best forum for seeking consensus and establishing standards and priorities and, finally, as a centre for coordinating development activities. These valuable initial ideas have focused the attention of the international community, which, since the issuance The Secretary-General’s report has thus been the subject of intensive consultations. The World Hearings on Development, held in June 1994 here in New York, at the initiative and under the presidency of Ambassador Insanally of Guyana; the high-level debate at the Economic and Social Council on the agenda for development; and the ministerial declaration at the conclusion of the commemorative ceremony of the thirtieth anniversary of the Group of 77 — all have enabled us to determine the eventual shape of the agenda for development. I should like on this occasion to thank the President of the General Assembly at its forty-eighth session who, in his note contained in document A/49/320 of 22 August 1994, drew up a concise and precise summary of the main conclusions of all of these meetings. I should like also to congratulate the Secretary-General who, on the basis of those conclusions, presented to us a new report, for which we are grateful. In his new report the Secretary-General pertinently highlights the priority objectives of development and issues a number of recommendations. These objectives fall into three categories: to strengthen and revitalize international development cooperation generally; to build a stronger, more effective and coherent multilateral development system; and to enhance the effectiveness of the Organization itself in its development activities. As to the recommendations, my delegation wishes to support especially those relating to the need to create a favourable climate and to the imperative of achieving the objective of allocating 0.7 per cent of gross national product to official development assistance. In that connection, I note with regret that 24 years after that goal was set, only four countries have achieved it, and to those countries we express our sincere appreciation. My delegation also supports the proposal relating to the outright cancellation of the external debt of the least developed and poorest countries. We have always felt that external debt was a major obstacle to development in the light of the fact that the development efforts of the poor countries are cancelled out by the debt burden and debt servicing. In my delegation’s view, such a conference should not be an occasion for another literary exercise but rather should be an opportunity to proceed to a critical scrutiny of the many development plans and programmes of action consensually adopted by the international community, and then to seek out ways and means to implement them. Especially with regard to Africa, the latest development programme — the United Nations New Agenda for the Development of Africa in the 1990s — is still the foundation upon which all of the development efforts of our continent could be based. Thus, for Africa, the agenda for development under preparation should reveal ways and means for the effective and urgent implementation of a development programme whose timeliness and relevance were reaffirmed at the Tokyo Conference on African Development. The African economy is essentially based on the production and marketing of commodities, and it goes without saying that any development strategy for the continent must, if it is to be viable and credible, take into account the imperative of commodity diversification. It therefore seems timely to me to echo the appeal made in the debate in the current session of the General Assembly by the head of the delegation of Cameroon for the creation of a commodity diversification fund for Africa. I hope that the present negotiations with regard to the creation of that fund will be crowned with success. I should like before concluding to revert to the Secretary-General’s report and underline that beyond any doubt that report represents an important contribution to the preparation of an agenda for development, but that certain aspects of the report would gain from further refinement. Similarly, certain recommendations in the report should be more action-oriented. Further, one might wish that the priority given to Africa in the Secretary-General’s report be strengthened along the lines contained in the note by the President of our Assembly. Moreover, conceptually speaking and in the light of the interrelationship between With regard, finally, to relations between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions, the Secretary- General’s recommendations relating to the strengthening of cooperation and coordination, especially the proposal to reactivate the United Nations/Bretton Woods Liaison Committee, should be encouraged. In this connection, the preparation of an agenda for development should be an opportunity to review the modalities for a more transparent and harmonious cooperation between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions. In conclusion, it goes without saying that my delegation fully supports the statement made by Ambassador Lamamra on behalf of the Group of 77 and China. In that regard, the proposal for the creation of a high-level working group of the whole enjoys my delegation’s full support.

At the outset, I would like to express our gratitude to the Secretary-General for the considerable amount of work accomplished in preparing the report (A/49/665) on an Agenda for Development and for the concrete recommendations drafted on the basis of the report. Our appreciation goes also to the President of the forty-eighth session of the General Assembly, Ambassador Samuel Insanally, for organizing the World Hearings on Development and to Ambassador Richard Butler, President of the Economic and Social Council, for his able guidance during the high-level meeting of the Council in June and July of this year. My delegation considers the issue a necessary and timely complement to the already adopted Agenda for Peace. Global peace and security will be precarious and vulnerable unless we create a democratic, as well as economically and socially more balanced, world. The five dimensions identified in the report of the Secretary- General — peace, economy, environment, justice and democracy — are integral parts of the concept of human- centred sustainable development. My delegation would like to stress that on the eve of the twenty-first century, when each country as well as the international community as a whole, is striving to shape new patterns of development, the commitment of the United Nations to promoting development is critical for the successful discharge of the mandate entrusted to it by the United Nations Charter. The Charter, as pointed out The role of the United Nations in the field of development is more crucial than ever before. It is rapidly increasing in virtually every field of international activity. Therefore, Member States are expected to make the United Nations system a far more effective instrument of multilateral than it has been in the past. My delegation considers that the revitalization of international development cooperation should lead to the sustainable development of all countries and regions and reduce the tremendous disparities between and within States. It should pursue the innovative approach that evolved in Rio de Janeiro during the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. Development can be sustained and sustainable only if none of its dimensions — economic, social, cultural, humanitarian or environmental — is undermined. This means, for instance, that the programmes for economic adjustment and systemic transformation that are under way in a number of countries should take into consideration the social and environmental elements of development. Moreover, the impact of the environmental component is often beyond the control of a single State. This is particularly relevant for the countries undergoing a transition to a market economy. The global political dimension of the reforms experienced by the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and of the Commonwealth of Independent States has already been recognized. Their integration into the world economy should continue to be supported by the United Nations. The problems of these countries in the economic, social and environmental fields should be more thoroughly addressed at regional and international levels. My delegation is of the view that an improved system of international trade based on non-discriminatory market access will spur the development of all countries. The successful conclusion of the Uruguay Round, with the signing of the Final Act in Marrakesh and the establishment of the World Trade Organization, will contribute to the enhancement of economic growth world-wide. Foreign direct investment, capital flows and access to technology are of paramount significance for global development. The achievement of a more effective multilateral development system is the goal of the ongoing revitalization The strengthening of cooperation between the United Nations and the Bretton Woods institutions in the financing of development activities was brought to the attention of the international community during the debate in the Economic and Social Council’s high-level session earlier this year. We share the view expressed in the report of the Secretary-General that the revival of the United Nations/Bretton Woods Liaison Committee would enhance substantive consultation on the issue of financing operational activities for development. Noting with appreciation the Secretary-General’s efforts to formulate pragmatic and feasible recommendations, we share the view, expressed by some delegations, that the Agenda for Development should specify more objectives, more concrete measures and clear time limits for their achievement. Therefore, my delegation supports the proposal to create an open-ended working group of the General Assembly to finalize the work on the Agenda for Development by drafting a comprehensive resolution before the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations.

Last year, when my delegation participated in the general debate on this important agenda item, “An agenda for development”, we offered our view that there were four elements which we believed should be considered part of the main theme of an Agenda for Development”. These were that the Agenda should serve as an instrument for the coordination of, and action on, relevant international agreements; that it should strengthen the coordination of activities within the United Nations system and with other international organizations and non- governmental organizations; that the role of the Economic and Social Council should be enhanced; and that the “Agenda” itself should go beyond the traditional concept of development policy in order to meet the challenges to development posed by a continually evolving world. Development is not merely a matter of material modernization. No, it is an endless pattern of transformation of society. My delegation agrees with the view that development is a process, and it must be seen as such. My delegation also believes that the five dimensions of development on which the Secretary-General elaborates in document A/48/935, “An agenda for development”, provide a firm basis for the new concept of development. This concept is very sound. It encompasses, as a matter of necessity, the combined efforts of the people, Governments and international organizations in addressing the political, economic, social, cultural and humanitarian aspects of development. Dimensions within these aspects of development — which include peace, economy, the environment, justice and democracy — are recognized as being the main factors which can play a substantial role in advancing the idea of human-centred development. Equally important, in my delegation’s opinion, are the roles of Member States and the cooperation between them. In the context of the United Nations, the role of the General Assembly, the Economic and Social Council and the Bretton Woods institutions and the operational coordination of development activities are all essential components of the Agenda’s implementation and are recognized as such in the recommendations of the Secretary-General. Valuable inputs into the debate on this issue and the formulation of the Agenda itself came from the World Hearings on Development organized by the President of the forty-eighth session of the General Assembly. We commend Mr. Insanally for his initiative and his role in convening the World Hearings. My delegation has read document A/49/665 with great care and will study its recommendations with great interest. Because the lack of time has been a severe limiting factor, and my delegation is therefore in a position to offer only a set of preliminary views on the issues raised by the Secretary-General. One major proposition has obtained our total support, however. It is that the degree of success of major development efforts depends on the degree of success of the domestic partnership between Governments and all During the early phases of Thailand’s current development trend, the Government, virtually alone — I repeat: virtually alone — occupied the central role in all aspects of the Kingdom’s development. It was essentially the sole component capable of planning and implementing measures nationwide for development. The Government established State enterprises. It supported and supervised commercial banks and their activities. It planned and managed health and educational services. It had and continues to have such a central and vital role even today, but with a significant difference. As development has taken root, other sectors of society have matured and have been able to assume greater responsibilities for their own interests. The Government is now a partner with these other components in the development efforts of the Kingdom. The Government’s concentration has become primarily focused on increasing popular participation for all parts of society. It has also become focused on managing the economy, maintaining financial discipline, providing infrastructure, encouraging decentralization, and formulating and implementing a policy which brings about a more equitable income distribution. It also has a special responsibility for the disadvantaged in our society. Domestic cooperation is only one dimension of development. International cooperation is equally vital. This must include partnerships with the business community at both the national and the international levels. A favourable international growth-oriented setting for development, which can be achieved only through international cooperation, is indispensable. In this regard, equitable access to the expanding global opportunities in trade, technology, investment and information must be accorded to developing countries. Without the necessary financial resources, however, development will remain in crisis, especially in the least developed countries among us. We commend Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden for having met the agreed development assistance target of 0.7 per cent of gross national product. Unfortunately, they are the only donor countries to have done so. Official development assistance must be brought closer to agreed targets. It must be sustained, lest gains obtained in the overall While we will have to await the formulation of these proposals, my delegation has found worthy of support the Secretary-General’s recommendation that the General Assembly consider convening an international conference on the financing of development, with the participation of the Bretton Woods institutions and other regional development banks as well as the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. The participation and contributions of the private sector should also be considered. This is timely and necessary if we are to elevate the importance of development in the context of this world body. As the Secretary-General has pointed out, the United Nations provides a unique forum for defining the international development agenda and building the consensus needed for action. It should thus be the locus of any development efforts. As the main organ of the United Nations, the General Assembly can play a valuable role in this effort by forging a new framework for development cooperation. The Economic and Social Council should also have an enhanced role in development efforts. Many important economic matters have been and continue to be decided outside the realm of the United Nations. Should this situation persist, the Agenda for Development could be just another expression of good intent with little hope of realization. A revitalized Economic and Social Council is the most appropriate United Nations organ in which to address development. The Council must intensify its role and gain credibility as an international decision-making mechanism. The proposal for the establishment of a council of international development advisers which could serve as a policy-analyzing body for the Economic and Social Council merits further discussion, in our opinion. It couId provide valuable analytical input for the Council. With regard to the operational coordination of the United Nations, we believe that it is imperative to build a more integrated, efficient and effective framework for the Organization. Here, too, the Economic and Social Council My delegation also agrees with the premise that man-made and natural disasters have adverse effects on development, especially if they occur in developing countries. To strengthen the capabilities of the United Nations to act preventively in this regard, the proposal of the Secretary-General on preventive development has great merit. Here again, my delegation would wish to see precise and clearly defined mandates and proposals for further consideration. In view of the importance of this item, my delegation believes that a working group under the Assembly should be formed to examine in depth the many weighty recommendations made by the Secretary- General, in order to arrive at a common understanding on an Agenda for Development and the most effective measures to ensure the success of its implementation. We believe that the fiftieth anniversary of the United Nations in October 1995 should serve us well as the target date for the membership to arrive at a clear consensus as to how to proceed with this Agenda for Development. For our part, we will participate fully and actively, and will support measures which will elevate the importance of the Agenda for Development to a priority no less than that of the Agenda for Peace. The two Agendas are complementary aspects of the same effort to promote and sustain “the economic and social advancement of all peoples” and to strengthen the United Nations as “a centre for harmonizing the actions of nations in the attainment of these common ends”, as eloquently stated in the Charter itself. Together they will provide a framework for action in the twenty-first century. We are happy to note that the recommendations on the Agenda for Development represent the views expressed during the high-level segment of the Economic and Social Council as well as those expressed during the World Hearings on Development conducted by the then President of the General Assembly last June. For the past four years the international community has set its United Nations machinery in motion through a variety of related global conferences: the World Summit for Children, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the World Conference on Human Rights, the World Conference on Natural Disaster Reduction, and the International Conference on Population and Development. At all these conferences, the complexion of the plethora of problems besetting mankind has always been similar, and, indeed, we already know what can and must be done. Can we, then, afford to remain inactive when opportunities for action abound, especially when there is overwhelming consensus in the international community for taking measures that can carry us forward? My delegation supports the Secretary-General’s view that “development should be recognized as the foremost and most far-reaching task of our time” (A/49/665, para. 4), particularly since during the cold-war era development in many Member States was always left to wallow at the periphery. We underscore his argument that new development approaches should not only generate growth, but should make its benefits equitably available to all, as far as possible. Indeed the yardstick of development should be the elimination of poverty, the satisfaction of people’s priority needs and sustainable economic growth for future generations. We in Botswana have for some time now realized that development can best succeed if it is driven by national priorities and if it is truly dedicated to the improvement of the well-being of the overwhelming majority of our people. We are, however, mindful of the fact that in today’s world of growing interdependence and rapid globalization, external macroeconomic forces like trade, debt-management, direct investment, capital flows and access to technology play an equally important role. The interdependent world that we live in dictates that the people of this planet have to share. The need for an enabling and conducive international environment in trade has been and continues to be paramount. Even where developing countries could muster resources for their development through what could accrue via productive international trade, a stifling environment remains a major stumbling block. Where international trade does not foster rewarding backward and forward linkages, the efforts of those involved are rendered almost worthless. The sharing of technology and information, and increased accessibility of both to developing countries, will go a long way in enhancing efforts towards national capacity-building. Without adequate technical know-how and relevant information, national development plans will remain good intentions without tangible and appropriate results. The need for investment in developing countries is overwhelming. However, the debt situation is still not very helpful in many of our countries, particularly in Africa. The suggestions in the Secretary-General’s report regarding this issue do not seem to be far-fetched in the view of my delegation. One cannot over-emphasize how this chronic situation curtails the development efforts of Africa. Just like an individual in debt, a State finds that its marginal propensity to consume and save gets drastically altered. One can imagine the extent to which such a situation will impact on the investment climate. Countries cannot produce sufficiently for their needs or give anyone enough confidence in them to offer adequate credit for them to pull themselves out of such woes. We urgently need to address this situation. We agree with the Secretary-General that efforts aimed at achieving regional cooperation and integration The significant potential benefits that can also be reaped through South-South cooperation should be fully recognized and exploited. This is particularly the case in the fields of appropriate technology, information sharing and the expansion of trade opportunities between countries of the South. Increased and improved trade in the South can indeed have positive multiplier effects in the development of our countries. A number of delegations, and the Secretary-General in his report, have emphasized the central role that the United Nations can and should play in the field of development. The universality of the United Nations gives it more latitude than any other organization to promote development. However, it is a fact that great coherence and coordination are a must both within the United Nations system and between it and other agencies involved in multilateral development activities. A greater sense of common purpose has to be cultivated, and coordination between the United Nations system and the Bretton Woods institutions must be strengthened. Let me conclude by noting that the chronic financial situation of the United Nations system is indeed worrisome. Whereas we would like to see the United Nations performing its function effectively and efficiently, without adequate resources and their predictable availability it will remain difficult for us to achieve our goals. This situation is a major impediment to improving international development cooperation activities. Perhaps, as suggested in the Secretary-General’s report, a forum should be created where we can sit down and find ways to improve the means of mobilizing resources for international development. My delegation fully associates itself with the sentiments expressed and proposals submitted by the Chairman of the Group of 77, and would like to highlight its views on some of the recommendations contained in the report of the Secretary-General (A/49/665). The five dimensions of development discussed in the report are totally acceptable to us in Ethiopia. However, we would like to underscore the need to conduct careful analysis in the process of elaborating these concepts, so that they do not give rise to new conditionalities which might undermine the harmony between national development priorities and external macroeconomic forces. The external macroeconomic environment must promote the attainment of economic and social objectives of developing countries by ensuring equitable access to expanding global opportunities in trade and technology, investment opportunities and the flow of increased concessional resources in a predictable manner. It is pertinent to pay due attention to the structural link and complementarity that should be established between the Agenda for Development and the outcome of global conferences such as the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the International Conference on Population and Development, the forthcoming World Summit for Social Development and the Fourth World Conference on Women, as well as other global summits slated for the future. These exercises should be carried out in a way that helps avoid duplication of efforts and promotes efficient utilization of scarce resources. My delegation feels that another area that should be an integral part of the Agenda for Development is the strategy for the realization of internationally agreed It is to be recalled that the General Assembly adopted the United Nations New Agenda for the Development of Africa in the 1990s at its forty-sixth session, in December 1991, based on the principle of shared responsibility and full partnership between Africa and the international community. When we examine the implementation of this Agenda, we find that the political will and commitment of the international community have not been up to expectations. The New Agenda sets clearly focused objectives to be attained during the 1990s; these include an average annual growth target for gross domestic product of at least 6 per cent, and a minimum of $30 billion in net official development assistance in 1992, which thereafter is set to grow at an average rate of 4 per cent per annum. The actual performance of the African economy and the availability of official development assistance draws a contrary picture. Preliminary estimates by the Economic Commission for Africa indicate that in 1993 the African economy grew by a mere 1.4 per cent from 1992, which falls far below the annual growth target of 6 per cent set in the New Agenda. The negative impact of 1.4 per cent growth as compared to an African population growth rate of 3.1 per cent needs no explanation. In like manner, the initial period of the implementation of the New Agenda has witnessed a cut in aid plans by bilateral and multilateral donors alike. The flow of official development assistance to Africa has shown a significant reduction, and is far from the recommended level. The external-debt problem of Africa continues to impair economic- and social-development efforts. The ratios of external debt to gross national product, of debt to exports and of actual debt service to exports has reached a critical level, and it would be difficult to talk of meaningful development in Africa without taking radical steps to resolve this problem. The discrepancy or variance between objectives and targets set internationally and their actual implementation is also true for the United Nations Programme of Action for the Least Developed Countries. It is therefore imperative to give priority to the realization of all programmes and specific targets, particularly with respect to those groups of There is a need also to recognize that in African and other developing countries socio-economic development problems can be tackled through regional economic cooperation and integration. Therefore, an Agenda for Development should give special emphasis to the establishment of an African economic community. We are aware of the diversity of views on the effectiveness of economic management at the international level and the inadequacy of the present arrangement, which fails to take the needs of developing countries into account or to integrate the diverse components of the development process. The need to bring the Bretton Woods institutions, including the newly emerging World Trade Organization, closer to the United Nations is today more necessary than ever if their operations are to have a positive impact on the global economy. To this end, structures and mechanisms to promote the complementarity of the two institutions must be in place at the highest management, expert and field levels. The Bretton Woods institutions must base their programmes and policies on internationally agreed principles, objectives and targets set in United Nations forums as a result of intergovernmental negotiations. It is our hope that the future deliberations on the Agenda for Development can result in a transparent cooperation mechanism between the aforementioned institutions, with participatory and democratic working methods. If the Agenda for Development is to make a significant difference in international economic cooperation and enhance sustainable growth and development in developing countries, there is a need to explore new and innovative methods of financing and to put in place follow-up mechanisms for their implementation. The Secretary-General’s report clearly points out how United Nations development activities have been hampered because of resource constraints. The mandate given the United Nations and the resources provided must be in a sound relationship, and predictability in funding is essential if projects and programmes are not to be undermined in the midst of performance. It is vital to restructure the existing regular and voluntary budgets and to explore new and additional methods of financing. The idea of including fees on speculative international financial transactions, a levy on fossil-fuel use, the utilization of resources released from disarmament and The effective implementation of the Agenda for Development requires the establishment of follow-up mechanisms at the various levels of the United Nations. In this regard the Economic and Social Council should be revitalized to assume these new responsibilities. However, the idea of establishing an expanded bureau of the Economic and Social Council needs further detailed explanations with regard to its duties and responsibilities, membership criteria and mode of operation. The early part of the General Assembly session, when high-level representatives are present, should be organized to enable it to consider implementation problems submitted to it by the Economic and Social Council. As the Secretary- General suggests, the convening every few years of a special session of the Assembly devoted to international economic cooperation would provide the political impetus necessary for the implementation of the Agenda. My delegation feels that elaboration of the Agenda for Development requires additional work and that therefore the General Assembly should mandate the President to constitute an open-ended working group whose mandate would be to conduct broad-based discussions and to submit its first report during the substantive session of the Economic and Social Council and its final report at the fiftieth session of the General Assembly.

The redefinition of the role of the United Nations in light of the changes on the international scene brought about by the end of the cold war began with the Assembly’s consideration of "An Agenda for Peace" and the adoption of resolutions 47/120 A and B. The Organization’s adaptation will not be complete until the Agenda for Development has been given similar consideration and corresponding decisions adopted and implemented. My delegation therefore supports the suggestion put forward yesterday by the representative of Algeria, in his capacity as Chairman of the Group of 77, to create a General Assembly working group with such a mandate. In particular, we would stress the link between peace and development, the reaffirmation of the central role of the United Nations in international cooperation for development and the recognition of the need to adapt United Nations institutions, including the Bretton Woods institutions, to urgent present-day requirements. Ecuador considers that those basic elements need further elaboration and that they must be provided with the institutional and financial resources they require to become fully operative. If we assume a link between peace and development and if we wish seriously to face the challenges involved in the achievement of sustainable development, then we need both a strengthening of the development agencies and a reorientation of the activities of multilateral credit organs, as well as a substantive increase in resources for that purpose. Therefore, although we share the views contained in the report on the role the General Assembly should play in this area, we feel that the reforms suggested for the Economic and Social Council may prove to be insufficient to deal with the Herculean task facing us. Those resources cannot be obtained through voluntary contributions, as has been demonstrated by the insufficient response to the modest commitments undertaken at the Rio Summit. This fact requires us to review the mandates of the Economic and Social Council and the General Assembly with regard to the financial contributions of Member States to the Organization. We recall that the growth of United Nations activities in the field of peace-keeping has led to an increase in the Organization’s budget that has meant that for some Member States, such as Ecuador, contributions for such purposes have grown more than seventyfold in barely four years. If the international community attaches the same priority to development, the increase in contributions to that end should be, if not of similar proportion, at least My delegation attaches the greatest importance to the neutral character of the United Nations, which is emphasized in paragraph 67 of the report. As the Secretary- General rightly points out, that neutrality has made it possible for the Organization, together with Governments, to work steadily and with long-term objectives, “free of short-term political or economic objectives.” (A/49/665, para. 67) In order to preserve this element so fundamental to the success of the Organization’s work, we should consider with particular care the ideas of “preventive development” and “curative development” that are introduced in paragraphs 81 and 83, respectively. Ecuador supports the concepts put forward in the report regarding the need to reach an equitable and definitive solution to the problem of external debt, including cancellation in the case of the least-developed countries. Moreover, although we share the view that the basic responsibility for development rests on Governments, my delegation believes that maintaining the current distortions and protectionist practices in international trade could cancel out any effort to achieve development. The unilateral and arbitrary restrictions recently imposed by various industrialized countries on exports of bananas, flowers and marine products from my country show clearly that the national efforts of developing countries to diversify their exports and strengthen the most competitive sectors of their economies will be insufficient if the current international economic environment is maintained, and especially if no action is taken to restructure international markets. The need for the United Nations to play an active role in the area of trade and its relationship to development led to the creation of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) 30 years ago. Since the need is still as relevant as the relationship, the report we are discussing must be supplemented with proposals in that My delegation endorses the initiative for the President of the General Assembly to hold hearings on the relationship between disarmament and development. Ecuador supports the idea that some of the resources released as a result of the reduction in the vast military expenditures of the great Powers should be channelled into development. The use of the so-called peace dividend to give an impetus to development would make it possible for the vast technological and human resources that are today absorbed by the military industry to be put to use to realize the aspirations of the great majority of mankind. In no event should mechanisms designed for that purpose be converted into a new form of conditionality for developing countries, nor should they affect those countries’ right of self-defence. Science and technology play a fundamental role in development and in the satisfaction of basic needs, such as health care and food. For that reason, the Agenda for Development should include objectives and programmes aimed specifically at encouraging the transfer of such services and commodities to developing countries on equitable terms. Development is not merely a long-term objective; it is a basic human right, recognized by the international community in the Vienna Declaration and ratified by resolutions of the General Assembly. The minimum food requirements of 800 million people are not being met; every day 34,000 children die of malnutrition or disease; 35 per cent of the adult population — two thirds of them women — are illiterate; more than 850 million people live in areas that are undergoing desertification, which is continuing its inexorable advance; 35 million refugees have had to leave their countries. The plight reflected in these figures reminds us of the obligation to take immediate action in all areas of international economic endeavour. The United Nations must urgently prepare and implement a comprehensive Agenda for Development. We trust that all Member States taking part in the negotiations that are being initiated by this debate will shoulder their full responsibility so that our work may result in innovative agreements of appropriate scope, commensurate with the gravity of an explosive situation in which the basic needs of more than 1.3 billion human beings living in absolute poverty remain unmet. The extensive consultations carried out during the World Hearings on Development and the discussions at the substantive session of the Economic and Social Council placed a focus on the proposed Agenda for Development that was equal to the focus placed on the Agenda for Peace. This is what was demanded of the Secretary-General, and he delivered very well indeed. My delegation’s view, therefore, is that the Secretary-General’s report on an Agenda for Development more than augments and confirms our trust, faith and positive perception of the United Nations and its very important role in development. The basic development problems to be discussed under the Agenda for Development demand urgent short-, medium- and long-term action if appropriate measures are to be devised and financial resources mobilized to implement them. The Secretary-General’s report highlights vividly the desperate plight of the developing countries, particularly the African developing countries, in this regard. The obstacles to sustainable development include very poor terms of trade and a heavy external debt burden, both of which actually inhibit development: poor public and private foreign capital flows, which are regressive and therefore stall development; and the lack of a meaningful transfer of technological resources, which is a major inhibiting factor. My delegation agrees with the Secretary-General when he says, among other things, that the perceptible marginalization of the "poorest and least-endowed countries" (A/49/665, para. 23) must be reversed; that financial resources earmarked by donors for development should not be taken away and diverted for the purpose of funding peace-keeping operations; and that the official development assistance flows should be increased meaningfully to secure the long-overdue attainment of the target of 0.7 per cent of gross national product. The attempts by these countries to implement the development programmes are doomed to failure from the start. Even when available, the financial and technological resources at their disposal are woefully inadequate. The poorest and least developed countries cannot be wished away or ignored. These are the realities which the My delegation applauds the statement by the Secretary-General to the effect that “Development can succeed only if it is driven by national priorities” (A/49/665, para. 15). However, national priorities are at times brutally distorted by factors beyond the control of Governments. My country is now facing, for the fourth year running, a very serious drought situation. Serious food shortages and famine demand the reallocation of scarce financial resources earmarked for development. Even food security programmes become unimplementable. These emergencies make it imperative to devise long-term programmes that can stem the recurrence of food shortages, hunger and famine. In the view of my delegation, irrigation schemes, for example, should be discussed within the framework of the agenda for development as one of the national priorities in development to combat the pernicious effects of drought in countries like Malawi. My delegation believes that a democratic regime must be in place with all the ingredients for political stability, such as respect for human rights and freedom of expression and association, for meaningful and sustainable development to occur. New democratic regimes cannot, therefore, afford to be undermined by external factors which expose and exacerbate internal weakness and make their vulnerability almost complete. This becomes a prescription for violent conflict, insecurity and political instability. The deliberations on the agenda for development should, therefore, highlight and stress specific immediate remedial measures to meet urgent problems that are major obstacles to development in this regard. My delegation strongly supports in this respect one of the Secretary-General’s key recommendations, that “An adequate and permanent reduction in the stock of debt for countries in debt crisis undertaking economic reforms should be made. The debts of the least developed and poorest countries should be cancelled outright”. (ibid., annex). “I am very confident that our partners in development will continue to assist us as we forge ahead in our efforts to improve the standards of living of our people. I wish to appeal specifically for donor sympathy to write off existing loans of the Malawi Government. Finally, my delegation considers “the desirability of an international conference on the financing of development” (ibid., Annex) a precondition for the success of the specific measures for action which will arise from the deliberations on the agenda for development. Secondly, my delegation would like to lend its strong support to the proposal made by the Chairman of the Group of 77, on behalf of the Group and China, in his statement that a high-level working group at the General Assembly level should be established to deliberate on the detailed and specific measures to constitute an agenda for development. This issue deserves to be given the urgency, importance and high-level attention it deserves.

In keeping with the decision taken by the General Assembly at its 58th plenary meeting, I call on the Permanent Observer of Switzerland.

For Switzerland, which is participating fully in all United Nations activities in the area of cooperation for development and humanitarian assistance, the definition of an agenda for development is of major importance. Thus, we would like to thank the Secretary-General for the document he has submitted to us. This effort lies in a context delineated on the one hand by the “An Agenda for Peace” and on the other by the succession of international Conferences over the last few For us, the implementation of an agenda for development should, above all, make it possible to improve the impact of the activities of the United Nations system, particularly in the field. It is from this angle that I should like to make the following points. The development of each country can succeed only within the context of a consistent and coherent policy pursued by a competent and honest Government supported by a population whose rights are respected and whose interests are equitably represented. This implies the need to place populations at the centre of development, as well as the need to define any national priority within the context of a participatory approach involving all the partners concerned. In respect of the States, the various components of the multilateral system for development cooperation all have a role to play. Thus, cooperation between the development system of the United Nations, international financial institutions and the future World Trade Organization is essential. Greater emphasis must, however, be placed on harmonizing their activities in the field. We must see to it that the comparative advantages of all concerned are fully exploited in this effort to bring about harmonization. In this respect, certain joint initiatives have already proved the potential of such cooperation and should be further developed. In this context, the role of the specialized agencies should, we feel, be defined more precisely so that each again concentrates on its area of expertise. These steps, ambitious but indispensable, require the determined support of all of our Governments. Are we not all members of these institutions, and would it not be useful in this respect for the bureaux of the programmes Finally, the supply of official development assistance must be improved in the medium term. All States — donors and recipients — share the responsibility for attaining this goal. We feel that setting negotiated intermediate objectives for the total volume of official development assistance could be useful in improving financing of assistance in general.

We have heard the last speaker in the debate on this item. In accordance with the decision taken by the Assembly at its 30th plenary meeting, subsequent negotiations on this item will take place in the Second Committee. The Assembly has thus concluded this stage of its consideration of agenda item 92.