Aid, Debt, Trade Fact Sheet
Global Challenge:Aid - The Millennium Development Goals could be attained if developed country governments allocate an annual U.S.$135 billion in 2006 (growing to $195 by 2015) toward fighting global poverty.
- In the United States, the government currently gives 13 cents per person per day toward foreign aid; private giving is at 5 cents per person per day. Compare this to Norway, which gives $1.02 per person per day in public aid and 24 cents in private aid. (Source: Center for Global Development)
Debt - For every U.S.$1 received in aid, the world's most impoverished countries repay $13 on old debts. (Source: Foreign Policy in Focus, Nov 2001).
- Debt payments for loan-strapped countries are nearly three times the amount spent on healthcare. Per capita annual spending is U.S.$22 on debt, $14 on education and $8 on healthcare. (Global Treatment Access Campaign)
Trade - Tariffs and quotas on cloths and fabric exports to high-income countries cost developing countries 27 million jobs.
- Rich countries' agricultural subsidies – more than $300 billion a year – hurt growth in the agricultural sector, where many of the poorest people work.
Global Hope:Aid - The outpouring of aid in response to the December 2004 tsunami in Asia has demonstrated how generous Americans can be in fighting global poverty.
- Britain has been using its presidency of the G8 to urge the world's richest countries to recommit to their pledge to give 0.7 percent of their national income to foreign aid.
Debt - The Debt Initiative for Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPCs) provides debt relief to the world's poorest and most heavily indebted countries; In March 2004, commitments of debt relief to HIPCs totaled $52 billion, compared to $34.5 billion at end of 2000.
- The United Kingdom has been recently lobbying G8 countries and international financial institutions to cancel much of impoverished countries' debts.
Trade - The World Bank estimates that full liberalization of trade could increase growth enough to lift 300 million more people out of poverty by 2015.
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