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Discussion

p. 181-192

Note de l’éditeur

Moderator: Philippe Mazuel


Texte intégral

1From the floor
I was very interested in your last remark, namely that we must not instrumentalise development policy, but when we look at the Cotonou agreement there are one or two points that bother me, or one in particular, the one about emigration, and especially the obligation on the ACP countries to accept migrants and potentially to expel them. The other point is very brief as well, it is the question of security, which also arises here in this Cotonou agreement. As you like interesting ways of putting things, I forgot just now to say: “ The sum total of poverty is not abundance”.

2Bernard Petit
There are some provisions included in Cotonou for the first time, but not the ones you have just mentioned. Read the agreement again. The provisions on migration in the Cotonou agreement essentially allow for the possibility of creating, in countries which are sources of immigration (especially West Africa), centres offering all the information necessary for people wishing to immigrate in the normal, organised, legal way so that, when they enter a country, they have all the information on what will happen, thus giving them the possibility of working in certain countries.

3The other provision is the one that concerned Libya in particular, in relation to Italy (this is not in the Cotonou agreement): the Libyans were asked to make sure that there were no illegal transfers of migrants from black Africa to Europe, and particularly Italy.

4There is no provision on security in the Cotonou agreement. Even so, I said that development policy is essential to meet the challenges of globalisation, and particularly the challenge concerning security.

5Dieter Frisch
Bernard Petit and I have long been so much in agreement that I cannot contradict anything he says. I would simply like to clarify one point. When I attended a conference at a German university some time ago, rather like Bernard Petit, a member of the public said “But under these conditions (it was before the ratification) it might be necessary to block the ratification of the Lisbon Treaty”. I said: “Thankfully, no, because that is not what we mean”. As Europeans engaged in the integration process, we must be satisfied that there has been some progress in the field of foreign policy and security. So it is a good thing that this section was added, spelling it out beyond Maastricht. The only issue (and it is important) concerns the demarcation of this new area, which has its raison d’être and which means a step forward, compared to development policy. And on this point I think that Bernard Petit is quite right. It seems to me that we have forgotten that development policy must be an active supplement to the other dimensions of external action (and the treaty does not contradict that). The Lisbon Treaty does not make the other dimensions subordinate to the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the umbrella term is “external action”, and that external action covers the foreign and security policy, trade policy and development cooperation policy. I fear that we are heading in the direction of making more and more use of resources actually intended for long-term development, and using them instead for crisis prevention or crisis management, i.e. to meet the everyday needs of the foreign and security policy. Yesterday I read that we have allocated a new tranche of 50 million to AMISOM, the organisation comprising African Union troops in Somalia. I am certainly not against that. The European Union, aiming to have an external policy, must be capable of doing that, but it should not take the money from the European Development Fund. These amounts cannot even be declared to the OECD because they do not meet the definition of official development aid.

6From the floor
I would like to go back to the last part of the presentation by Mr Olivier Cattaneo, which ended by alluding to large companies and the private sector. Last week, in Busan, at the forum on aid effectiveness, Hillary Clinton pointed out that 50 years ago aid made up 60% of the resources of underdeveloped countries, whereas now the figure is just 13%. This shows that the private sector now plays a major role in development. If you want to put it another way, without the private sector, development is not possible, even communist China has understood that. But I must immediately add that if we want the wealth created by businesses to trigger development, i.e. to be distributed among the population, the country must be governed by the rule of law. We increasingly see that – without painting an idealised picture, because there are villains everywhere – large companies in some countries convey the rule of law because they have rules that are known and respected. They pay their staff regularly. Their schools and hospitals are often the benchmark and model for the population. If we want aid to be effective, we need to involve the private sector at a very early stage, when the aid is first thought of.

7And I would like to add to what Corinne Balleix said about French policy. You know that the French Government has understood that perfectly well for more than five years, since the private sector is represented on the AFD management board, and that is an extremely important step. I ask myself: would it be possible to organise this type of consultation at European level?

8From the floor
I have listened very closely to the whole debtate about the efforts made by European States to help African continent escape from its poverty, since that has been the aim of all those states. But for decades we have seen the result. Poverty is still there. So the question I ask you is this: would it not quite simply be possible to abolish poverty since you are not succeeding with your current approach? In conclusion, the reason why I make this comparison is that, you know, humanity has suffered another scourge in the past, and that was slavery. Slavery was abolished, and today humanity can proudly say that we have more or less overcome that scourge. This second scourge, poverty, is worse than slavery in my view. Should we not simply abolish it?

9From the floor
I would like to speak mainly about the economic partnership agreements, but also about ourselves as migrants. My first question is this: about two years ago a lot was going on with your agreements, which had to be ratified, in any case according to the European Union, via Mr Louis Michel, who went on a pilgrimage to African states to get them to ratify these agreements. As a member of civil society, I can remember that we spoke out against these agreements. But nothing was done, the agreements were passed and implemented on all sides, giving Europe’s preference to European farmers and not African farmers.

10As for us as migrants, nowadays much has been written about the role of the transfer of funds by migrants. There is a whole literature on the subject. Everyone nowadays agrees that the contribution, at least at the financial level, made by migrants from African countries is very significant in terms of Gross Domestic Product, but how come these migrants are now being excluded on all sides? Partly in our country, in the adopted country where we live, but also in our countries of origin. How is it that today, when we talk about knowledge transfer, and the brain drain, we do not welcome these migrants, we do not offer them opportunities both here and in their country of origin?

11From the floor
I would like to add something and make four points aimed at disputing the assertion that European cooperation had an influence on French cooperation. The concept of an agency rather than a fund was in fact largely inspired by the Canadian, Swedish and German experience, not European experience. Regarding aid effectiveness, with all the work that has been done at the OECD, I would simply point out for the record that the leading figure was actually a Frenchman, a member of this department, a financial adviser and currently the ambassador to Chad, and I think that, regarding the work done on the aid effectiveness pyramid that led to the Paris Declaration, there was quite a strong French influence and not an international influence via Europe.

12On predictability, once again what I say is based on considerable experience since we had medium-term guidelines as long ago as the 1980s, and I would even say that the derogations from the 1959 organic law allowed us to think in multiannual terms when financing French aid. Moreover, we reintroduced that device with what we call the framework partnership documents. So the multiannual approach to aid is in fact shared by all European partners, and I dispute that it came from Brussels.

13Finally, just for the record, the CICID is explicitly mentioned in a very famous report which was never published but which is very famous all the same: the report by Stéphane Hessel, which was commissioned in 1990 and drew upon the experience of coordinating aid between1981-1983, and hence upon the experience of Jean-Pierre Cot. I don’t want to enter into an argument, I would simply say that there are two things. The first is that Brussels and Paris influenced one another on certain matters. The second is a minor comment, namely that the Europeanisation of French aid is still giving rise to debate if you look at the parliamentary papers or if you meet French members of parliament: they still regularly ask whether it is legitimate to transfer a proportion of our aid via international institutions but also via European institutions. So opinions are certainly divided in France, at a political level.

14Olivier Cattaneo
Regarding the consultation of the private sector at a very early stage, I agree entirely with what you say. I just want to give you the example of what we did this year at the French G20, for instance regarding agriculture. We got together with firms during the negotiations. It emerged that the private sector’s priorities were totally compatible with those of the public sector. In preparing our own papers we fixed upon the same priorities. So the action plan adopted by the Government and the G20 members already reflected the views of both sides.

15It was not enough. Afterwards, we asked the private sector to show us how private firms were already helping to achieve these goals which were to be adopted by the G20 members. Once again they gave us 54 articles on this subject. Phase 3 (implementation) is the one where we told them how we could establish a formal public/private dialogue for implementing the G20 action plan. We are currently negotiating with the next presidency (Mexican presidency) to ensure that this dialogue is not just confined to the declaration but actually turns into something, a way of conducting public policy and aid policy in the future.

16Bernard Petit
The private sector cannot be on any Commission management board, but has long been consulted at a very early stage in the definition of policies and in the debate on the Green Paper. Before Cotonou, the private sector was constantly consulted. Today, the European Investment Bank is the main secular arm implementing investment with the private sector where you have to have a dialogue, but in the “new policy” as well (whenever there is a new commissioner, there is a new policy, that is called the agenda for change), there is a very strong emphasis on the private sector being able to act in countries where there is the rule of law, a stable, sound environment etc.

17Just a word about Hillary Clinton. I was in Busan, I heard her. She is absolutely right. For the Americans it is easy to say that official aid represents only 13% and the private sector 70%, because the Americans are second to last in the world in the ranking of official aid donations as a percentage of their income. Yet Hillary Clinton still said: “we are the best”.

18I told you that I was thinking about the EPAs; in my view there is no alternative solution. I don’t know of one. If you do, then you must put it on the table, because the system of preferences as it stands is, by definition, open to everyone and so there is no mechanism protecting a number of the existing benefits enjoyed by the ACP countries. I don’t know of any. That said, there is a way of negotiating the EPAs, a way of negotiating with all stakeholders in civil society. I have told you what I think and that we were wrong to hand over the negotiations to the Directorate General for Trade. I shall tell you a little story. At the time when we negotiated Cotonou and we launched the EPAs, I had a directorate comprising five divisions. One of them was the Trade Division, and whenever a European decision was taken internally, the people in that Trade Division tried to work out how it would affect the ACP countries, in order to protect them and to take various measures. One day, my commissioner called me. He was Danish and he said to me, “ Bernard, this division is being transferred to the Directorate General for Trade”. I replied, “No, we must not do that, it’s a mistake, etc.”. He said, “You mustn’t be obstinate, protecting your big directorate and your staff like that.” I answered, “It’s not to protect my staff. These people protect the interests of the developing countries. At DG Trade they will be protecting the interests of the European Union”. Unfortunately, they were transferred to DG Trade and protected the interests of the European Union.

19Philippe Mazuel
On the question of migrants, I think you are saying that the transfers of funds are very substantial, so you are asking about the future of these people both in Europe and in their country of origin. But I think that there is also an underlying question: you are asking how these people, who are significant economic players, are involved in deciding and designing policy.

20Issiaka Mandé
I think that varies between countries. The country which should be congratulated from that point of view, which is really ahead of all other countries, is Mali, which is very good at involving Malian migrants from the Paris region in development work. It is an electorate with influence. That is not so yet in Burkina.

21The Malian investment code does not differentiate between native Malians and those who have adopted another nationality. Malians are always Malians, so they have the same rights as Malian nationals. At some level there could be an idea there that should be looked at more closely.

22Regarding the transfer of migrants’ resources, at first the literature claimed that this involved what was effectively spending on luxury items. We have now moved beyond that stage. From time to time there are still people who have grand weddings in the Comoros, but that is very unusual for migrants. The money really goes on development. Money transferred by women is genuinely spent by families on such things as health and children’s education. The 2004 UNFPA report is extremely informative on that.

23Yes, the migrants are from here and from over there. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) has set up programmes whereby the experience or capital which these migrants have accumulated elsewhere is put to good use in their original communities.

24One final point about this programme: it is also the programme concerned with the mobility of the highly skilled; a good example is the Top Ten programme, which enables teachers of African origin to go and teach in the universities of their country of origin. That is funded entirely by the IOM with support from the United Nations Programme for Development. There might be scope for expanding that, but the transfer of money is obviously something that fascinates everyone because there is more money to mobilise elsewhere. The IMF makes that its hobby horse, the World Bank makes it its hobby horse, but we know no more than that. The surveys are not yet sufficiently reliable, otherwise we would say: “Yes, the GDP is very substantial”. In the case of Burkina, I read that the transfer of resources by migrants is what made the difference in terms of growth in the 2010 and 2011 budgets. I don’t know what figures people are using, but it is still true that the volumes are constantly expanding. To take this into account, it is probably necessary to channel this money into specific programmes, i.e. to insist on greater use of the banking system in the country. This means that there must be benefits for people transferring their money through official channels, otherwise they will continue to carry it in a suitcase. We also need to reduce the cost of transfers.

25I believe that people have begun thinking about this, even in the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs, with an immigration and development programme which is even more interesting than the migration and co-development aspect. I do not know what has been co-developed, but it is always the case that linguistic shortcomings conceal things which are not very interesting.

26We can also talk about the issue at the level of health care staff. This has been well documented by the WHO. In effect, it is said that: “Yes, there are as many Beninese doctors in the Paris region as there are in Benin, as many Nigerien doctors in the United States as in Niger, etc.”. Beyond that, perhaps we need to channel this expertise to make it available to the country.

27From the floor
Just to pick up on this last point, particularly the brain drain in the medical sector. A large number of people move around in connection with the WHO and the GATT, particularly in the case of services. I think that there have been many fairly intelligent initiatives recently. To give you one example, the Netherlands is short of nurses and has to bring them in from outside, but Dutch cooperation is going to finance the training of these nurses in the Philippines, i.e. where there will not be the problem of a developing country using its resources to train doctors and nurses who then leave and go to a rich country, since the rich country itself helps to train these people who subsequently move on. I think that there is really something to be done here, aid initiatives which can be intelligent, to enable the movement of persons under optimum conditions.

28Corinne Balleix
Regarding the 1998 regime, I ended by saying that there were some additional points to be made, stressing that there were certain limits to this Europeanisation of French policy. In fact, when I referred to the French Development Agency I was not specifically referring to any particular experience. I was linking it to the New Public Management model which may have influenced the Canadian model, with this succession of stages, cascading from international to European level, and the European level adopting some international approaches and then promoting them at the French level. As regards aid predictability and coordination with a view to coherent development policies, I also agree with you.

29Before 1997-1998, efforts were being made in this area, but institutional changes only took place as from 1997-1998.

30Next, of course there are cross influences, and I think that is where we should really be going between the French level, the international level and the European level concerning development policy.

31I could have added something about the Europeanisation process; it seems that the important thing is that, in the end, Europeanisation can exist when it is useful to people involved in French development aid. In particular, I am thinking of the RGPP [the French state’s programme for revising public policy], the division or sharing of labour among donors can be an argument to justify and legitimise the concentration of French aid, and also to justify job losses. France is likewise resisting Europeanisation because it considers that it has certain messages of its own to give, e.g. the specific features of its development cooperation policy, such as the promotion of cultural cooperation or the specific support that it wants for Africa. These are things that it considers it can really do.

32France also wants to ensure permanent, constant visibility, including within development aid. For example, in the division of labour France is sometimes reticent about delegating certain forms of cooperation to other donors, particularly if that is going to be detrimental to its own visibility. France played a key role in the adoption of the code of conduct on the division of labour to ensure that the value added by each donor in a sector or in a geographical area was evaluated by the donor concerned, and that if development activities are delegated, there is an element of reciprocity in that delegation. The purpose of all that is to preserve the visibility of French aid.

33I would also like to draw attention to the idea of the coherence of policies in favour of development. In the European debate, the aim was to prevent other public policies (such as agricultural or commercial policy) from having a negative impact on development cooperation policy: European action would not be “coherent” if it allowed aid policy to be diminished by interference from other public policies. In its relations with European institutions, France presented the reform of French aid in 1997-1998 as a contribution towards coherent policies in favour of development. Yet that reform allowed for the emergence of institutions designed more to coordinate aid policy with other national public policies, rather than specifically promote development cooperation policy ahead of other public policies. For France, the aim is therefore not to promote the coherence of policies in favour of development, which would amount to artificially isolating aid policy from its political, strategic or commercial environment, but simply to coordinate the various dimensions of French foreign policy. The White Paper on France’s foreign policy clearly affirms, moreover, that development aid is only one of the components of France’s external action. In that respect, France adheres to the concept of the Whole of Government Approach, discussed, for instance, in the OECD/DAC.

34In addition, particularly in the Lisbon Treaty, France played a role in promoting at European level the idea that development policy is just one aspect of the Union’s external policy: this is the Whole of the Union Approach, a Europeanised version of the Whole of Government Approach. The European debate on coherence in favour of development has changed considerably since the adoption of the Lisbon Treaty. It is no longer a question of protecting European aid from interference by other public policies, but of looking for synergies in favour of development between various public policies (migration-development, environment-development). However, for some NGOs there is a risk that funds originally intended for development may be used for other purposes (combating climate change or illegal immigration), unconnected with development.

35Philippe Mazuel
As to the last and perhaps most difficult question about abolishing poverty, I am not sure that anyone has the answer to that. In any case, it proves that there is still much to be done and major challenges to be tackled, and thank you for this parallel between the abolition of slavery and the abolition of poverty.

36From the floor
My question is for Mr Olivier Cattaneo and Mr Issiaka Mandé, who touched on the problem that I want to raise. I would first like to thank you for the quality of your presentation, which was clear and interesting. My question echoes what you said about China, particularly the example of unprocessed timber sent to China. By operating in this way, isn’t China in fact reproducing the old colonial type of trade, with the South supplying only commodities and the North supplying manufactured products? China is acting like a new Northern country; isn’t it preventing the development of countries in the South, isn’t it now tending to strangle the infant industries of the least developed countries?

37Olivier Cattaneo
I agree entirely with your remarks, and I think that if we were to draw a cartoon in a newspaper showing a development ladder with the developed countries at the top and the least developed countries at the bottom, there would be a very fat China climbing the ladder and breaking all the rungs behind it, preventing the others from coming up. The caption I would put under this cartoon would be something like what you are saying. Unfortunately, I think it is true.

38Once again, I don’t think it will always be like that. There has to be a transition in China, but today we are in fact seeing that the values endorsed by European multinationals are unfortunately not those of Chinese multinationals. There has been a great deal of research on this subject recently, particularly by the World Bank. We can see that, depending on the value chain applicable to the developing country and the nature of the target market (an emerging country market or a market in a developed country), the prospects for local industries of rising within the value chain are totally different. Many studies confirm what you say.

39Issiaka Mandé
I would say that China is doing business. It says so very clearly. It is establishing a win-win strategy. If you want to win, you must know how to negotiate. I think that is the big problem for many African partners. They do not yet know how to negotiate. The crux of the problem, as a friend of mine told me: when he was a student in Geneva and there were WTO negotiations (at the time of the GATT), the French took over one wing of a hotel, the Americans took the other and the people from Burkina negotiated to share with them because they did not have enough money. That is a problem. The other problem is the ability to negotiate. That is also something that can be learnt, and I think that we still have a great deal to do in terms of African schools of diplomacy, and “knowledgeable experts”, as we say. It is not the Ministry of Foreign Affairs that is supposed to negotiate certain contracts, since they do not understand everything. There are specialists in the Trade Ministry. We have to realise that people are doing business, and that does not involve sentiment, it does have a particular ideological hue.

40All that is set aside for effective negotiation. The Ivorians tried it when they said to themselves: “Yes, we shall abandon France, we shall negotiate with the South Africans”. They found out that the black South African business leaders were much tougher than the French business leaders. I think it is much more at that level.

41Turning now to the issue of development, China is in fact an emerging country. It is not just China, we are responsible too. When I go shopping I am pleased to be able to buy a glass for one dollar, but in the end a one-dollar glass still poses problems. The cost must be paid for. And some of those who have been ripped off the most are the Africans. On the other hand I think that we can see the macro level, but you have to look at the populations, that is where the big problem is. The Gabon fisherman who has to face competition from the Chinese trader, that is what causes problems for the Gabonese people. The man from Senegal who has to compete with the Chinese businessman, who is both a wholesaler and a semi-wholesaler and who then goes into the street to sell as a retailer like him ... that is a problem. I think that this is the level where the emphasis should be, but otherwise Africans still have much to learn about the art of negotiation.

42Philippe Mazuel
Thank you very much to our four contributors, who have raised many points. Before the break, I would like to remind you that we have a forthcoming round table when we have the honour of welcoming His Excellency Mr Tertius Zongo, former Prime Minister of Burkina Faso, who left office in April. He held this high office for four years. Also attending the round table will be Mr Omar Kabbaj, a former minister and adviser to His Majesty the King of Morocco, and former President of the African Development Bank, Mr Philippe de Fontaine Vive, first Vice-President of the European Investment Bank, and Mr Dov Zerah, Director General of the AFD. Mr Bernard Petit and Mr Dieter Frisch will also attend this round table, representing the European Commission.

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