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Highly-Indebted Poor Countries Initiative

Under the deal, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund and the African Development Fund will immediately write off 100% of the money owed to them by 18 countries - a total of $40bn.

—BBC story

Maybe someone will be along in a minute to explain to me why this isn't as good as it sounds. Maybe most of the countries' debts aren't to those organisations; maybe there are countries that should be included but aren't. But until such a person comes along to tell me that this isn't great news, I'll continue to think that it is.

Bob Geldof was on Friday Night with Jonathon Ross last night, promoting the Live8 concerts. I can't see how anyone could fail to be inspired by him; he's such an insightful speaker. While I generally consider national boundaries to be an artificial—though possibly necessary—divide, Sir Bob is one of few Irish people who would make me proud to be associated with them, if only by that tenuous link.

Comments:

Sun, 12th Jun 2005 (18:15)

you beat me to the post, damn you. The question is: 'why are these countries so poor?'. the debt is obviously a monkey on their back, and as far as I'm concerned, this initiative is a definite step forward, and I think that we should commend it.
Debt is not the complete answer to that question however: the root causes of the debt are. Protectionism, exploitation and corruption are. It's a bit hollow to write off debts while supporting things like the Common Agricultural Policy, tarriff and so on that mean that developing countries are denied a level playing field on an ongoing basis. Unless there are fundamental changes, these countries will just find themselves back in debt.
Corruption and bad government are perhaps the obstacles that are most difficult to surmount, and it's inevitable that it will be the corrupt officials rather than the people on the street who will benefit most from debt relief. Short of the pusuit of 'regime change' by the G8, there's not really that much that we can do about that. levelling trade playing fields and increasing prosperity on the grass roots levels, thus freeing people to think about politics, is the only realistic way to effect long term change.
Perhaps it's even a bit mean to cancel debts that will only allow governments to spend more money on weapons and so on, thus further enriching the rich salesmen.

by Stephen Brophy