Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Foreign Affairs and International Trade
Issue 5 - Evidence - Meeting of March 12, 2008
OTTAWA, Wednesday, March 12, 2008
The Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade met this day at 4:05 p.m. to continue its examination of Bill C-293, An Act respecting the provision of official development assistance abroad.
Senator Consiglio Di Nino (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Honourable senators, I wish to welcome everyone to this meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade. Today, we are continuing our study of Bill C-293. This bill aims to make poverty reduction the goal of Canada's official development assistance, to ensure that this assistance is consistent with Canada's international human rights obligations and that it takes into account the perspective of those living in poverty.
We have the pleasure of having with us two gentlemen from the Canadian International Demining Corps. Irving Schwartz, the founder and chair of this organization, is accompanied by the executive director of the organization, Mr. David Horton. On behalf of my colleagues, welcome to you. We look forward to your remarks. I understand that Mr. Horton will make the presentation, and Mr. Schwartz will be available for consultation, if necessary. Is that correct, gentlemen?
Irving Schwartz, Chair, Canadian International Demining Corps: That is correct, yes.
The Chair: Mr. Horton, please proceed.
David Horton, Executive Director, Canadian International Demining Corps: Honourable senators, we very much appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today. First, I will tell you a bit about our organization.
The Canadian International Demining Corps, CIDC, is a leading Canadian charity engaged in land mine action. Formed in 1996 and headquartered in Sydney, Nova Scotia, CIDC works in mine-affected communities to clear and destroy land mines, provide mine-risk education and deliver other related projects. To date, CIDC has completed assignments for 22 mine-affected countries in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East. Currently, CIDC is demining in Bosnia and Herzegovina and has proposals under consideration for operations in Sudan and Zambia. We have a volunteer board of directors led by our founder, Irving Schwartz. It is managed by a small team of professionals based in Nova Scotia and in Sarajevo.
We are essentially an indigenous capacity-building organization, our typical mode of operation being to train, equip, monitor and report on land mine action teams recruited from among local mine-affected populations. Our operations deploy mined-area survey teams, mechanical and manual demining teams, mine detection dogs and mine- risk education personnel.
To date, we have spent approximately $16 million on our projects, with funding having been provided by the Canadian International Development Agency, CIDA; Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, DFAIT; European and U.S. donor agencies; United Nations' agencies; NATO; and the International Trust Fund for Demining and Mine Victims Assistance, ITF. We have also had invaluable support from the Canadian Landmine Foundation and the Adopt-a-Minefield campaign, and we have received contributions from the corporate sector, from CIDC members, student groups and the public at large.
Funding from CIDA and DFAIT was critical to our early development and growth, but it has substantially declined in recent years. As the special purpose Canadian Landmine Fund has been exhausted.
The Slovenia-based, U.S. supported ITF has now become our most important source of funds, and we continue to enjoy the support of the Canadian Landmine Foundation and Adopt-a-Minefield.
Virtually all of our current support is confined to operations in the Balkans, which is only one of numerous mine- affected regions around the world. With a moderate level of sustained government support, we could be doing much more than we are currently to provide a Canadian presence in many more areas of the world.
Canadian funding for land mine action and for official development assistance, ODA, in general, has been increasing. However, a growing percentage of Canadian aid is being delivered via multilateral organizations and large, international non-governmental organizations, NGOs. As a consequence, many Canadian NGOs are facing diminishing opportunities to make their contributions to the advancement of human rights and poverty reduction.
We are not authorized to speak on behalf of other NGOs but we are well aware that our concerns are shared by others, both inside and outside of the land mine action community.
Our basic proposition is that, as compared to multilateral agencies and large international NGOs, Canadian NGOs are able to deliver many programs more cost-effectively, more efficiently, and we are uniquely positioned to promote Canadian values, provide Canada with a lasting legacy overseas and improve international relations. Multilateral programming cannot accomplish the objective of increasing Canada's visibility; greater Canadian NGO involvement will.
The intent of Bill C-293, the proposed official development assistance accountability act, is to establish criteria for resource allocations and to enhance transparency and monitoring of Canada's international development efforts. It mandates a focus on poverty reduction and, among other things, articulates the aim of promoting Canadian values. The bill includes the concept that ODA may be provided for the purposes of alleviating the effects of ``artificial disasters.''
CIDC, in common with virtually all parties involved in land mine action, considers land mines to be a development issue that directly impacts both human rights and poverty reduction initiatives. Moreover, we are reasonably satisfied that the inclusion of artificial disaster alleviation in the stated aims of ODA addresses the broad needs of the land mine action community to have land mines and other explosive remnants of war recognized as human rights and development impediments. However, for greater clarity, we would urge consideration of a more explicit reference to alleviation of conditions emanating from the legacies of conflict.
The real weaknesses we perceive in the bill relate to matters of aid effectiveness and Canada's profile on the international stage. The bill addresses accountability issues through requirements that the ``competent minister'' submit to Parliament annual reports of ODA activities, spending and statistics. It appears to be silent on the topics of aid effectiveness, results and value.
If the Government of Canada is truly interested in its stated aims of improving aid effectiveness at the same time as raising Canada's international profile, Bill C-293, or supplementary legislation, should address more clearly the issues of value and visibility.
In the case of land mine action, we currently face the paradox that while Government of Canada and international funding have been increasing, Canadian NGOs engaged in this field are experiencing reduced levels of support from both CIDA and DFAIT. This, despite the fact that Canadian NGOs have built significant capacity and expertise since the Ottawa Convention came into force 10 years ago.
Our capabilities have improved, the funding has increased, but CIDC and others now have capacity sitting idle for unacceptable periods of time. We believe there are three main reasons for this situation: first, the end of the special purpose Canadian Landmine Fund, which has also substantially reduced the administrative resources within the mine action units at CIDA and DFAIT; second, the integration or mainstreaming of land mine action with general development and poverty reduction programming — consequently, modes of program delivery have shifted toward multilateral institutions and large-scale international NGOs; and, third, the recent concentration of effort and resources in countries where Canadian NGOs do not yet have sufficient presence.
In my written presentation, I have provided graphs to indicate the trends of the increase in funding internationally and from Canada. Looking at last year's effort, in 2006-07, only 12 per cent of Canada's funding for land mine action was handled by Canadian organizations, while 77 per cent was delivered through UN and other multilateral agencies.
The figures for last year in terms of mine action, UN agencies received $23.1 million or 70 per cent; other multilateral organizations, $2.1 million or 7 per cent; and Canadian organizations, $3.9 million or only 12 per cent.
In prior years, much of Canada's contribution to land mine action was delivered by Canadian NGOs. This is no longer the case. A good example is the declining share of Government of Canada funding that we have received. If we look back six or seven years, we were receiving somewhere in the order of 16 per cent or 17 per cent of the total. Nowadays, we receive close to 2 per cent or 3 per cent.
Fortunately, we have been able to fill at least part of our Canadian void by attracting funds from others donors. About three years ago, in fact, the level of funding we received from other countries exceeded that which we received from Canada. Those trends have been continuing.
A relatively small number of large, well-established international NGOs, mainly from Europe, and commercial enterprises from Europe, the U.S. and Southern Africa have been able to take advantage of the greater multilateral programming and donor mainstreaming because of their size, broad capacities and widespread geographic presence. Smaller-scale programs that Canadian NGOs have traditionally delivered are becoming less attractive to donors as their administrative capacity is reduced and the bureaucratic burden of contract administration and monitoring for smaller projects becomes more disproportionate.
CIDC and other Canadian NGOs would welcome the opportunity to scale up our projects to mitigate the effects of disproportionate administrative burden, but we need more flexible contractual arrangements to do so.
In the case of land mine action, we are convinced that Canada's contributions are not being optimally used. As Canadian NGO activity yields to multilateral programming, the relative cost for Canada increases at the same time as global recognition for our efforts diminishes. This situation is made all the more frustrating when so much more work remains to be done. It is becoming clear that many, perhaps most, mine-affected countries are not meeting their deadlines in terms of mine clearance and other activities under the Ottawa Convention.
In a more general sense, the recent Manley report on Afghanistan made the point that over 85 per cent of CIDA's spending in Afghanistan is directed through multilateral agencies and the Afghan government, leaving little for locally managed initiatives or projects readily identifiable as supported by Canada. The Manley report urges CIDA to direct more of its energies to projects identified with Canada and led by Canadians.
Unfortunately, the Afghan example appears representative of broader CIDA policy. A review of programming in other countries reveals the same pattern. Also, there is a growing concern about our apparent inability to adequately measure results for dollars being spent. In our view, these two scenarios are linked. Accountability and measurement of results are more distant and more difficult objectives when so much of our ODA is delivered by multilateral agencies, recipient governments or large international NGOs.
We do understand the rationale and certain advantages in CIDA and DFAIT allocating significant resources for multilateral programming, and we are not arguing for that to change. We are arguing that there is now a growing imbalance between funds available for multilateral programming versus those for Canadian NGOs.
We firmly believe that Canadian NGOs can deliver many types of programs more efficiently and cost-effectively than large, often bureaucratic, multilateral institutions and international NGOs. Generally speaking, smaller, more focused and agile organizations are able to operate with lower fixed cost and overhead structures than apply to multilateral institutions.
At CIDC, for example, our overhead accounts for only about 8 per cent of our program costs. On a number of occasions, we received donor funds channelled through multilateral agencies where standard administrative fees of up to 15 per cent were charged for simply drawing up contracts and administering them. We even encountered situations where we tried to get direct funding from CIDA and DFAIT for our projects only to be turned down because there were no funds available. We then found there were Canadian funds sitting with UN agencies that they were not able to spend, and we were able to access those funds.
Although those opportunities are welcome, they do not represent an efficient use of Canadian taxpayer dollars because of the percentage withheld for UN overhead. A rebalancing of funds allocated between multilaterals and proven Canadian NGOs is merited and readily justified. The modest added administrative burden that such a policy might impose on donor agencies will be more than offset by efficiencies in program delivery.
We further submit that administrative burden on the part of donors could be substantially reduced if some form of pre-qualification or accreditation could be implemented so that Canadian NGOs may qualify for simplified grant funding as opposed to the more complex contribution agreement form of contract administration.
The United Nations Mine Action Service Annual Report 2006 notes that Canada subscribed to what was termed as ``good humanitarian donorship'' by agreeing to provide flexible, multi-year funding and accept concise contribution agreements and simplified reporting. A single annual report covering all activities was deemed to be sufficient.
We view these practices as sensible and appropriate, and would urge greater flexibility and common sense also be applied to contractual arrangements for qualifying Canadian NGOs. In our view, it is indefensible that certain non- Canadian organizations can qualify for simplified grant funding whereas proven Canadian organizations are denied such a privilege and advantage.
In terms of promoting Canadian values, there is no substitute for the visibility of Canadian organizations on the ground. The goodwill and positive media attention our demining teams are able to generate by flying the maple leaf yield untold dividends. In comparison, Canadian contributions to multilateral programs deliver little, if any, visible benefit or recognition for Canada.
In conclusion, our recommendations are that we need to rebalance the allocation of ODA funds between multilateral and NGO delivery such that Canadian NGOs may have the opportunity to significantly increase their levels of activity. We would also like to apply what UN describes as ``good humanitarian donorship'' principles to qualified Canadian NGOs. We would like to see a substantial increase in CIDA's physical presence in recipient developing countries.
In terms of Bill C-293 itself, we would urge amending clause 4(1.1) to provide more explicit reference to alleviation of conditions emanating from the legacies of conflict.
With specific reference to land mine action, we would like to see effective maintenance of roles and capacities for the mine action units at CIDA and DFAIT; and allocation of at least 50 per cent of annual land mine action funding for competition among Canadian NGOs.
If these recommendations were enacted, we would see increased aid effectiveness; increased productivity and cost efficiency in the use of Canadian taxpayer dollars; increased visibility overseas; increased promotion of Canadian values and enhanced Canadian legacy internationally; and, ultimately, improved international relations.
The Chair: I appreciate your testimony. If Mr. Schwartz wants to make a comment, he is more than welcome. Otherwise, we willing go to questions.
Mr. Schwartz: I will take questions.
Senator Corbin: Am I to understand that your organization, per se, does not do demining? That is, your chief business is to train people to do that type of work. It is not clear from the text.
Mr. Horton: No, we actually do demining. Our method is common to other organizations around the world that are structured as ours. It is cheaper and more sustainable if we can go into a mine-affected country and train their people to do the work. That is what we do. They are our teams, but we recruit those people overseas in the mine-affected countries themselves.
That applies to demining for survey work, mine-risk education and any of those activities.
Senator Corbin: What type of personnel are you talking about here?
Mr. Horton: Many of them are former military personnel that have training. However, that is not necessarily the case. For instance, in our mine detection programs, we have trained women who do not come from a military background as well as people from all walks of life. They do not have to come from a military background, but often that is the case.
Senator Corbin: What are the numbers?
Mr. Horton: Depending on what is happening at any particular point in time, the highest level of employment in our programs is about 100 people. With our programs at the moment in Bosnia, it is probably around 50 people.
Senator Corbin: Generally speaking, worldwide, are the countries that produce, manufacture or export land mines involved in demining?
Mr. Horton: No, not at all.
Senator Corbin: What would they be?
Mr. Horton: Are you referring to the exporters?
Senator Corbin: Manufacturers, exporters, arms dealers or whoever is involved.
Mr. Horton: Although not all countries have signed on to the Ottawa Convention, one of the effects of that convention has been to effectively stigmatize the use and trade of land mines. Although I cannot claim that they are not being manufactured, the level of trade has certainly diminished. I am not an expert on who is doing what in that regard.
However, I know there is an issue here in Ottawa with MacDonald Dettwiler Space and Advanced Robotics Ltd., the Canadarm manufacturer, and the sale of that organization to a company in the United States that apparently does manufacture land mines. As an organization, we are a member of the Mines Action Canada coalition. We are very much against any involvement of companies that manufacture land mines.
Mr. Schwartz: Countries such as China, the United States and North Korea are still manufacturing land mines.
Senator Corbin: One can tell the origin of the land mines, I am sure.
Mr. Horton: Some we can tell, but there are many improvised weapons around as well.
We are working in Bosnia, and those mines are all Yugoslavian. Generally speaking, you are correct; we can tell the origins of a mine.
Senator Corbin: You talked at length about Canada's contribution in this effort going substantially to international organizations rather than ad hoc contribution to made-at-home programs such as yours. You question their effectiveness. That is a serious comment, in my mind.
What do you feel led the government or governments, whoever they may be, to go in this direction and lessen support to organizations such as yours? What is the rationale behind that?
Mr. Schwartz: The rationale is that it is much simpler to just give a cheque to another nation and say, ``You go and spend the money.'' If they give it to us, they have to call tenders and monitor what we are doing. It takes much more work.
Once they give it to many of these multilateral nations, the money disappears. We never know what the money will be used for. On two or three different occasions, we were given a contract from CIDA and asked to work with local NGOs. Twice, we had to tell CIDA that if we had to work with these NGOs, they could take their money back, and we did not want the contract. On those occasions, we were willing to give up the money, and give it back, because we did not feel Canada would get a fair shake for its money, even with us being involved. We turned the contract down.
Mr. Horton: I do not want to give the impression that the UN and other multilateral agencies are not doing good work. My point is that organizations such as ours can often be more cost-effective and make better use of that money. I believe that 80 per cent of funding channelled through multilateral organizations versus 12 per cent through Canadian NGOs and a little through other international NGOs is out of balance, particularly if we want to provide visibility for Canada overseas. We do not get any visibility at all by putting our money through multilateral agencies. We are not arguing that the UN and others are not doing good work; they are. We are arguing that we are out of balance and that a much greater role could and should be played by Canadian NGOs.
Mr. Schwartz: There are two major benefits. One country donated money that was to come to us. For the UN to cut the cheque, they charged us 17 per cent of the donation. I do not feel that is very efficient. Our total overhead was 8 per cent on the job, and 17 per cent for the UN just to give us a cheque does not make any sense.
Everywhere we go, we put signs up. We make a very good impression for Canada. We feel, as taxpayers and from the private sector, that we can give the best bang for the Canadian dollar by far.
One morning in Bosnia, I met the chief of defence for the army, and I met the minister of defence. In the afternoon, I met the minister of civil affairs. In the evening, we were interviewed by the local TV station, all with the maple leaf and our flags being shown. Canada was front and centre. If a cheque is just sent to a country, the cheque goes in the treasury and Canada is not recognized at all. The work we are doing is great, but the pat on the back and goodwill we can create is very important for our country.
Mr. Horton: Even though money is channelled through multilateral organizations, often, at the end of the day, the actual work or part of the actual work done on the ground is done by NGOs. Money goes through a UN agency out to an NGO to deliver the project. Those NGOs also have to recover their overhead, so we have a double whammy there. The multilateral organization takes its rake off the top, and then another NGO may take 10 per cent, 15 per cent or 20 per cent. This is not a hard number, but, in many cases, with the sort of programming we do and our overhead structure, we can do 40 per cent more with the same dollars than much of the programming around.
Senator Smith: Let me try to characterize my sense of what you are saying and then have you respond to it.
I do want to commend Mr. Schwartz for all the time, energy, commitment and money that have been put into this project. Canadians — to the extent that they are aware of it — feel very proud of it, and it is to the credit of Canada that this project was initiated here.
My sense is that you are frustrated as a group, in part, because of the degree of commitment from the government at the moment. Your words were that funding from CIDA and DFAIT was critical to your early development and growth, but it has declined substantially in recent years as the special purpose Canadian Landmine Fund has been exhausted. That is frustrating.
Mr. Axworthy was quite involved in this. He left Parliament at the end of 2000. I hope that no one's attitude is tainted because of that connection and that this is dealt with in a non-partisan way. Let us assume that it is for the sake of this discussion.
If we can set aside the polite talk, I certainly can empathize with getting bang for your buck and doing it cost- effectively. I visited Bosnia with our troops and saw some of the work there. Our Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade did a report on aid to Africa, particularly sub-Saharan Africa. Whenever we go there to talk to people, the first item on every agenda is about the money going to the cause it was sent for or how many people's pockets it is going into. They talk about this when we are over there because it is a huge problem. It is one from which there is no escape.
Last summer, I went to look at some projects funded by the World Bank in Mozambique because of all the infrastructure that had been wrecked in 17 years of civil war. There were 11 parliamentarians, and I was the only Canadian. The others were from other countries. Within five minutes of every discussion starting, we would get into cost-effectiveness and ensuring that the money goes to the cause and not to other areas — you know what I mean.
You may be frustrated that this bill does not address your problem, but I do not know that that in itself is cause to derail the bill. The concern that some of us have is about getting into amendments on this in a minority situation. If this bill is not perfect but going in the right direction, do we torpedo it? What if it goes back to the other house and there is an election? Perhaps another bill is needed to address your problem and, to the extent that it is a private member's bill, that is hard to do when it comes to the expenditure of money.
If some of us agree with most, if not all, of what you are saying, is that reason to derail this bill or put it on a side track with a bunch of amendments, or is the way to try to help your cause a totally different bill? If necessary, it may be a private member's bill to the extent that it can deal with issues that are inextricably caught up in funding. That is difficult, but it does not mean there are not matters that can be addressed that way. Do you get the gist of what I am saying?
Mr. Horton: Yes, I understand.
Mr. Schwartz: I want to say that it is bipartisan. Canada is actually spending more money than ever on demining. It is not a question of funds.
Senator Smith: I am not suggesting it is.
Mr. Schwartz: That is not the problem. The money is there, but it is how it is spent. I would assume that this is a marvellous bill. However, I believe that you can add something with your recommendation that Canadians should have more access to spending the money for Canada. I do not know how you do that, but that is what we are suggesting.
Senator Smith: One idea I toss out is maybe your problems are better dealt with by another bill.
Mr. Horton: Somewhere in my presentation, I suggested that if it is not this bill, then maybe subsequent legislation should address this. As I understand it, this bill is the proposed official development assistance accountability act. When I looked at the act, I did not see much in terms of accountability. All I saw was a requirement for the minister to send in a report once a year. To me, that is not accountability.
The Chair: Senator Smith, you may not know that somewhere in the middle of April the president of CIDA will be appearing before us on the CIDA issue. You may wish to take this matter up with the president at that time.
Senator Smith: I am sure it will be raised, yes.
Senator Dawson: To get to the point, I totally agree with Senator Smith. If we want this bill passed — and to get into a window at the beginning of April — if we start looking at amendments, this will not happen. We have to recognize the faults in the bill but also recognize the fact that this is the best we will get in this political process.
You recommend allocating 50 per cent of annual land mine action funding for competition among Canadian organizations.
Can you explain what you mean by ``competition''?
Mr. Horton: Over the past 10 years, we have had a fund. In the first five years, we had a special purpose fund of $100 million specifically for mine action. We used to get periodic requests for proposals that would come out of, particularly, CIDA, but DFAIT was involved as well to some degree. There are not many organizations doing what we are doing; there is one other structured similar to us. They support this, by the way. Their name is CAMEO Landmine Clearance, and they are based in Ontario. I have had contact with them; they have seen this brief and endorse it.
There are other organizations, victim assistance, mine-risk education and so on, but it is only a handful of organizations. I would like to see us get back to that position where periodically significant chunks of funds are made available under requests for proposals where we can put in our ideas and compete for that money with other organizations. That is all I was referring to there.
Senator Dawson: When Minister Axworthy brought up these issues a few years ago, there was a strong political will from the Canadian government to look at these issues. Technology was discussed, and I have not seen any follow-up. We are basically demining now the same way we were demining 15 years ago. The pictures are quite obvious that it is at high risk to the people hired by you. You talked about the Canadarm. We have been creative in certain areas. Has there been any funding for developing new technologies that would be less human-driven and more mechanically- driven?
Mr. Horton: There has, in fact, been much funding over the years, both internationally and by Canada, to look at different systems. There has been much advancement made in mine detectors, ground-penetrating radar, and so on.
Crazy ideas have been tried too, and money has been wasted in this technology search, in my view. If we look at programming happening around the world, the methods being used are not very different from what they were 10 to 15 years ago. By far, the most common form of demining is the manual deminer with the mine detector and prodder, as you saw in some of those pictures. Where we can use a flail — a large piece of mechanical equipment — to prepare the ground and beat down vegetation and so on, we do that.
The short answer to your question is, yes, there has been money spent; quite significant money has been spent on technology. By and large, the results have not borne much fruit. We are looking for pieces of equipment that are affordable and robust, that can be used in far-away places and that are easy to maintain and operate. High tech often does not fit with that scenario.
Senator Dawson: I would like to add my voice to Senator Smith's on the political will of passing this bill and looking at another bill of this type to address the demining issue directly. I do agree there are technical problems about funding, but we should look at that as a committee or as individuals to see if we can do something to help you in that endeavour.
Mr. Horton: We are talking about demining because we are deminers, but this pattern or imbalance between funds available for NGOs and so on is a broader issue than just demining.
Senator Dawson: Our Africa report addressed part of that. It did not go far enough, but we were making compromises at that time.
The Chair: I am told on April 15, 2008, the president of CIDA will be here. We have strayed somewhat from the direction of the bill. I have allowed it to continue, but we should try to refocus on the bill.
Senator Mahovlich: Is demining getting more expensive?
Mr. Horton: That is a good question. I do not believe so. As time goes on and as these programs are migrated to more control by the mine-affected countries themselves, the costs should generally go down. Some of the technology involved might be getting more expensive but hopefully more efficient as well.
I believe the answer is, no. However, it is a good question that I have not really focused on; I must be honest.
Senator Mahovlich: A number of years ago, I was in Croatia and our ambassador, Stephanie Beck, showed me around the country. The Croatians were hesitant to show me the areas where the mines were, but she took me out in the country to show me. When I came home, we organized a dinner in the west end of Toronto, where there are many Croatians, to raise funds. Interestingly, we only raised $8,000 at that particular dinner, but the governments and a couple of other countries added to that. By the time the money got to Croatia, it was over $100,000. The only response I got was from Stephanie Beck, who said that the mines were cleared and the kids could walk to school, which thrilled me.
Have you done any work in Croatia?
Mr. Horton: Yes, we provided the Croatian Mine Action Centre with 12 mine detection dogs and handlers about four or five years ago, partly funded by CIDA, Belgium and Austria.
Croatia is a leading country in terms of accepting their responsibility for the problem. They have funded much of their demining themselves. That has not been the case in many countries. Croatia today is booming; the tourist industry there is just amazing. They have not cleared all of their mines yet. They probably did not want to draw attention to their mines because of the tourism industry, et cetera. However, they have come a long way.
Senator Mahovlich: Are you always involved in the bidding for any funding that is raised here in Canada?
Mr. Horton: We work with the Toronto-based Canadian Landmine Foundation. They run Night of a Thousand Dinners and similar fundraising events. They are affiliated with Adopt-a-Minefield which has started in the United States. They have a U.K., Swedish, Canadian and, I believe, a New Zealand arm.
They are taking funds raised here and in other countries to New York to put in a pool. The Better World Fund at the United Nations is then matching those dollars. We are sometimes able to match those dollars with CIDA funding and so on.
The example you gave of raising $8,000 that became $100,000 happens quite frequently because of these dollar- matching schemes. The Slovenia-based ITF is another such example. The Americans set that up. For every dollar a donor puts into that fund, the U.S. Department of State matches it dollar for dollar.
That is where we get most of our money now. We are competing for those dollars — in Bosnia, anyway. The ITF is mainly limited to the Balkans region, but it is an example of what could be done in other regions.
Senator Dallaire: Gentlemen, you have done work in the Balkans. Was Lieutenant-General Gordon Reay working for you when he was killed demining?
Mr. Horton: No, but we were there at the time. He was on a mission there.
Mr. Schwartz: There was a convention. He was driving with the chief of staff of the Croatian demining ministry, and that is when he was killed. We met him a couple of days before.
Senator Dallaire: You gentlemen mentioned that you have done work in about 22 countries. I have been into Cambodia, Somalia, Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda. I have seen the enormous restrictions mines create in the ability of those countries to maximize their terrain, their agricultural areas and their infrastructure.
In Rwanda, my mission had a specific mandate of demining; first identifying the mine fields and demining. Mines that had been on hills had been washed down into tea plantations. Women were being killed because mines were littered everywhere. There were massive tea plantations not being used because there were so many mines.
We received special funding to do the demining there. Subsequently, a demining process continued after that, as we see in other areas. However, the funding is very often specially allotted funding; it is not necessarily direct funding on development.
Do you agree that, first, mines create more poverty and greater difficulty for countries to pull themselves out of such poverty; second, mines are in countries with poverty-stricken populations that need access to the remaining infrastructure and terrain; and, third, that, although you were initially started up with DFAIT and CIDA money to demine, we could go either for specific funding or, if we were trying to reduce poverty by increasing productivity, actually fund demining in order to assist poverty reduction?
How are we doing in those three areas?
Mr. Schwartz: Last year, we drove from Bosnia to Brod. As we drove from Sarajevo to Brod, we passed agricultural fields that we had just cleared of mines. There were people working those fields so soon after that. It was a tremendous feeling of satisfaction to see that we made those fields productive again. Demining is a major help to getting the economy of various countries going again.
Mr. Horton: Your observations are spot on. Land mines are a poverty issue and a humanitarian issue; they affect access to water and land and impede the development of countries in all sorts of ways.
Philosophically, I have no problem with the idea of integrating mine action with development or mainstreaming — call it what you will. It makes sense; it is a development issue. In my view, the problem is that the structures are not in place. Organizations such as us that have expertise in this particular field — we are a niche player — have tried over the last two or three years to forge links with NGOs doing water or land projects. We all have our own little niches and focus, and ongoing programs, and because of that, we do not want to be bothered with each other. There is much talk in the NGO community about cooperation, but there is not much of it. We have not had much success in forging those links.
Senator Dallaire: One of the great successes of the NGO world is their independence; the ability to go everywhere. However, that is also the bane of the NGOs. The independence prevents them from creating a synergy of their capabilities, and, in fact, they nearly undermine each other by not wanting to coordinate, cooperate or collaborate. They are certainly nowhere near integrating their capabilities.
You say that the reporting process in the bill does not necessarily spell itself out in effectiveness. One would agree with that. However, in attempting to try to gather data from the report so that we can then look at effectiveness, it is certainly a step in the right direction instead of simply having them do their thing and let the civil servants — very responsible people — move without any sort of oversight.
I would contend that the reports are feeding us data so that we can assess the operational effectiveness. That brings me to a significant point. Aid effectiveness, Canadian profile, value, visibility, small and large NGOs and multilateralism are all very specific policies, processes and procedures that the Canadian government has decided to apply mostly through CIDA and, to some extent, DFAIT.
Would it not be more helpful if we were able to focus those toward something more specific to stop all this fiddling around in different methodologies; focus them toward a very single objective that would permit them to achieve effectiveness instead of shot-gunning all over the map? It would permit them to demonstrate a profile because we would focus on an endeavour or vision more so than what you are seeing now.
If we focused on poverty reduction, we might be able to bring back many of the NGOs. We might want to enlist multilateral organizations. We might want to take certain components of different societies and focus on that to reduce poverty. Would that not be an option toward which this bill might be helpful, at least at the first stage?
Mr. Horton: I am not sure I follow all of what you are saying. Are you suggesting that CIDA and so on focus on specific themes?
The theme of poverty reduction is central to what CIDA is doing. That is my understanding, and we have no problem with that. As you said earlier, what we do is part of poverty reduction and humanitarian aid. I am questioning whether we are spending our money wisely.
Mr. Schwartz: Senator, we are not perfect as NGOs. There is a big competition for that dollar that CIDA spends. Your idea to bring various NGOs together with particular expertise would be a valuable contribution to getting rid of poverty. If we used a number of NGOs and concentrated on a specific area with the various skills that each NGO had, that could make a big difference. However, it is tough to get the NGOs to work together.
Senator Dallaire: The bureaucracy in international development is horrendous. One has to write a master's thesis to get $50,000 out of that place. It is overwhelming how it seems to be gun-shy of making mistakes and trusting lesser known or smaller organizations, or simply throwing cash at multilateral organizations because it is fearful of having egg in its face.
Would you contend that that methodology has been created, or that fear has been created, by the government accountability methods and that it reduces its ability to meet challenges such as the one you are offering with respect to more synergistic efforts of NGOs in a specific theme?
Mr. Horton: The accountability issue may have an impact on the margins, but the bureaucracy and the tendency not to take risks have always been there.
We have been around for 10 years. We have made mistakes; everyone makes mistakes and learns from them and develops. We are in a far better position now to work with the Canadian taxpayers' dollar than we were seven or eight years ago. However, seven or eight years ago we were entrusted with much more money than we are entrusted with now.
The bureaucracy could be reduced if there was a way to accredit or fast-track organizations such as ours — which have been around, produced results whether good, bad or whatever and have a track record — for simplified funding as opposed to these contracts and reporting requirements, et cetera, that bog us down so much.
We cannot go into an area and demine unless we are accredited by a mine action centre. We have to produce our credentials, prove our people are trained and that the equipment is good. Why can we not apply some of that thinking to qualifying and prequalifying organizations that are applying for government money?
The Chair: On a point of clarification, earlier, I heard Mr. Schwartz say that the Government of Canada is putting more money in this basket. I understand your concern is that your company and, if I understood you correctly, other Canadian NGOs get a smaller portion of this larger basket. I do not want to put words in your mouth, but you are concerned and would like to see a change in that, in particular to speed up the process of receiving your allocation through a request for proposal, RFP — which is not a bad idea — so that you can be more efficient. You are not suggesting that the Government of Canada has taken money away from this basket. I believe Mr. Schwartz is on the record as saying that it has actually increased. Is my recollection correct?
Mr. Horton: That is correct. Canadian funding for our type of work, namely, mine action, has been on the increase. On average, over the years, it has been about 6 per cent of the international total, which is a laudable number.
Since the Ottawa Convention came into force, about $3 billion internationally has been dedicated for mine action. It is not an issue of money being taken away. The money is there and has actually been increasing. The sole argument we are making is that more efficient and agile organizations such as ours are not getting a fair share of that any longer.
The Chair: I will not make a comment on your organization because I do not know it well enough, but your concern was also expressed by a report on the Africa study. We do not have a major disagreement with that, and thank you for that clarification.
Senator Downe: I am curious about your funding. You have indicated in your presentation that you have spent $16 million. As well, you had early funding from CIDA and DFAIT that has declined over the years. It then indicates other donors, European, the U.S., and so on, have contributed. Do you have other countries such as China, Japan and Russia contributing as well?
Mr. Horton: Japan has been a significant donor; I am not sure about China and Russia. The big donors are the European nations and the United States. The Americans, although they have not signed on to the treaty, have to get credit for being the single biggest donor country. The Japanese, New Zealanders, Europeans and Australians are the major donors.
Senator Downe: You indicated in your presentation that the United States is your single biggest donor, which they are in many international organizations; they are very generous.
Do you see any increase in some of the other countries that have more prosperity now and more additional funds, or are they holding out their contributions?
Mr. Horton: Although we have worked in all these other countries, such as Africa and so on, at the moment we are confined to the Balkans merely because we are able to get funding for our operations there through this international trust fund. We do not have the ability to go to Cambodia or Rwanda and seek out projects; we are not big enough and do not have the resources to do that.
I cannot answer the question directly as to what is happening in these other countries. All I can tell you generally is that most mine-affected countries will not meet their deadlines under the Ottawa Convention. The convention requires that countries clear their mines within a 10-year period of ratifying the treaty. That is not happening in very many countries.
Regardless of the overall level in various places of the donor funds being applied, they are not sufficient to meet the requirements of the treaty.
I do not know if that answers your question.
Senator Downe: Yes, that is very helpful.
Mr. Schwartz: The answer is very simple, senator. There is more money coming from Europe. The European nations are stepping up to the plate and increasing their donations.
Senator Downe: I am interested in this line of questioning because, as the chair indicated earlier, the president of CIDA will be here in April.
I am interested to know — and maybe you can answer as well — why CIDA has reduced their contribution.
Mr. Schwartz: No, actually the money that they give is the same; it is their method of spending the money, not the amount, that is the problem.
Mr. Horton: I can explain some of that. Because this dedicated, special purpose fund is now exhausted, the mine action units, small units of desk officers within CIDA and DFAIT who have expertise in this field, have been downsized over the years and are now down to one or two people. They do not have the administrative resources to administer complex contracts. That is part of the reason.
Much of it goes back to what Mr. Schwartz said earlier about the fact that it is easier for them to write a cheque and send it to the United Nations Development Programme because they do not have to monitor and follow-up on it in the same way that they do with our contribution agreements. They do not have those resources any longer.
Mr. Schwartz: That would be a good point to raise with the president of CIDA when he appears before you.
Senator Downe: We will do that. As you indicated in your earlier comments, the complexity of some of these procedures is a bit overstated now and slows the whole process down. We found that in our study on assistance to Africa.
I note, chair, that, unlike many national and international organizations, this group is headquartered in the Maritimes, in Sydney. I know your local members of Parliament speak highly of you and have done so on many occasions. We are well briefed on your work. I thank you for coming here today.
Senator Corbin: How many people, every day, lose a limb or lose their life because of hidden mines?
Mr. Horton: That is one of the good-news stories from the convention. At the time the convention was signed, the estimate was perhaps 40,000 or 45,000 casualties a year. Canada has a big part in putting together an annual report called The Landmine Monitor. For last year, those casualty numbers are down to the 15,000 level. There has been a significant reduction in the number of casualties.
Senator Corbin: Is the reduction due mainly to demining activities, or are people better educated about the risks?
Mr. Horton: In some cases, it is just a question of having lived with these mines for so long that the people know where not to go. The mine-risk education program that has been going on for a number of years and the demining has certainly contributed. It is a combination of all these factors.
The Chair: If you produce an annual report, would you object to sending a copy to our clerk?
Mr. Horton: No, not at all.
Senator Corbin: Do you produce one?
Mr. Horton: I produce a report internally for our board of directors. I have not produced one to date for publication, but there is no reason why that should not be circulated.
Senator Corbin: Thank you very much.
Mr. Schwartz: Senator Dallaire talked about what causes economic slowdown. The cost of looking after someone who has had his or her limb broken is a major cost. If you can eliminate the casualties, there would be much more money to spend on development.
The Chair: Mr. Schwartz, thank you for that.
Senator Mahovlich: With Bill C-293, is there more bureaucracy or less?
Mr. Horton: I am not sure I am qualified to answer that, to be honest with you.
Senator Mahovlich: How do you feel about it?
Mr. Horton: I felt it was very light. It is a couple of pages of nice words. I keyed in on the word ``accountability'' and did not see anything in there that truly addressed accountability other than a requirement for reports to be presented. Reports are presented now.
Senator Mahovlich: Mr. Schwartz, you talked about injuries. Are there many injuries to the dogs?
Mr. Schwartz: They are safe; we train them very well. When they come near a land mine, they sit down.
Senator Mahovlich: All we have to train is the men, and we are all right.
Mr. Schwartz: We were over in Bosnia on an airfield, and we cleared 30 feet each side of the runway. We put up signs saying ``Do not go beyond this point because there are land mines.'' Immediately, a father took his son hunting through that territory, and they were killed. They have to believe what they are seeing.
Mr. Horton: For the record, we have a clean record of no injuries and no incidents with our men or our dogs. We have a 100 per cent safety record so far, and I am touching wood.
The Chair: Congratulations on that.
I was in the Falkland Islands, and I do not have to tell you about the problem they have with land mines over there. Senator Corbin was talking about shifting land mines. The problem they have is that the land mines on the beaches shift every day with the tides.
A question arose about livestock, the cows and other animals, and the problems that it created for them. They have the mine issue under control as far as the humans are concerned. They are very well educated on the issues and have well-marked areas where no one goes except for the livestock.
Is that a problem as well with the nations in which you have been involved?
Mr. Horton: Do you mean the death of livestock?
The Chair: Yes, the death of livestock.
Mr. Horton: Yes, very much so. In the Falklands, they have a pretty clear delineation of where the mines are, although there is migration. They have marked-off and fenced-off areas, but in most countries that is not the case. The mines could be on the outskirts of a village or inside a village. In many cases, the casualties to livestock are a major factor.
The Chair: That is what I thought. The educational component of your organization and other organizations in the field must be just as important.
Mr. Horton: Are we talking about outreach in Canada?
The Chair: No, in the countries where the mines are.
Mr. Horton: Yes, mine-risk education is one of the pillars of mine action. Much work is done by UNICEF, for instance. They take a lead internationally on mine-risk education. Many of the projects that we are now doing take a more holistic approach. We do demining but, while those teams are in a community, they are providing mine-risk education to that community as well.
Senator Dallaire: I want to come back to poverty. Even before the Ottawa Convention, people wanted land mines. They were more or less difficult to acquire. When I had troops in Kuwait, the Bedouin would use their families to go in and pick up the mines to bring to Saddam Hussein's forces; they were being paid a dinar a mine — that is, if they ever got there. They would simply throw them on the backs of camels, and every now and then we would hear a boom and no more camel, but worse than that, many of these people would be blown up trying to pick up these mines to make money. Has that been exacerbated by the fact there are fewer mines? Are people trying to get them on to the black market and so on?
Mr. Horton: I am not sure about that. However, last year we carried out not mine-risk education but risk-avoidance education in Lebanon after the problem with the cluster munitions. That was a problem there with children and others, again, related to poverty. They saw the possibility of picking up scrap metal. Yes, that is a major issue.
Senator Downe: What do you do with the mines after you collect them?
Mr. Horton: Normally, if it can be dealt with this way, we would destroy them in situ by just attaching a charge to it. If it is in a sensitive area next to a building, for example, we might have to pull the mine out and destroy it somewhere else.
Senator Downe: Are they totally destroyed so that no one could reconstruct them in any way, shape or form?
Mr. Horton: That is correct.
The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Horton and Mr. Schwartz. As you can see, this is an area of great interest to our committee. I must admit that it does not have quite that much to do specifically with the bill, but it is an area that we have discussed in the past. We thank you for coming here and for your contribution. Certainly, your remarks will be well-considered when we discuss how to go forth with this bill. We appreciate you coming here today. Mr. Schwartz, congratulations to you. You are a visionary.
Mr. Schwartz: Thank you very much for asking me to come. It was a privilege to be with you here today. We hope that what we have said today can have some impact on your future deliberations.
The Chair: Honourable senators, for your information, on April 2, the minister is coming. The next meeting will be Tuesday, April 1 at 5:30, or when the Senate rises. We are still confirming that. If there is no witness, there will be a change, but our schedule is that the next meeting will be April 1 at 5:30, the usual time and place.
The committee adjourned.