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Proceedings of the Standing Senate Committee on
Foreign Affairs and International Trade

Issue 11 - Evidence - Meeting of June 10, 2008


OTTAWA, Wednesday, June 11, 2008

The Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade met this day at 4:01 p.m. to examine such issues as may arise from time to time relating to foreign relations generally.

Senator Consiglio Di Nino (Chair) in the chair.

[English]

The Chair: With everything that is happening today, I am thankful that we have as many people here as we do. We have some very interesting guests. Let me welcome all of you to the meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

In February 2007, this committee tabled its report on Africa, entitled Overcoming 40 Years of Failure: A New Road Map for Sub-Saharan Africa. The report stressed the need for the Government of Canada to establish an all encompassing and coherent policy on Africa, not only an aid policy, but one that focuses on attempting to generate economic and employment opportunity for Africans.

Today, we are fortunate to have appearing before this committee to discuss this report and the actions taken by the government following the tabling of the report, Mr. Robert Greenhill, President of the Canadian International Development Agency. He is accompanied by Mr. Allan Culham.

We will start with comments by one or both of you after which I will invite our colleagues on the committee to ask some questions.

[Translation]

Robert Greenhill, President, Canadian International Development Agency: Mr. Chair, thank you for the invitation and the opportunity you have provided for me to come and speak to you today.

[English]

My appearance today provides an opportunity to provide updates on recent progress in Africa and how Canada's aid program is adjusting to the new context.

To begin, let me provide a quick overview of the sense of the change in Africa. Over the last 40 years we can see three distinct periods: the period from the 1950s and 1960s marked by decolonization, hope and growth; followed by a period in the 1970s and 1980s during which the continent experienced economic and broader development, stagnation and reversal; then, since the early 1990s and accelerating through the mid-1990s, around the same time as the liberation of Eastern Europe, there were new political and economic dynamics in Africa.

Today, there is a period of restored economic growth, restored democratization — and although very significant challenges, that cannot be underestimated — and a new sense of possibility and progress.

Let me touch on a number of these issues. On the political side, governance, noted as one of the key issues for Africa, is improving. In the political sphere, the number of democratic presidential and parliamentary elections has seen a sharp rise since the early 1990s. In 1982, only 10 per cent of leaders were elected and the number of democratic elections for the whole decade was a mere 28.

In the 1990s, the number of elections had increased to 160. The number of presidential and legislative elections considered free and fair according to the standards of the Inter-Parliamentary Union had risen to two thirds of the total.

At the same time, beyond the elections themselves, in 2001, the New Partnership for Africa's Development, NEPAD, was a case where the African leaders took charge of defining their vision and priorities for their countries. Part of this was the launch of an African-made and African-led peer review of countries' social, economic and democratic governance.

Canada was the first donor to support this ground-breaking process, which aims to improve accountability, transparency and efficiency through regional collaboration. Today, 28 countries have signed the memorandum of understanding for this review and 5 countries have completed the full African Peer Review Mechanism.

At the same time, the issue of conflict — in a sense the exact opposite of effective governance — that plagued the continent through much of the 1980s and early 1990s, while still existing in too many places, has seen a dramatic drop. The number of refugees has declined by approximately 60 per cent since 1994.

Another key issue that the honourable senators had noted in their report was the issue of economic growth. From an economic perspective, sub-Saharan Africa's per capita gross domestic product, GDP, reached a low point in the 1990s. In the mid-1990s, it was actually below where it had been 20 years before. Since that time, however, per capita GDP has been rising. This is true for the majority of the continent.

As pointed out recently by the president of the World Bank, 17 African countries, not energy producers, but countries whose population make up about one third of the total for Africa, grew an average 5.5 per cent between 1995 and 2005. This average over a decade meant real per capita economic growth and a reversal of the stagnation of the 1970s and 1980s.

In addition, the energy producers — led in size by Nigeria — that represent another third of the population of Africa, achieved annual growth of over 7 per cent for a decade. The remaining third of Africa's population saw 4 per cent or less growth over that decade. Two thirds of Africa's population live in countries that have had a decade of economic growth over 5 per cent.

On the social side, mortality rates for both infants and children under 5 years of age in sub-Saharan Africa have been declining since 1970. In 1968, the mortality rate for children under 5 years of age was 250 per thousand. In 2006, it was slightly higher than 150 per thousand. It is several times higher than what we have in Canada, but it is a 40 per cent reduction from the earlier period.

Ten countries in sub-Saharan Africa are on track to ensure that all boys and girls complete a full course of primary schooling by 2015. This is not to say that there is consistent progress in all countries in Africa. Even the best performing African countries face major challenges.

They are, without exception, dealing with challenging vulnerabilities and fragilities, relatively weak institutions, demographic challenges, vulnerability to economic and other shocks. However, the overall trend for the continent, which was negative in the 1970s and 1980s, is positive today overall.

There are two key points to note. In the same way that we cannot look at the last 40 years in a monolithic fashion, we cannot look at a continent as complex and diverse as Africa as a monolithic block. Some countries are fragile or, in some cases, failed states with weak governance structures and internal conflicts. Somalia and Sudan are examples of fragile states. Other countries have built strong and growing reputations as good performers. Countries such as Ghana, Mali, Mozambique and Tanzania are seen as well-performing.

These countries have held multiple peaceful democratic elections. They are demonstrating true commitment and leadership in improving governance, growing their economy and advancing the health and welfare of their people. As they have taken more control of their own development, their national programs, which under World Bank oversight were called poverty reduction papers or strategies, are now increasingly called economic growth and poverty reduction strategies. This is as the countries determine the right mix of priorities for themselves and their populations.

[Translation]

As Minister Oda, among others, has stated, CIDA, on behalf of the Government of Canada, is taking steps to focus Canadian aid more and to increase its ability to justify it better. The Government of Canada is resolved to work with its international partners, both Canadian and African, in order to achieve our development objectives.

In view of the possibilities in Africa and the development problems that the continent faces, Canadian aid to Africa is evolving. It is better focused and it is the logical result of our international commitments.

[English]

The Canadian government committed to doubling Canadian assistance to Africa from 2003-04 levels to reach $2.1 billion in 2008-09. We are on track to meet this firm commitment this year. The Prime Minister committed to increase bilateral assistance for basic education from $100 million per year in 2005 to $150 million per year by 2010. Education, of course, is one of those interventions that not only have important social implications but also creates the educated population that is necessary for sustained economic growth. Sub-Saharan African countries enrolled an astounding additional 29 million children in primary school between 1999 and 2005.

We are increasing resources for food aid and health through partners such as the United Nations World Food Programme and the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. At the same time, we are significantly increasing our investments in agriculture and food security in Africa.

A key preoccupation of many is to ensure that Canadian aid is more focused. Preliminary 2007-08 numbers for the share of bilateral disbursements to the top seven recipients show that 75 per cent of our bilateral aid went to those seven, up from 49 per cent in 2001-02.

Focus is not just a question of geography; it is also a question of sectoral focus. In each of these major programs, we focus on three or four sectors.

One of the key ones is health. Prime Minister Harper announced Canada's African Health Systems Initiative, a 10- year, $450-million commitment made at the G8 summit in 2006. A cornerstone of this was launched last November by the Prime Minister in Tanzania — the Canadian-lead initiative to save a million lives. It is bringing together donors in partner countries to help save the lives of over 500 children every day over the next seven years, using proven, coordinated and harmonized approaches to save lives at a cost of less than $500 per death averted. It will be setting new standards for accountability and transparency, with evaluation systems put in place in conjunction with the John Hopkins University and evaluated on an annual basis in terms of performance in the field.

It will deliver essential primary health care services for children and pregnant women. As well, CIDA is supporting reform of health care systems in several African countries, such as Mali and Mozambique.

The effectiveness of Canadian aid will also be improved through a number of other elements. As honourable members would know, the Official Development Assistance Accountability Act will come into force on June 28, 2008. Its underlying objectives of greater clarity, purpose, strength and accountability in setting new standards of transparency are consistent with the government objectives for Canada's international assistance.

At the same time, we are engaged in an organizational transformation initiative to ensure that we can have a more effective and coordinated approach within CIDA, and can continue to move to have more people and more accountabilities in the field. Recent announcements made by the government yesterday in Afghanistan are one example of significant delegation of people and authorities into the field.

Finally, we are looking at other ways to improve our efficiency. One of the most important recent developments was a move to open 100 per cent of our food aid budget to international procurement. Canadian aid in food is now 100 per cent untied, compared to 90 per cent tied only 36 months ago. This is a tremendous change that allows us to source locally and regionally to support African farmers. By so doing, we can save time, money and lives.

Working together with partner countries, we have achieved real results. In Tanzania, governments and donors together have helped to increase primary school enrolment from 59 per cent in 2000 to 97 per cent in 2007. In Mozambique, nearly half of CIDA's bilateral program is devoted to education. More than 75 million textbooks and workbooks were distributed to millions of primary school students thanks to Canadian assistance over the past 10 years.

I have talked about some of the elements of progress. I would like to refer senators to a quick snapshot that simply compares two dates: For 1990, we looked at the challenges of governance — with only 10 per cent of the leaders being elected — security and development. During that time, there was 1 per cent of growth, which meant, given demographics, negative per capita growth for a sustained period of time. From this low base, a number of developments — mostly positive but some negative — have continued. We then have a snapshot of 2007 and 2008 in terms of governance, security and development. Again, it is not all rosy, but compared to the situation in 1990, there have been some dramatic and, on the whole, positive developments.

We have a number of key challenges ahead. HIV/AIDS continues to have a significant impact on African development. Although home to only 11 per cent of the world's population, sub-Saharan Africa accounts for almost two thirds of those living with HIV/AIDS, and a disturbing trend is the increasing feminization of the pandemic. In sub-Saharan Africa, 25 million people are living with HIV/AIDS, of which 60 per cent are women and girls.

Population is another challenge, particularly in those countries that have challenges with agriculture productivity. Persistent high fertility in certain parts of Africa, linked to high levels of maternal and infant mortality, is fuelling population growth. Maternal health remains a serious issue. A sub-Saharan Africa woman has a 1-in-16 chance of dying from the complications of pregnancy and childbirth during her life compared to a 1-in-7,300 chance in the developed world. There is currently a 27 per cent unmet demand for family planning by sub-Saharan African women.

Food security is increasingly becoming an issue, threatening development gains in Africa. Combined with the demographic challenge, that means many countries — Niger being one example — are faced with the possibility of a persistent famine.

In response to the global food crisis, CIDA is providing $230 million for food aid this fiscal year, a $50-million increase over last fiscal year. However, we are also working to address long-term food security, making a difference to people in countries such as Sudan, Ethiopia and Mozambique.

The other key area is the private sector. Canada's private sector is taking a renewed interest in investing in Africa, especially in the mining sector. Developing countries with significant natural resources face long-term challenges in the management of those resources. The recent and rapid rise in prices of products, such as oil, poses new challenges as well as significant opportunities for these countries.

By strengthening governance, CIDA is supporting the effective and sustainable use of natural resources in Africa. The Government of Canada is also looking at how the promotion of corporate social responsibility can play a role in improving the contribution of natural resource sectors to poverty reduction. In addition, we have been involved in innovative approaches in partnership with organizations such as Enablis Entrepreneurial Network, under leadership of Charles Sirois, to bring new approaches to entrepreneurship and economic innovation to key parts of Africa.

[Translation]

In conclusion, many changes have taken place in Africa over these last 40 years. The optimism of post-colonial days has given way to the realization that development will be a more difficult task than was thought at the outset.

[English]

The continent lost a lot of ground in the 1970s and 1980s. However, once again we see signs of hope — signs that are grounded by the lessons of the past. Many governments in Africa have made a commitment to grow sustainable economies and meet the millennium development goals, and a commitment has been made by the international community to accompany the continent to achieve those goals.

We are working hard to help countries in Africa improve the lives of their men and women and for African countries to be accountable to their citizens. Members of the committee, Canada can make a real difference in Africa, especially in those countries that have demonstrated their own commitment and capacity to use aid effectively, to build better governance and to build not only better social but also economic prosperity for their people.

The Government of Canada has confirmed its commitment to doubling aid to Africa. As I mentioned, we are on track to achieve this in a focused and efficient way.

I look forward to your questions.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Greenhill.

I would like to start by giving you some kudos, which we do not often do in these committees. You made a statement that I was very pleased to hear. You said that 100 per cent of Canadian aid is now untied. Well done.

Mr. Greenhill: Thank you. I hope you will not completely take back the kudos, but it is 100 per cent of our food aid that is untied.

Our overall aid has gone from two thirds of it being tied about 6 years ago to between two thirds and three quarters being untied today. Therefore, we have made progress overall, but it is in food aid where we had made the most progress.

The Chair: I agree, and I will not take back my applause. It is probably still one of the things that need to be totally eliminated from our aid.

I remember questioning a previous CIDA minister probably about six years ago who told us that two thirds to three quarters of our aid was still tied. I thought it was a shame.

Good for you, and hopefully that will continue.

Senator Stollery: In our Africa report, we decried the fact that 81 per cent of CIDA's staff was located in the Ottawa region instead of in aid-recipient countries.

I wanted to get that out right away was because we did not know this when we were doing the report, but then we started examining the report entitled Our Common Interest: Report of the Commission for Africa, referred to as the Blair report, very carefully. Mr. Greenhill, you mentioned Rwanda on your sheet here. The Blair report said that because aid agencies were not paying close enough attention to whom they were giving their assistance, this was a contributing factor to the genocide. That seems to me to be a powerful argument for having people out there on the spot. As I say, it is in the Blair report; I did not dream it up.

What is the current situation?

Mr. Greenhill: An important element in terms of our staff is the very dedicated development officers, who are also Canadian public servants, and our very committed development experts in our programming support units, who are locally engaged staff on the ground. About 40 per cent of the total of those two groups combined is actually in the field. Of Canadian-based staff, about 20 per cent of Canadian public servants would be in the field today.

Senator Stollery: Therefore, it is 80 per cent.

Mr. Greenhill: It would be 80 per cent of that group, but if we look at the percentage of our total complement, it would be 40 per cent in the field and 60 per cent here. That compares to about a fifty-fifty split for the U.K. government's Department for International Development, DFID.

I can talk about what we are doing in regard to changes, but I do not want to take your time.

Senator Stollery: I asked the question because we were shocked when we read the evidence in the Blair report. We had to look it up in the notes. A contributing factor to the genocide — I did not say that it was the only cause — was aid being given to the wrong people. I know Africa reasonably well, and I would say that local development people may have certain local interests that the Canadian aid officers may not have. That is what happened in Rwanda.

The committee, as you know, decried the fact that 81 per cent of CIDA staff was based in Canada. From what I understand, it is now down to 80 per cent of the Canadians, not the local staff. Is that right?

Mr. Greenhill: That would be approximately correct.

Senator Stollery: I know you mentioned the economic growth rates in Africa. Repeated witnesses have basically told us that growth is, as you said, around 5 per cent to 5.5 per cent in sub-Saharan Africa. However, we also had repeated witnesses, including people from the World Bank, suggest that if you remove the oil-producing countries from Nigeria to Angola from the equation, many countries would have, even now, a negative growth rate. In addition, the growth of the birth rate is about 4.5 per cent. According to many of our witnesses, the fact is that the stagnation in most countries has continued.

I know you may disagree, and you have a right to do that. However, we have to remember the population growth. Much of the revenue from oil production has been stolen, so that is not an answer.

Our report commented on the fact that CIDA's mandate is basically part of the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Act. We strongly supported the idea that CIDA should have its own legislation with a clear mandate and with precise measurable objectives that can be monitored by parliamentarians. What has happened to that recommendation?

Mr. Greenhill: Let me comment on those three elements.

I cannot comment on the issue of Rwanda. That is not the interpretation I have heard of the situation.

Senator Stollery: It is in the Blair report; it is not my opinion.

Mr. Greenhill: I cannot comment on that.

I can comment on the engagement of Canadian development officers, for example, in places such as Mozambique. It was a war-torn society that has increasingly become democratic, stable and effective. That reinforces the point of having effective long-term commitment with real numbers of people and delegated authorities on the ground to be more effective.

Since 2003, the field postings that we have done to begin building Canadian-based staff in the field have increased by about 60 per cent. We were putting about 35 people per year into the field five years ago. We have put 60 people into the field in our most recent deployment and actually moved half a dozen of our biggest programs to Africa. The head of the development program that used to be in Ottawa is now in the field.

Is that as far as we would like to go? No, it is absolutely not. However, it is progress toward that goal.

On the economic growth rates, I would make an important distinction. You are absolutely right. The eight energy producers in Africa have grown over the last 10 years an average of nearly 7.5 per cent. What is interesting is that the 17 well-performing countries that are not resource-rich, such as Ghana and Tanzania, have also grown at an average of 5.5 per cent.

Across Africa, all but a handful of the countries have achieved real economic growth over the last year. The majority of them have significant per capita increases. However, I would underline the point you made that population growth of 2 per cent or 3 per cent per year means that the first 3 per cent of real economic growth is just keeping you above water. Therefore, a 5 per cent growth rate is only a 2 per cent per capita growth rate. It is positive, but it is not sufficient.

In terms of the issue of legislation, the Official Development Assistance Accountability Act was passed; it has received Royal Assent and is coming into effect June 28 of this year.

Senator Stollery: Is that Bill C-293?

Mr. Greenhill: That is right. As a result, all Canadian development assistance to be determined as official development assistance has to meet the three tests of contributing to poverty reduction, taking into account the perspectives of the poor and being consistent with Canada's international human rights obligations. We have an obligation to ensure that we have a comprehensive consultation with all key actors involved in this every two years, and that we provide annual reports on the results. This is a legislative initiative, with which many members of the committee are intimately familiar, that will have a significant impact going forward.

Senator Stollery: It is not CIDA legislation. We do have a fairly good understanding of the subject, and it is not CIDA legislation that gives the clear mandate that we have been talking about, comparable to the British system. I tag this on and leave it because this could go on all night, and we are quite knowledgeable about the story.

What about the fact that the DFID minister in the U.K. is actively involved in trade negotiations? I am sure they have had the idea — it did not take our recommendations to cause them, to my surprise, to give instructions to the minister to be involved in trade negotiations. The British minister now is involved actively. First, he is a minister, so he is at the cabinet table. He is at the table when trade negotiations are discussed because I think every observer understands that development means economic development and that trade negotiations are among the most important elements of that. Of course, it is a large subject. What do you think about that, and where are we going?

Mr. Greenhill: CIDA has been involved for a number of years in helping to support developing countries engaging in trade negotiations. We have been very involved in Aid for Trade, which is that if countries sign new trade agreements and need to put regulatory changes in place or understand what the key bottlenecks are to growth so that they can take advantage of those, we have been involved in supporting, either directly through our own programming or through the World Bank or the International Finance Corporation, IFC, approaches that allow developing countries to take advantage of the opportunities created by trade.

In terms of the decision as to whether or not a specific minister is involved in this, that is not something that, as a civil servant, I can comment on.

Senator Stollery: I understand that. However, we have not done it, and the British have.

The Chair: Senator Stollery is talking about a major recommendation of our report, which suggests or recommends to the government that CIDA should be its own ministry and have its own minister sitting at the cabinet table, with a full ministry associated with it.

Is there any movement in that regard? I am not sure if it is an appropriate question. If it is more of a policy question, you may say so. However, is there any movement that you know of in CIDA toward achieving that objective?

Mr. Greenhill: Well, obviously, Minister Oda is a full member of cabinet. That is a statement of fact.

CIDA does not at present have its own legislation. That is a statement of fact. Whether or not the government is or should be considering that is not something I could comment on. That would be a policy decision to be discussed with the ministers.

Senator Dawson: Inevitably, I will be coming back to some of these issues. With respect to the legislation, sometimes we say that that is above your pay bracket even though you probably earn more than the minister — but that is another issue. We have had 10 ministers in 15 years. For all parties concerned, we have not taken our responsibilities seriously as far as aid is concerned, not only to Africa but aid in general. This is something this committee should continue insisting on. If we want the issue to be taken seriously, we have to take the department seriously.

On the absence of legislation — again, I understand we are here to talk about the issues and some of them are not your responsibility, and we do not want to blame it on you — the reality is that we have to come back and say that there is no legislation. You did an analysis about the last 30 or 40 years and you have talked about the changing environment, but the fact that there is no legislation governing CIDA means we do not know what to compare it to. We do not have any framework in which we can say that we adapted to the changing environment.

This week, you announced $600 million more for Afghanistan. If you were asked on a scale of 1to 10 if is it a problem, yes, we understand it is a problem. However, it is more a military-driven issue than an aid development- driven issue compared to what we were proposing and what has been proposed for Africa.

Legislation on CIDA would help us be able to ask the government whether this is inside their framework or whether they are just improvising because of military decisions that force development aid, which is not, I think, the objective of it. When CIDA was created, it was development-driven; it was not with an attitude of let us go put out fires that we lit.

Would it not help you — again, I am not asking you to make policy — to have a framework that was clearer for you? The way you would spend money would be easier to defend than having it spent depending on circumstances.

The press release this week announced that the $600 million was signed by three ministers. I would rather know there is one person responsible for development aid. Would you not be helped if you had that framework?

Mr. Greenhill: I am not in a position to comment on the appropriateness of legislation. However, I can comment specifically on some of the issues of focus, particularly in the context of Afghanistan and in terms of where development dollars are going.

An interesting fact is that compared to 20 years ago, security and development are so closely intertwined. When we look at the bottom billion today, in the majority of cases, those are countries that are in danger or that are just coming into or out of conflict. Therefore, security and development are much more closely intertwined than they were 20 years ago.

The opportunity that comes from providing increased stability — and Mozambique is a tremendous example — is that we can achieve great development results. Mozambique actually had social indicators in the early 1990s that were similar to those of Afghanistan today. It had come out of over a decade of civil war; it had an 11 per cent literacy rate; and the few institutions that had been left by the Portuguese after the colonial period were destroyed in the civil war.

Because of international engagement and national leadership, it has now had four democratic elections. The prime minister is a woman. This country that had 11 per cent literacy now has 70 per cent of its children in school, and it has had an annual growth rate of 8 per cent a year for over a decade. That is because security and development have come together to provide opportunity for the people.

Afghanistan, depending on the measure, rates about 174 out of 176 on the human development indicators. By any measure of poverty and need and poverty reduction, it is a very legitimate place to be focusing our efforts. The results we have achieved in terms of the education of children, particularly girls, is that we have gone from 700,000 to 6 million in school and from zero per cent to 40 per cent girls.

We have reduced the mortality rate of children in Afghanistan in the last four years by almost one quarter. There are 40,000 more children alive every year now because of our international engagement. In a sense, the announcement yesterday is a reflection of the development need and opportunity.

I would note broadly in terms of where we have become more focused and effective, over the past six or seven years, we have gone from one of the most disbursed programs in the world to not yet the most focused, but increasingly focused. In our top 15 countries, including Haiti and Afghanistan, barely 55 per cent of our funding was going to those top 15 countries 6 years ago. Now it is almost 70 or 72 per cent.

Here is the point: When we look at the least developed countries, LDCs, those most in need, in 2001 only about 21 per cent of our bilateral programming went to those countries. Today, it is somewhere around 38 per cent or more. While we have increased our focus, we have almost doubled the proportion that goes to that bottom billion.

I cannot comment on the legislation, but I can make a statement of fact, which is that Canada's program is more focused than it has ever been in the last 15 years. It is more focused on those most in need.

Senator Dawson: The research bureau provided a wonderful list of questions that I think we should table and ask the department to answer. I do not know if we can do that, technically, but many of these questions deserve to be asked, and we should try to get the answers.

The Chair: Yes, we can, and yes, we will.

Senator Dawson: I appreciate that these questions will be officially asked by the committee and answered.

My second comment would be on the New Partnership for Africa's Development, NEPAD, and China. We respect NEPAD and the choices it is making. We are trying to work in partnership with NEPAD, but at the same time, China does not care what NEPAD thinks about a country. China goes in, gives as much money as they want to, and does not respect international cooperation with any other country.

What is your reaction to China's involvement in Africa without respecting some of the international agreements, insofar as you are still giving money? We are giving aid development program money to China. They are giving aid development money to Africa, and they are going against our collective agreements with other countries in trying to help these countries. How can we do that and not feel in contradiction with ourselves?

Mr. Greenhill: That is an excellent, fundamental question. It is a broader set of challenges of the engagement of China. India is also very engaged, particularly the private sector, and a set of other donors that have a different viewpoint from ours.

The issue of China is complex, with many of the challenges that you have laid out. However, I also think it is important to note the incredible capacity and competence that Chinese companies bring to bear in various areas. The question is, can these be channelled in a positive way?

Ultimately, the people who will be most effective at doing that are the countries themselves. We can ensure that there are effective governance systems and oversights, whether in terms of public procurement, or regulations in the mining industry, or in terms of extractive industry transparency initiatives, of which Canada is a strong supporter. These then help to create the context to ensure that all companies in particular, but also donors, will be working in as constructive a fashion as possible. One of the challenges for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, OECD, Development Advisory Committee is to be aware of the challenges of competition. Competition is, in a sense, a good thing. Monopolies are never good things. We are being challenged by new models of behaviour. Those models may have things that are detrimental and need to be improved. However, they also have elements in terms of competency and speed of which we have to meet the challenge to ensure that people do not go with one group because even though they cut corners, they can build that road in 12 months, while it takes us five years, to ensuring that we are actually, in a responsible and effective way, being able to speed up how long it takes us to support building a road.

That type of challenge will only grow. If we get it right, it means that there is a new set of players that can play potentially a very constructive role in Africa's development.

Senator Johnson: How do you see CIDA evolving in the future? I believe your priorities, as your website says, are social development, economic well-being, environmental sustainability and governance. You have indicated today a lot of advancement in those areas, especially in health, in the number of women and children you are helping. Maternal and child health seem to be getting better.

In the next five years, are these the major fronts you will continue on, or will you get more involved in other areas? How do you see your direction and achievements? Is there anything concrete you see coming along in the next few years?

Mr. Greenhill: I can talk about the areas where there have been concrete achievements that can be built on. Basic education is one of the great unsung success stories globally and particularly in Africa, where, as I mentioned, the number of children in school is increasing by millions, and on the continental level by tens of millions. An international initiative called the Education for All-Fast-Track Initiative with significant Canadian leadership is allowing us to have a more effective and responsible approach to basic education.

Many of these countries are going from having barely half their children in school to having 80 per cent, in some cases 90 and approaching 95 per cent, with now the challenge being the quality and the secondary level. That would be one area where there is real success, and also where, in the last year and a half, Prime Minister Harper announced a commitment by the government to increase what we are doing in Africa from $100 million to $150 million a year.

With respect to health, a key issue has been Canada's approach to saving lives through tuberculosis treatment, where we have saved half a million lives in the last few years.

Senator Johnson: Is that the priority for the next five years?

Mr. Greenhill: No, those are the key elements. The sectoral priorities would have to be set by the minister.

Senator Johnson: In your disbursements for 2007-08, health is the largest followed by private sector governance and education. What about the environment?

Mr. Greenhill: We are doing specific elements in the environment; for example, watershed management in the Nile Delta and the Congo Delta. We also have the environment as a cross-cutting issue. Every one of our projects to receive approval has to be reviewed in terms of environmental impact.

Senator Johnson: The Congo Delta was a major initiative. How is that progressing?

Mr. Greenhill: I could not give the status, but we could provide an update in terms of where we are.

Senator Grafstein: I was talking to Senator Dawson. When we look at the overall security situation since 2002, the Bush doctrine is working in Africa.

The Bush doctrine is essentially the same doctrine as Louis St. Laurent set out in 1946 in Canada. I call it the ``St. Laurent- Harry Truman-Bush doctrine.'' It says that the role of Canada and of the United States laterally is to spread democracy, freedom and liberty around the world. If we look at what has happened from 2002 until recently, in terms of the number of armed conflicts going down and the number of democracies going up, the St. Laurent-Harry Truman-Bush doctrine is working.

Mr. Greenhill: I am not sure about post hoc ergo propter hoc. I will not comment on a causal relationship, but I would note that as part of a much more serious international engagement since the horrors of Rwanda, African nations have taken stronger responsibility. As you know, Canada has helped to set up capabilities in Mali and Ghana for peacekeeping. A quarter of the UN peacekeeping troops are now African. We have the case where Senegalese and other police or peacekeeping troops are contributing to our work in Haiti.

Senator Grafstein: I wanted to point this out because, as your notes tell us, there has been a dramatic transformation from 1990 to 2008, essentially in terms of democratization in sub-Saharan Africa. Human security is not the pre- eminent item. Now we are back to economic security and growth as issues.

Mr. Greenhill: We are dealing with those few clusters where there is still fragility or state failure, but those are now the minority.

Senator Grafstein: We have gone, according to your notes, from 16 armed conflicts in the area down to 5. Even those are starting to accomplish things except in some intense places, so it is good news.

Having said that, I want to go back to the questions of our mandate and this new act, which is the relationship between poverty reduction and trade. Do you perceive your mandate, when you read Bill C-293 — which is essentially mandating your agency to focus on poverty reduction — as moving toward poverty reduction by means of economic self-help and growth? You get out of the poverty cycle and move into the self-help cycle, so trade is effectively a driver between the two.

Mr. Greenhill: It is an important point, and I think most importantly, the vast majority of African leaders would see it that way. It is interesting how many of them now have growth and poverty reduction strategies.

Senator Grafstein: I take it that the institutional framework for that within Africa is NEPAD. Is that sort of a quasi- free trade agreement?

Mr. Greenhill: It is not. It is a governance framework. There are, within Africa, areas of regional, I would not call them free trade but freer trade. We have been strongly supportive of increased openness to trade on an individual basis, but also on a collective, regional basis within Africa.

Senator Grafstein: You perceive it, as I certainly do — I just wanted to see if part of your philosophy is that freer trade is a quick means, as is happening with NAFTA and so on, to improve productivity and growth.

Mr. Greenhill: The challenge is that open economies tend to provide higher economic growth if the institutional capabilities and the infrastructure are in place for those countries to take advantage of that more open situation. That is the Aid for Trade.

Senator Grafstein: In addition, to be sorted out so that there is a trickle-down effect to the producers.

To carry the argument forward, what is Canada's position with respect to importation of agricultural products from the sub-Saharan countries? Are there tariff barriers in place that prevent the sub-Saharan African countries, which are to a large extent agriculturally driven, from benefitting from that? The report talked about those experiments in terms of fast start, up and down. I will not get into that, but the question is if one country — you can pick any two or three that are agriculturally based — gets their products up to a certain standard and want to export into Canada, what would be the barriers for them to do that, either tariff barriers or subsidies? How can we help them export into our marketplaces?

Mr. Greenhill: The vast majority of tariff and non-tariff barriers for the least developed countries have been reduced or eliminated, but there are exceptions, particularly for agricultural products. We need to follow up with the specifics of how that is done.

However, I would make an important point. In the last 36 months, Canada has moved to significantly support African agricultural production because of the fact that out of the $230 million we provided in food aid, of which probably somewhere around $150 million and $175 million would be into Africa, we are now in a position to purchase those from the best lowest cost, including transportation providers. In the vast majority of cases, those will be African countries; in many cases, it will be producers within a country where there is a famine. If there is a famine in one part of the country and a surplus somewhere else, instead of us ignoring that and purchasing back in Canada, we can purchase there. That is a very important policy change supporting agricultural productivity in Africa.

Senator Grafstein: That fits into our general framework of poverty reduction within the continent; and it moves away from the other policy, which is in the questions and answers you will give us about how we untie our aid to allow us to be able to use our funds in this particular fashion.

[Translation]

Senator Nolin: My knowledge of Africa is not as extensive as that of my colleagues. They tackled the reality with a great deal of professionalism and produced a report that is certainly giving rise to discussion in your circles just as it is in ours.

My knowledge of Africa is limited. To be specific, my knowledge of sub-Saharan Africa is only recent. In January 2007, at the time my colleagues were putting the final touches to their report, I agreed to take part, with the Speaker of the House of Commons, in a series of interparliamentary meetings in three African countries, Benin, Burkina Faso and Mali. There was a kind of progression in the way the tour to those three countries was programmed. As I met parliamentarians from the three countries, I discovered a common thread, the role of women. We spent about three days in each country.

Mali was, without wishing to cause offence and for want of a better expression, the best of the three countries and Benin was the most disadvantaged. To my eyes, at least, it was in Benin that the women most wanted to be involved in the challenges facing the country.

I was pleased to discover CIDA's role in a city waste management program run entirely by women, where there were no men at all. I look at the figures that you have provided on the evolution of those three countries and the totals. They are not adjusted dollars; they are 2001-02 dollars as opposed to 2007-08 dollars. You can only compare them if they are adjusted for inflation. You cannot compare dollar for dollar. Still, we can see a clear progression in Canada's involvement in these three countries. I very much hope that Canada has helped to make it possible for women in those three countries to be involved with the challenges: governance, for one.

Does your agency share my view, or did I misunderstand, or was I just dazzled by the local culture? That was the impression I was left with. I have to tell you that I met men who often did not put my mind at ease about ethical standards in public governance. The female parliamentarians that I met seemed much more determined to reject all the old post-colonial concepts that Europeans, great friends and allies of ours though they are, had happily spread throughout their colonies. The women were not as affected by all that and, today, they are ready to start from square one and face the challenge. If my impression is correct, what can we do to help them?

Mr. Greenhill: You make an excellent observation. The role of women is essential to the whole area of development. It is very important to value and empower them in their political and economic roles. We know, for example, that the more educated the women, the lower the rate of infant mortality.

We know that the most productive ministries in a number of countries are those where women are playing an ever greater role. CIDA has been very involved in questions of equality for girls and women for years. Canada is considered a leader in the area.

What does that mean at the most basic level? Education is vital. The more girls are educated, the greater freedom of economic, political and personal choice they will have when they marry and decide how many children they will have and when.

[English]

There is no silver bullet, but if there was one, it would be the education of girls.

[Translation]

Senator Nolin: I encourage you to increase your efforts at community level, even if that means taking on the perceptions of our fellow men. Our strong focus has to be on the efforts of the women. As one example, we went to a rural community in Mali where I saw not one man working, only women. They were extracting the butter from shea nuts for the cosmetic industry in the west. These women climb the trees to gather the large fruit from which they extract the paste that, I assume, will command a good price when it is sold to North American and European cosmetics manufacturers. The men were sitting on their behinds smoking pipes. They were great talkers, but it was the women who impressed me with the efficiency of their work. I urge you to put your money on them, because my impression is that the future of Africa lies in their hands.

Mr. Greenhill: In that context, I would like to make a comment about microlending, which is a way to empower individuals and communities. In a number of countries, most of those who participate, and often those who participate most successfully, are women.

Senator Nolin: In the same village, there was a little financial establishment, Desjardins International, along the lines of the credit unions that we know so well in Quebec. After three years, its assets were the equivalent of $3,000 Canadian. It was tremendous listening to them talk. Interest rates were set almost daily, based on the cost of operating the place. No one argued with that. It was a community where determined women had taken the lead.

The motor used to crush those shea nuts came from Canada. It was not the newest of models, but it definitely seemed to be getting the job done.

[English]

The Chair: You will find very little argument with the position taken by Senator Nolin, namely, the empowerment of women being one of the key factors that will probably change the face of Africa in the next generation.

[Translation]

Senator Corbin: In 1972, the first Canadian parliamentarians to be formally received by the parliament and the government of Senegal attended the launch of a program to put engines in fishing canoes. That program came about with CIDA assistance.

We were told that the second stage of that effort should be to set up a cold chain, a way to refrigerate fish products, that is. In the meantime, they began to experience the problem of overfishing in Senegal's waters. Other African countries with coastlines also exhausted their fish stocks. They still have fish, but fewer and fewer of them. They are now doing in African waters what we did off Newfoundland and Labrador, in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and in other places.

The canoes catch only enough fish for domestic consumption, and a small one at that. They are mostly used by young people, teenagers, who want to sail away from their country and land in Europe where their future is brighter. Things are bleak in Senegal and places like it. Many of them die on beaches or are washed ashore on the Canary Islands. Do not try to tell me that everything is fine in Africa. I do not believe it.

I have been to Africa several times, most recently with the members of this committee. We wrote a report. What do you think about it? You must have read it, or at least, your staff must have prepared a summary of it for you. Do you agree with the report, and why?

Mr. Greenhill: I am not in a position to provide an answer to your question about an official response to your report. No request has been made. I am not the right person to answer.

Senator Corbin: Let us talk like people. Let us forget bureaucracy, forget the cumbersome apparatus of government.

Mr. Greenhill: This is not about my past positions or my style. It is the reality of my role, about what I can say clearly and what I cannot. I can say, for example, that more refugees are going to try to get to Europe from Senegal. Some will die in the attempt. It is a tragedy both for them and for their families.

Does that mean that there has been no progress on the continent for 15 years? I think that the facts show that the reality is dynamic rather than static. But for hundreds of thousands of people in Africa, it is static. Is this a worse situation than we would have wished? Absolutely. It is true that, until recently, it was a place where poverty rates were increasing rather than decreasing. Now we are beginning to see a drop, but the rate is very high.

Senator Corbin: I do not agree with you. The basis for that data is so shaky that the slightest blip causes a colossal change in the numbers that we tend to interpret as progress. It is perhaps just the difference between one meal a day and one and a quarter or one and a half meals, nothing more.

Statistics can be interpreted differently; you can make them tell you what you want. But when you are there, you do not see statistics, you see faces. You see little boys, four and five years old, breaking rocks by the side of the road in the Congo, for example, or running after tourists in the cities, their bellies empty, asking for money so that they can get something to eat. They are not statistics, they are real. That is what you see in Africa. Statistics have never particularly impressed me, because, over the years, I have come to understand that you can make them tell you anything.

Now, I would like to turn to a statement you made at the very end of your presentation. I cannot quote it word for word; I do not have your text at hand. You mentioned a process of transformation.

What are you referring to? Would it by any chance have anything to do with an important meeting of the entire CIDA that you are going to have soon?

Mr. Greenhill: We had a meeting of all our people this morning. Given the background, the challenges and the opportunities for international aid, the desire to have a more focused and harmonized approach, there are a number of things that we can bring in line with reality and with the requests made by the countries themselves. We evaluated our structure, which has been in place for years. We told ourselves that we had to change our way of operating.

Senator Corbin: When did you start to do that?

Mr. Greenhill: We began structural changes in June 2007. Those changes are one aspect of what we are doing to improve CIDA's efficiency.

Senator Corbin: It is important; it is vital; our report says so. This initiative comes after our report was tabled. So our report might have had some effect.

Mr. Greenhill: It provides a context that makes it easier to change things.

Senator Corbin: That is a good way to say yes.

Mr. Greenhill: Twelve months ago, we brought together all the geographic groups that have existed separately at CIDA for 20 years or more: Africa, Latin America and Asia. We have some geographic coherence. A senior vice- president is overseeing the way we do things, our process, which is too cumbersome, and finding a way to reduce by 60 per cent the time required to get a project up and running, and making sure that our approach is much more structured, focused and coordinated.

A new vice-president is responsible for a much more strategic approach to our policies. The approach is tied in with our evaluations and our communications to provide a clearer fact-based strategy that can be better communicated to Canadians.

We have brought all our experts together into precise areas. People have been saying for some time that we must have a deeper knowledge of important areas like education. We have established a sector group and broader partnerships so that our skills in those areas become deeper.

These are organizational changes. As such, they do not automatically produce results, but they create an organization that is more results-oriented. The results that we hope to achieve are to support a much more focused and better developed program arranged by sector in each geographical area. We will not just be saying that we had nice activities and spent money, but that we have clear and quantified results that we can really show to Canadians and to our partners in those countries.

So we will have an organizational foundation that will allow us to be more decentralized and put more people with responsibility in the field. Afghanistan, for example, is a country where we needed to do things differently and had the opportunity to do so. We have established much more creative programs there than anywhere else. We have established a system of microfinancing that has the best results in the world at the moment. We have placed more and more people with responsibility in the field, and, with the minister's announcement yesterday, our on-site funding has gone from $100,000 to $2 million.

Senator Corbin: I understand all that. Let me ask a final question, on another matter. I did not support Bill C-293; I criticized it all through the process. The supporters of the bill clearly seemed to want a missionary program. I could ask you how you interpret the term ``poverty reduction.'' I think that this is like the statistics we were discussing: you can turn them around however you like in an attempt to satisfy everyone.

What irks me is that I do not think that, as an ideal, it will change anything, however much it is churned into legal terms. I read that China has gone into the Congo and signed a $6-billion agreement. They did that recently, two or three months ago. In exchange for access to copper, they will build infrastructure from one end of the Congo to the other. They are going to link the east of the country to the capital, and so on; I am sure that you are aware of the initiative. You mention the presence of Canadian mining companies in the Congo. What are they doing there; are they going to leave anything behind when they have exhausted the deposits? China is going to leave something behind, something fundamental to the future of that new democracy. That is where I find Canada to be very weak.

Poverty reduction programs in themselves will not move those countries forward. They need job creation; they need money to put in the pockets of the people so that they can spend it and bring the regional, and eventually, the national economy to life. Little poverty reduction programs are not the answer, however commendable, noble and what have you they are. I am not against them in principle, but real poverty is reduced by creating jobs.

Mr. Greenhill: Exactly.

Senator Corbin: Is CIDA working to create permanent and stable jobs in Africa? CIDA's share in overall development assistance, Canada's share, in fact, is not really that significant. In your remarks, you painted a picture that the people watching this meeting on television might easily swallow. But, Mr. Greenhill, excuse me, Canada is not playing a particularly significant role in Africa. I feel that we have everything to gain by changing our focus and our approach. And, furthermore, we said so in our report.

I hope that the changes and the corporate reorganization that you are presently engaged in will allow these crucial problems to be finally dealt with. Otherwise, you are wasting both your time and billions of dollars. That is my opinion, for what it is worth.

Mr. Greenhill: I would just like to assure you that we are going to do our best to avoid wasting time and money. You have pointed out the major challenges we face: for poverty to be permanently reduced, there has to be sustained growth. How do we produce that? How do we make sure that there is a foundation of security and good governance on which to build the infrastructure? How do we make sure that we have an educated population that can do it? How, as you mentioned in your report, do we fight the infectious diseases that can have, not just a major social cost, but also a huge economic cost? How do we effectively coordinate it all?

One of the things that I have found most rewarding in recent years is that countries themselves are coming to grips more and more with two or three fundamental issues.

The first is that, to an increasing extent, we see much more integrated development programs that include education, health, infrastructure and institutional development. Countries have their own programs of growth and of poverty reduction, instead of piecemeal efforts here and there.

Second, they are concentrating on economic growth and increasing their revenues through taxation, so that they can pay for their own development to a much greater extent.

Third, they have a clearer view of democratic responsibility. People in charge of implementing the programs have to answer to the polls every four years, and the people decide whether they are delivering the goods.

We blend our efforts into that background. For example, we will invest in education and health, but in programs where, to an increasing extent, funds are set aside for direct economic growth from revenue provided by other backers. In other cases, we put money into economic growth either directly or through organizations like the African Development Bank. In that strategy, the bank's focus is on infrastructure and the private sector.

We have significantly increased our investment in the African Development because we believe that infrastructure is one of the obstacles to growth in Africa. Instead of all the bilateral funding agencies coming up with our own infrastructure programs, we think that it is better for things to be coordinated by organizations like the World Bank and the African Development Bank.

[English]

Senator Mahovlich: Many years ago, my wife and I took a trip to Africa. I believe it was Tanzania that we visited. It was fairly primitive. The tribes were there. I often wondered how we will ever educate these people or if we should even try. They are almost living as the Aboriginals here were living maybe 100 years ago.

They seem to be very happy. I went into some of their villages. The chief had five or six wives. Their homes were made of cow dung. I thought that these people needed a lesson, but I do not know whether we should try to change them.

They were farmers. They were looking after cattle. They seemed to be quite happy in their own way. Do we aim to educate those people, or do we simply leave them as they are?

How does CIDA measure aid effectiveness, and what are the conditions under which aid can be the most effective?

The business community in Canada has advocated that CIDA channel less of its aid through multilateral institutions, such as the World Bank and the United Nations, and disburse more of its aid directly itself. That way, Canadian firms will be better able to know when project opportunities will occur and, therefore, be in a better position to participate in the aid effort.

I was in the Democratic Republic of the Congo a few years ago with this committee. China and a few other countries were there constructing roads. I thought to myself if anyone can build roads, it is Canadians. However, we did not have a group of construction workers there building roads. I think it would help them very much. Why do we not have some of our private companies there building roads?

What do you think about China and its increased presence in Africa? What implications does this development have for Canada?

Mr. Greenhill: In terms of our engagement in countries, it is dependent on the issue of aid effectiveness. Given the challenges, the failures and the successes over the last 40 or 50 years in development, a very serious stocktaking took place in the late 1990s in terms of what works and what does not work. It was clear that goodwill and good efforts were not enough for development to work. Out of that came a series of principles for aid effectiveness that were enshrined in a core set of principles in 2005 that we all try to live up to, namely, the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness.

The first principle is that development has to be primarily the responsibility of the community and the country itself. If there is no will, focus and determination to move forward, our dollars and ideas will not help. If there is a determination and will to move forward, we can be most effective if we respect and reflect what those countries see as their own priorities, whether it is education, health or economic development. It should be country-led.

The second principle is that aid needs to be coordinated and harmonized to be effective. Tanzania was a good example. We had a situation where a study done by a Canadian scholar about 10 years ago revealed close to 1,500 different development projects were going on in a completely uncoordinated and, often, overlapping way.

If you looked at education for Tanzanian children, you may have found some interesting Canadian, French, British, American, Swedish and German projects. Each of them was well-meaning and probably doing good work. However, they were not coordinated, did not have any sustainability and were not building capability there. If the Canadian project ended, these initiatives simply withered away.

Senator Mahovlich: We will have to apologize to these people.

Mr. Greenhill: We did better than that.

We basically said that we have to do things differently. In the case of Tanzania, for example, about six years ago, Canada and other donors voiced a concern about education but that they wanted to build education capability there.

Therefore, fourteen agencies put money into one pool to develop a primary education development program for Tanzania. We asked the following questions: What will the curriculum be? What will the text be? What are the criteria? How many children per classroom — we should have no more than three children in these long desks and at least two textbooks per child? What standard testing will we do at the end of the year to ensure results? How do we ensure that the money is going where it is supposed to, and that an annual assessment is done that is made public, not only to donors and the government?

Another element was put in called a social audit. If a village is supposed to receive 2 teachers, 40 desks and 150 books, that will be posted on the outside of the school. Then if only 1 teacher turns up or if there are only 30 desks or 75 textbooks, we can be assured that the community will be aware of it and deal with it.

The Auditor General always talks about light being the best antiseptic. That social audit is created at the local level.

The results have been that we now have one powerfully successful education system at the primary level in Tanzania. The last six years has seen 1.4 million more children in school, 38,000 more teachers and about 40,000 new classrooms.

We actually have a program that is more cost-effective, more effective and sustainable because it is now owned by the Tanzanian government and increasingly financed by them.

That is a key measure of effectiveness when it is country-led, harmonized and a mutual accountability for results exists in a concrete, outcome-based way. If we can put that in place, we can make things happen. Those are the core principles of aid effectiveness on which we are trying to focus.

The Canadian private sectors play an increasingly important role in areas of Africa. Our mining companies, such as Barrick Gold Corporation and others are major sources of employment, investment and training in many of these countries. SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. does outstanding engineering work. Interestingly, their primary clients are not CIDA. Their primary clients are private companies, governments and multilateral organizations.

Senator Mahovlich: Why not CIDA?

Mr. Greenhill: Let me give you the example of infrastructure. We do not support much infrastructure directly. However, the African Development Bank and the World Bank do.

In those cases, we provided the money in an untied fashion — as many have mentioned around the table today — and then it went out to tender and the best company with the best capability at the best price wins. In many cases, the best company with the best price will be a Canadian organization.

Senator Mahovlich: In Ethiopia they have quite a problem with drugs. Are we doing anything to help them out? Are we sending engineers there?

Mr. Greenhill: Yes, we are involved in setting up irrigation systems, digging simple wells and having systems when there are rains. When it rains, all the water runs off quickly, and the goal is to have catchment systems built. In many cases, it is not engineers who are needed. We have Engineers Without Borders Canada. I do not know if they are in Ethiopia, but they have sent engineers to assist in different parts of Africa. Many simple activities the communities can do themselves.

We are involved in a very intense way to do this in Ethiopia because food security is one of the big challenges, and the key to food security is water.

Senator Mahovlich: I know it is a desert-type climate, so the evaporation is a big problem; if they could contain that water underground somehow.

Mr. Greenhill: That is correct.

The Chair: You will find, Mr. Greenhill, that Senator Corbin's opinion on Bill C-293 has a great deal of support, particularly in this committee, but also in the Senate. The reality of politics is what it is. We all share concerns, as was eloquently expressed by Senator Corbin. I wanted to bring back the message to your people that there is a lot of sympathy for his position.

The second issue that I think Senator Corbin also raised is the fact that the invitation to you, I believe, contained a request that we have some commentary on the report. Obviously, you are somewhat reluctant — and I understand that — but I wonder if you could inform the minister that, at the first opportunity, we intend to invite her to come and make specific comments on the report. It is important for us, having spent a couple of years doing this, to have some feedback.

After spending this couple of years plus looking at this issue, I — and I think a number of other people — have a very strong opinion that long-term aid enslaves. We do not believe it is the most effective way to bring people out of poverty.

About halfway through our report — probably a year and a half ago — I wrote an article that was published by a national newspaper entitled ``Pity, aid is not the answer.'' The past president of Tanzania phoned me from Tanzania. As a matter of fact, a couple of months later he visited Canada and specifically asked that I meet with him to discuss the article and the report. He was very supportive of the fact that we believe, on this committee, that unless we do engage in more economic activity, that aid will be less of a factor in helping countries, such as sub-Saharan countries, from overcoming the difficulties they have. Therefore, it leads me to my question, which has been talked about a little here.

You talked about it a little bit the role of CIDA in the economic development of sub-Saharan Africa, not through third parties such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, and other organizations, but directly; microcredit is one area. I would like to specifically ask you if you engaged directly in the public-private partnerships that I understand are occurring in many parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where maybe a little bit of money will go a long way to help seed some projects or to help to multiply an investment. Do we do any of that today?

Mr. Greenhill: Clearly our goal is to make ourselves redundant. Our goal is to ensure that the countries are actually able to take control of their economic, social and political destiny. It is the cycle of progressing from a failed state to a fragile state to a low-income state, such as Mozambique, and then from a low-income to a middle-income state — as many of the countries in Latin America and Eastern Europe have done, and actually become donors themselves — that we would like to see. We have been focusing today on Africa, but if we look at Asia, at Thailand and Malaysia, at many of our key partners in Eastern Europe, at many of the development recipients of the past, such as Chile and Argentina who are now partners with us in Haiti, and at Latin America, this cycle is not only possible but has been realized. It has been realized in dozens of cases around the world.

It has been realized in a very limited number of cases in Africa up until now. Botswana might be one example. Other countries, such as Ghana, aspire to have middle-income status by 2015. Under their present growth rates they are moving toward it.

In case there is any sense that the people who are committing their lives to development in CIDA are interested in creating dependency and a static approach to poverty, senators can rest assured that people's view of success is when these countries are able to grow and move out of this themselves.

The issue is the combination of interventions to do that and what role we should be playing directly or indirectly. That is why I come back again to the issue of what the integrated program is that that country has.

Tanzania has a growth and poverty reduction strategy, as does Ghana. The vast majority of what we do in both those countries is aligned with the country's own development priorities, including a very significant growth agenda.

Should we as an agency be engaged in more economic-growth supporting investments? I think that is a good challenge for us, and I will not give a simplistic answer to that.

Vocational training is an example of where we can and should do more. Minister Oda has noted the importance of having education for employment as there is economic growth. Therefore, in our reports on planning and priorities last year, we noted that vocational training is an area where we will be looking at what more we can do. That is an area we can be involved in that creates the conditions where growth driven by the private sector can work more effectively.

One caveat I will put forward as a person who has been in the private sector as well as serving as a public servant is that we have learned, through long and expensive experience here in our country, that governments are best at creating enabling conditions for business, not choosing winners and losers, and not being involved in specific projects.

We have a very competent group of dedicated people. I find it difficult to imagine that we would be better at choosing specific projects in Africa for businesses than we are here in Canada. Enabling conditions, such as infrastructure, institutions or skills training, those aspects that have worked here in Canada, are where we are investing and supporting Africa.

The Chair: Thank you for that answer. I am not sure it is totally what I wanted, but it went some way to recognizing that, without economic development and growth, we will be talking about this for another 40 years.

Senator Stollery: I realize we can go on all night because there are so many questions, and the subject is one with which some of us are familiar.

Senator Corbin was absolutely right, in my opinion. I have noticed in this whole discussion — and I knew colonial Africa 50 years ago — that people talk about Africans differently than they would talk about themselves and their own country.

Of course, we would like people to become richer and have more money. However, would we use the concept ``poverty reduction'' in Ontario? Would we say, when we are arguing about the government assisting in a car factory — which we do — ``We are doing poverty reduction,'' or would we say, ``We are trying to create jobs for Canadians''?

Why do we use a different vocabulary when they are Black peasants than we use for ourselves? I remember some racist people in my youth, but I find that has not changed, actually, in a funny sort of way.

Mr. Greenhill: I hope you are not inferring that I am racist.

Senator Stollery: No, I am not inferring that you are racist or anything like that. However, I am telling you that the vocabulary seems to be different for one group of people than for another. As Senator Corbin said, the committee knows 7,000 people drowned two years ago. They were peasant farmers from Mali, the old Sudan and Burkina Faso, trying to get to the Canary Islands. Seven-thousand people drowned; that does not count the people who made it in the open boats.

Last week, we saw pictures of the shootings in South Africa because the South Africans resent the migration of people from Zimbabwe, Mozambique and the neighbouring countries. I would come up with a case, because I know the area intimately, that people to the south tend to try to get to South Africa and the people to the north try to get to Europe. This is what has been happening.

This subject is vast. It seems to me that the development people have always come up with a few favourite countries, such as Tanzania and Mozambique. If I were to pick a favourite country in Africa that is in desperate straits and one that, if the situation is not solved, affects a huge region, it would be the Democratic Republic of the Congo. However, the Congo has actually dropped on the sheet that you have given us entitled ``Increasing our focus in sub-Saharan Africa.''

The Democratic Republic of the Congo has moved from fifth place to fifteenth place. Certainly, one of my questions would be why that is.

I did look into your biography and noticed that, three years ago, you said, before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, that there should be a hike in foreign aid. We know the objective was .07 per cent; that was the old figure that was used.

Then, when the committee made two trips to Africa, we found that in Ethiopia, we now perform budget assistance and give the money to the government. I cannot remember exactly the details of what happened. We met with the prime minister. I know the ambassador was nervous about us coming to Ethiopia because of riots. Just after we left, I forget how many people were killed; many people were arrested.

It seems to me that assisting in budgets means that CIDA does not actually know what to do with the money. I knew Ethiopia in 1959, and I spoke with many people who said that it was worse in the countryside when we were there a couple of years ago than it was in 1960. That is what I was told by quite a few people. I went around and did a bit of investigating because I arrived there a day or two early.

To some extent we present CIDA with an impossible or difficult situation. We have made our comments in our report, and you have responded in June of last year. You did not say that it was because of our report but that was the clear implication.

Afghanistan is our largest recipient, I think. I find it incredible. How many millions of people have been killed in the Kivu provinces and Eastern Rwanda?

The Chair: A thousand people are killed per day in the DRC still.

Senator Stollery: It is still happening, and we dropped our assistance. I went twice to Kinshasa, and the famous international committee has focused on one of the candidates; they like President Joseph Kabila better than Jean- Pierre Bemba. One comes from one area while the other comes from the other. Meanwhile, as Senator Mahovlich or possibly the chair mentioned, the Chinese come up with $6 billion. We talk about the colonial legacy. I am not certain why there is criticism of the Chinese when they come up with the dough; no one else does. There is a certain amount of criticism of the Chinese.

I know that I have, to some extent, been getting this off my chest. However, I do not buy the story that we have heard, although I am not accusing you of trying to mislead the committee. I do not believe you are.

However, we have heard many people on this subject and know the ground reasonably well. I do not think there has been much improvement. I have to say that the world has been distracted, probably, by Afghanistan, and that is also is not your fault. You are being asked to do things that I know, from my own experiences, are practically impossible. Nevertheless, I think Africa is being abandoned; it comes up and then fades periodically. I feel the DRC figure is astounding.

I know I have made a lot of observations, and I could continue and drive everyone crazy, but I will not do that. I know it is not all Mr. Greenhill's fault. The World Bank told the committee in Washington that there have been six changes in policy since 1962.

The Chair: Mr. Greenhill that is a wide area to cover, but I hope you can make some comments.

Mr. Greenhill: Let me focus on the issue of poverty reduction; what does it mean, and who uses that term? That is an important issue to a number of committee members.

The term ``poverty reduction'' is not one we use in our normal, everyday life. We can translate it to people not being hungry, people having more than a dollar a day. It means children not dying below the age of five; children having an education; mothers not dying in child birth; and it means doing this in a way that does not destroy the environment for the future. That is what poverty reduction translates into in terms of the lives of the people, and that is what is reflected in the UN Millennium Development Goals, MDGs, which lay out concrete indicators of success or failure in terms of the impact on peoples' lives and whether people's lives continue.

Who uses that term?

It is used by virtually everyone in the developing world. It is not a term imposed by the North. The whole idea of poverty reduction and the concept of the MDGs were endorsed by the United Nations, the majority of whose members are developing countries.

If you look at the national strategies for many of these countries, with their type of economic growth and poverty reduction, they use that term because for them it is meaningful. Does that not include job creation? No, it does not. The only way one can grow oneself out of poverty is through market-based, private-sector-driven growth. It is a fundamental part of the equation. The key measures while that is taking place are how many children are dying before the age of five long before they get into the workforce? How many girls are educated or are married off at age 14 — long before getting into the workforce? Those are some of the fundamental issues behind the term ``poverty reduction.'' I would not accept for a moment that this is an imposition by development bureaucrats. It is a reflection of a core reality, and, in many cases, a dire reality that the entire international community is trying to address.

The point I would make is reflected by the conversation that we heard around the table today. This is extremely difficult work. There is no easy answer to the challenges of many of these countries. We can try to learn practicality not only from the successes but also from the many failures of the past in development to try to do this in a more effective way. Some of the key points that we were talking about in what makes this effective is doing things where the country itself sees the priority; doing it in a coordinated way so that we do not trip over one another's toes; doing it in a way that there are results so that we can come before honourable senators and others and show what this means in terms of lives saved, people educated and growth attained, and sticking at it.

That takes us to the issue of where we focus. You can only focus on something if you can also focus away from it. That is one of the toughest decisions people make. Presently, the countries that we are most focused on include, first, Mozambique: an absolutely destroyed society with a non-existent government that, since 1991, has made extraordinary strides such that the World Bank and others see it as a positive case for how countries can grow themselves out of a difficult situation. We increased our investment there. Second is Tanzania, which has gone from a one-party socialist system of many years ago to an increasingly vibrant, private-sector-driven economy and an increasingly pluralistic political system where we are seeing significant results. Third is Ghana, which is on its way to showing how multi-party democracies work.

These countries were chosen because the belief was that Canadian aid dollars could make a difference for them also in terms of there being pathfinders that are relevant to the rest of the continent. One can and absolutely should debate specific countries. However, that was the intention behind the increased focus, which is one of the important recommendations that senators have made.

Let me reiterate. I do not want people to believe, in any way, that we are underestimating the challenges involved in this. We must be realistic about what is happening in Africa. Compared to the 1970s and 1980s, there are some promising elements, but it is not consistent across the continent. Even in those countries where there is promise, there is real fragility. I do not want anyone to think that we underestimate the challenge of this. However, I want senators to have a sense that the people who have committed their careers to development are doing their utmost to ensure that they are having a positive effect.

Senator Smith: I remember when we were in South Africa and then in Kenya. You are talking about progress. About 50 years ago, Africa represented about 3 per cent of the world's economy; it is now down to about 1 per cent. I am not sure if that is a precise figure, but it is a small fraction of what it once was.

When we were there, we spent a lot of our time, in every conversation, on the challenge of how to ensure that the aid goes to the people that need it, to poverty reduction, and not just to lining the pockets of government officials and whoever.

I am glad you mentioned Mozambique because last year, I was the Canadian on a committee of 11 people — and, this was organized by the World Bank — that went to Mozambique. We were shown major projects that they thought were role models for trying to ensure that the aid went to where it was needed. It included rebuilding the railway system, which had been devastated during the civil war, to get their products out and greatly expanding the docks so that they could ship products to wherever and generate income from that; and also their hydro facilities. The big dam was up near the Zimbabwe border and about half of the power was exported to South Africa, for which they did get paid; and some to Zimbabwe, for which they did not get paid and their patience was running out there. Projects were created to deal with orphans whose parents had both died of AIDS. There were days when your eyes were moist. Most of the time, it was very moving.

We had various sessions. When we were close to Zimbabwe, we heard the horror stories non-stop. I want some reaction to the following: The election that is happening there is a complete and utter farce, according to everything I have read. I will be shocked if President Robert Mugabe's opponents win. I would be pleased, but we do not want aid going to the poverty reduction of President Mugabe's anointed hacks. What are your thoughts on a situation such as Zimbabwe, which is a classic case?

The other bad country is Cameroon with the corruption of the oil money that they receive. Unbelievable horror stories are told. Can you give us your thoughts on a country such as Canada, who wants to think of the people in Zimbabwe and the subject of poverty reduction but does not want to see aid going to President Mugabe's anointed hacks and into a society that has become a tragedy?

Mr. Greenhill: Those are great observations and questions.

It is a perfect comparison in a sad way. If we look at Zimbabwe and Mozambique 15 years ago, who would have imagined this and who would have imagined the decline in Zimbabwe in terms of life expectancy, economic growth and political and civil liberties?

How do we respond to that case? Certainly, no money goes to or through the government. Our work there is focused on humanitarian assistance, some on HIV/AIDS and to support civil society; that is, CARE, and other groups who are trying to provide basic assistance in a very difficult situation. What we can do and what we invest is limited. The first principle of aid effectiveness is whether or not there is a responsible and effective partner there. Unfortunately, the non-governmental organizations there are very constrained and certainly not at the national level.

It is interesting to compare that with Mozambique. Who would have thought that, in 1991, Mozambique would be making the progress it is making now? As you would have seen, it is still very poor and fragile; but it has gone from being absolutely destroyed in many areas to actually having a sense of possibility of progress on the democratic side, on growth and even on its ability — we talk about ability to deal with issues — to deal with natural disasters.

It is subject to flooding and famine, and its own country capacity to deal with humanitarian disasters is much stronger than it was five or ten years ago. That is a case that provides hope.

In that case, we have tripled or quadrupled our assistance to Mozambique in the last eight years. We moved our head of the program from Ottawa to Mozambique, and we have been key partners with them, not only on the government side but also on the agricultural sector, where they have huge potential. That is the type of opportunity that we can invest in and what we meant when we said that there is a great opportunity for the people of Mozambique. However, it is also a bit of a pathfinder for that region.

One of the challenges, when we look at Africa, is the question of whether Africa has had, in fact, 40 years of decline or a period of 25 years of decline, followed by 15 years of relative progress. In both cases, we end up at the same point. However, depending on how we define and interpret the last 40 years, we may come up with a very different perspective on what we do going forward.

If it is the former, indicating that nothing is working, we have to push the reset button and do it all over again. If it is the latter, if there is this uptake in terms of per capita economic growth, democratization, governance, education and health care, even if many of them are still below where they were in the 1960s, what does that mean?

Are mistakes still being made that we should be learning from, but are there things happening? Is there the national and local leadership in place by Africans themselves that we should be supporting? If there are development agencies that are starting to get this and do it right, including potentially, as a hypothesis, our own in some cases, do they deserve recognition and support for the changes in approaches, policies and programs in the last five or ten years?

I will leave that as a question for the senators.

[Translation]

Senator Nolin: Mr. Greenhill, respect for the rule of law is one of the elements that allow us to assess the quality of public governance. Correct me if I am wrong. In sub-Saharan Africa, 22 per cent of your contributions go to governance efforts. I assume that you must share this responsibility with other donor countries rather than going about it piecemeal.

Mr. Greenhill: Yes.

Senator Nolin: I would like to know how you make sure that they come to respect the rule of law, an independent judiciary, that is. How many female judges are there in that part of the world, for example?

Mr. Greenhill: That is an excellent question. We will provide you with other specific examples. But one basic situation is our work with the Supreme Court in Ghana to enhance not only their role, but also their efficiency: ``justice delayed is justice denied,'' as they say. We are working to improve that area.

In Mali, we are working to establish an effective auditor general's office. With more responsible government comes more accountability. We are working to support groups who make sure that human rights and political rights are respected. One of those groups is Lawyers for Civil Rights. We can talk about a country's institutional underpinnings, one of the most fundamental levels. We will provide you with specific examples of what we do.

Senator Nolin: If a written reply can stimulate thought, at least my thought, I certainly would like to have more information about that. I also remind you about my question about female judges.

Mr. Greenhill: We will provide you with that information. It is a good question.

Senator Nolin: It is all about respect.

[English]

The Chair: We often do that. We understand that we, at times, put our witnesses in a position that they may not be able to give us full answers because the questions are complex or they do not have everything at their fingertips. We would appreciate if you can send the response to the clerk, or any other thoughts you may have that relate to our meeting; then the clerk will ensure that every member of the committee receives that response.

Senator Stollery: Last night, Mr. Greenhill, we had a tremendous meeting on Russia. It was a powerful performance by our former ambassador to Moscow, who informed us that in 10 years, from bankruptcy, Russia has created a middle class of 20 million people. We have not seen anything like that in Africa. Maybe they are lucky that the development people did not get hold of them.

The Chair: I have to give you the last word.

Mr. Greenhill: I wanted to thank senators for their interest in Africa, because it is clearly one of the most challenging situations in the world today. There are no easy answers on this.

I have noted the areas where I believe there is a sense of possibility of progress, but I wanted to underline two elements: The first being that it is very difficult and challenging in each of these countries — even the successful ones that we are talking about — and the second element is that at the same time that I have laid out areas where I believe we have learned and are doing things better, I would not in any way want to leave the impression that we think we have it completely right. We need to do a lot more to become more focused, effective and accountable.

I talked about some of the organizational changes. We are also reviewing how we work in each country, how we are engaged in each sector to become more effective. While I think there are some positive elements that can be built on, we can all look toward more positive changes going forward. I wanted to leave that with honourable senators, as well. Thank you very much for the opportunity.

The Chair: Mr. Greenhill, before I let you go, I should clarify, first, that our opinions is largely based on the testimony given to us throughout the two years plus that we were involved in this exercise.

Senator Stollery: It is also based on 400 witnesses.

The Chair: Therefore, we may be interpreting them, but this is what we heard out there, particularly in Africa.

Second, if there is any criticism, I do not believe any of our colleagues meant that it be criticism aimed at you or your associates or colleagues, but more criticism of the policies, some of which we believe would serve the cause of development better if they were changed.

Third, I appreciate that this was not an easy gig for you, if I can use that term. The issue is quite complex and difficult. We appreciate and respect that. You can also see that we have a passion for and an interest in this issue. I hope you also saw that we have expertise on this issue, or perhaps knowledge is a better term.

We want to thank you for appearing before us and for adding value to our discussion. You can certainly tell the minister that I was serious about inviting her to give us a commentary on the report at the first opportunity. Thank you for coming. We look forward to the next time.

Honourable senators, because of the uncertainty of the parliamentary calendar, the next meeting will be at the call of the chair.

The committee adjourned.


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