Madame Co-Chairperson,
Your Excellencies, Distinguished colleagues.

I am honoured to have this opportunity to address the resumed third session of the Preparatory Committee for the International Conference on Financing for Development. I am particularly pleased to be speaking to you on behalf of the three Rome-based food and development agencies. Jacques Diouf, the Director General of FAO, Catherine Bertini, Executive Director of WFP and I share a common vision of a world free from poverty and hunger. We believe that the Conference which you are preparing has a vital role to play in making this vision come true.

We are meeting here under the shadow of the terrible events of September 11th. In the words of the Secretary General and I quote: "Terrorism is an international scourge, which the United Nations has many times condemned. A terrorist attack on one country is an attack on humanity as a whole."

These tragic events must command a reaffirmation of our common humanity and our shared destiny. A resurgent sense of human solidarity should summon us to action on the aims that have been proclaimed by the international community for over fifty years, starting with the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. But sadly, poor countries and poor peoples are likely to face an even more difficult environment in the coming period especially if the insecurity and uncertainty induced by these events precipitates a global economic slowdown. Yet creating the conditions in which each human being can lead a life of dignity, free of poverty, deprivation and hunger, is now all the more essential if this new century is not to be blighted by the repeated conflicts that marked the last one.

The forthcoming Conference in Mexico next March has a central role in this quest. Many years in the making, this Conference is being held at an unusually important time.

Madame Co-Chairperson,

Just over a year ago, world leaders at the Millennium Summit declared their commitment to the goal of reducing by half the proportion of humanity that lives in extreme poverty by the year 2015. They also reiterated the commitment made at the World Food Summit to reduce the number of hungry by half by 2015 along with parallel goals in health and literacy. The Millennium Summit also drew specific attention to the development needs of Africa.

Our agencies have critical and complementary roles to play in supporting the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, especially those for halving hunger and poverty and those related to the sustainable use of the world's natural resources. Each of our agencies has recently engaged in a process of reflection and strategic planning with the Millennium Development Goals in mind. We believe that the goals which concern us are attainable, but not without the mobilisation of significantly increased financial resources, both domestic and international. The potential impact of each of our agencies in the quest for a world free of poverty and hunger is seriously impaired by chronic under-funding not just for our own activities but, above all, for the required actions within our developing member countries.

Achieving these goals will require not only greater resources but also channelling those resources to reach the poor, where they live, to support their own efforts to earn a viable livelihood and to live a full life. This Preparatory Committee has the onerous responsibility of promoting a consensus at the Mexico Conference that will lead to the mobilisation of financial resources on the scale required to achieve the Millennium goals and will ensure that these are targeted so that they make a real difference in the lives of hundreds of millions of poor people.

Earlier this year IFAD brought out the Rural Poverty Report. The Report highlighted that three-quarters of the world's 1.2 billion extreme poor, some 900 million people, live in rural areas depending on agriculture and related rural crafts, trade and services for their livelihood. The Report also highlighted that the rate of poverty reduction declined in the 1990's and that the present rate is far below that required to achieve the Millennium Summit poverty goal. In Africa, it is barely one sixth of the rate required and in some African countries, social and poverty indicators are actually getting worse under the assault of civil strife and the AIDS pandemic.

Both FAO and WFP share similar concerns over the slow rate of progress towards the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals. The latest observations show that the rate of reduction in the number of undernourished persons must be raised almost four times if the World Food Summit goal is to be attained.

Paradoxically, even as the focus on poverty has sharpened, ODA to agriculture and the rural sector, where the bulk of the poor live, has declined by an estimated forty percent over the past decade. Food aid for development purposes has also fallen steadily. At the same time, domestic resources for agriculture and other productive activities of the rural poor have dropped in most developing countries
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Achieving the Millennium Summit poverty and hunger goals requires a sharp increase in economic growth. An estimated rate of growth of seven percent a year is needed in the case of Africa. Since agricultural and rural activities provide the bulk of employment as well as a large share of the exports in poor countries, the best - and perhaps the only - sustainable way to increase overall growth for them is to help accelerate the pace of rural development and agriculture. This will require higher investment for productive activities, rural finance, research and extension as well as in rural health, education, infrastructure and institution-building. Creating new opportunities in the countryside will reduce migration into urban areas, greatly improving the conditions of the urban poor.

But we also recognise that growth is bound to be slow as long as large numbers of people remain undernourished. Hunger is both a cause and effect of poverty. Direct measures to reduce hunger among those who are denied access to adequate food, if carefully planned, can lead to growth through enhancing the productive capacity of individuals, creating new assets and stimulating markets.

Madame Co-Chairperson,

The Member States in this Preparatory Committee and the Facilitator are to be commended for their determined efforts to prepare for a successful outcome of the Mexico Conference. The Draft Outcome statement is a comprehensive document covering a wide range of issues before the Conference on Financing for Development.

Our three agencies share the aspirations for a Fully Inclusive and Equitable Globalisation, voiced in the draft statement. We are not, however, convinced that the measures proposed for endorsement by the Conference are sufficiently specific to be successful in mobilising the resources required for the achievement of food security, poverty reduction and sustainable development goals. These are goals which the international community has strongly endorsed and which are of special concern to us.

We welcome the proposals relating to the mobilisation of international private resources for development and for further liberalisation of trade so that it becomes a more effective engine for growth and development. We also share the perception that "ODA plays an essential role as a complement to other sources of financing for the development of developing countries.....", and we "recognise the need to foster a much enhanced provision of global public goods....".

Our main concern, however, is over the document's lack of specificity in its prescriptions for raising both development assistance as well as funds for an enhanced supply of Global Public Goods. Greater attention is also needed on the issue of innovative fund raising methods, especially market-based methods. We look to this Committee to develop a more explicit expression regarding resource transfers reflecting the commitment made by world leaders at the Millennium Summit.

We recognise that domestic resources must play the pre-dominant role in the efforts of developing countries to accelerate their pace of poverty reduction and development. At the same time we need also to recognise that development assistance has a crucial catalytic role in building institutions, including rural microfinance institutions, that can mobilise substantial volumes of domestic resources to support the productive activities of the poor. Such institutions can also serve as cost-effective mechanisms through which to channel external resources to the poor. ODA through public-private partnerships can also help create the physical and social infrastructure necessary to attract direct private investment into rural areas.

Improving global governance and the international financial architecture is also central to foster greater financial stability and an open trading system as well as enhance the supply of global public goods. This will greatly facilitate the brave efforts that developing countries themselves are making to reform their economic policy and institutional structures.

The United Nations Agencies in Rome, FAO, WFP and IFAD have specific and strongly complementary mandates to address different aspects of the issues of rural development, poverty and hunger. All three of our institutions remain deeply concerned about the conditions of the poor and the hungry throughout the world and the risks of further marginalisation that they now face. We are therefore raising our voices together to urge the Conference on Financing for Development to halt the decline in resources committed to poverty and hunger reduction with a special focus on the rural sector.

Madame Co-Chairperson,

The tragic events of September have dramatically underlined the linkages and the weaknesses in our global society. But at the same time, they should lead us to a better and clearer understanding of our common heritage of values and our shared respect for human beings. Today, for far too many people, life continues to be in the same state as that described by a seventeenth century philosopher, "Poor, nasty, brutish and short". Yet we now have the resources and knowledge to open opportunities by which even the poorest groups can build secure and productive lives for themselves and their families. We must not fail them.

The quest for realising this noble goal will be long and complex. But a decisive first step can, and must, be taken at the Mexico Conference. In closing, let me assure you of the commitment of FAO, WFP and IFAD to work together and with others in mobilising resources and providing financial, technical and food assistance in the fight against hunger and rural poverty.

Thank you.