Conference ends with concrete proposals on debt, ODA, capital flight

Abstract

African Ministers of Finance and Economic Development and Planning have ended a three-day conference with concrete proposals on what Africa and its partners need to do to address some of the continent's key development challenges. In a Ministerial Statement issued today at the end of the conference - convened under the theme "The Challenges of Financing African Development" - the Ministers called for wide-ranging measures to address the continent's debt burden, dwindling overseas development assistance (ODA), the need for foreign direct investment (FDI), and the scourge of capital flight. A key aspect of the Conference follow-up strategy is that these and other positions on the international dimension of financing Africa's development will be conveyed by the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) - which organized the conference - to the Development Assistance Committee of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) as well as to the upcoming G-7 meeting in Cologne, Germany in June.