World forum on aid opens in Busan

BUSAN ― The world’s largest forum on aid officially opened in Busan on Tuesday with 3,000 participants from governments, parliaments, international organizations and civic groups.

Delegates participating in the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness, or HLF-4, assessed the progress made since the 2005 Paris Declaration.

“We should never stop in our efforts to explore effective aid. And ultimately we need to find ways to turn aid effectiveness into real development. This is exactly what the Busan High Level Forum aims to achieve,” Korea’s Vice Foreign Minister Min Dong-seok said in his opening address.

“There is still a lot to be done for the eventual realization of poverty reduction and sustainable development. In this regard, our clear responsibility at this forum is to present a new roadmap to make development happen.”

Donor and recipient countries are expected to establish a new global partnership for effective development cooperation, a draft showed.

The Busan forum, the first time to have taken place in Asia, follows on from the first High-Level Forum on Harmonization meeting in Rome in 2003, the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness in 2005 and the 2008 meeting in Accra, Ghana.

Key participants will include Korean President Lee Myung-bak, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Rwandan President Paul Kagame, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Queen Rania of Jordan and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development Secretary-General Angel Gurria.

On Wednesday, Lee will give a keynote speech addressing South Korea’s commitment to sharing its economic development experience with developing countries.

Clinton, who arrived on Tuesday night, plans to address women’s role in global development aid and gender equality on Wednesday morning. She will meet with Lee and Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan, the U.S. Department of State said.

By Kim Yoon-mi (yoonmi@heraldcorp.com)