Replenishment Authorizations for the World Bank's International Development Association, the Asian Development Fund, and the African Development Fund: Hearing Before the Subcommittee on International Economic Policy, Export and Trade Promotion of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, One Hundred Seventh Congress, Second Session, September 12, 2002U.S. Government Printing Office, 2002 - 53 pages |
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achieved administration administration's African Bank African countries African Development Bank African Development Fund agreed agreement American Asian Development Bank Asian Development Fund Ayittey billion Bread Bretton Woods Committee Bush Congress contributions corrupt debt relief development assistance dollar donors economic effective focus Ghana global going growth hear HIPC IDA borrowers IDA funding IDA loans IDA resources IDA's important improve increase institutions International Development Association issues leadership loans to grants MDBs measurable results Meltzer memo ment Fund Millennium Challenge Account monitoring multilateral development banks needs negotiations NGOs odious debts Operations Evaluation Department percent policies poor countries poorest countries poverty reduction PREPARED STATEMENT private sector development programs progress projects proposal PRSP reflows reform Reverend BECKMANN Secretary Taylor Senator Allen Senator SARBANES staff subcommittee success stories Thank tion transparency Treasury Uganda United World Bank World Bank Group
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Page 6 - Association are to promote economic development, increase productivity and thus raise standards of living in the less-developed areas of the world included within the Association's membership, in particular by providing finance to meet their important developmental requirements on terms which are more flexible and bear less heavily on the balance of payments than those of conventional loans...
Page 44 - force majeure," and "state of necessity." Odious debt State debts contracted against the interests of local populations are judged unlawful. According to Alexander Sack (1927), who theorized this doctrine, If a despotic power incurs a debt not for the needs or in the interest of the State, but to strengthen its despotic regime, to repress the population that fights against it, etc., this debt is odious for the population of all the State. This debt is not an obligation for the nation; it is a regime's...
Page 36 - I would like to thank you for giving me this opportunity to testify on the subject of the high incidence of cancer in the urban areas of the United States.
Page 40 - African countries it had provided more than $20 billion in funding to sponsor structural adjustment programs over a ten-year period, 1981-1991. Its report, Adjustment Lending in Africa, released in March 1994, concluded that only six African countries had performed well: The Gambia, Burkina Faso, Ghana, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe. Six out of twenty-nine gives a failure rate in excess of 80 percent. More distressing, the World Bank concluded, "no African country has achieved a sound macro-economic...
Page 44 - ... on the mere form of the transaction but upon the good faith of the bank in the payment of money for the real use of the Costa Rican Government under the Tinoco regime. It must make out its case of actual furnishing of money to the government for its legitimate use. It has not done so. The bank knew that this money was to be used by the retiring president, F. Tinoco, for his personal support after he had taken refuge in a foreign country. It could not hold his own government for the money paid...
Page 36 - In other words, the Bank is not organized to assist countries to develop their economies and improve the quality of life for their citizens. Further, the memo charges: The Bank today has no focus and is driven by an ever growing list of mandates imposed on it through a variety of means — President's favored subjects.... Board sentiments..., public pressures, ideas generated by internal constituencies, and even fads. ... "No initiative that starts as a pilot is ever considered a failure because...
Page 6 - IDA'S assistance for HIV/AIDS will be in grant form for all IDA-only countries, and up to 25% of such assistance to blend countries (those eligible for both IBRD and IDA) will also be in the form of grants. All of IDA'S assistance for natural disaster reconstruction will be in grant form. And up to 40% of IDA's assistance to post-conflict countries will now be delivered on grant terms. This is a significant achievement in terms of meeting the Administration's policy objective of helping poor countries...
Page 20 - UN, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organization, and transnational corporations.
Page 17 - ... economies. As the members of this Committee know, whereas the IBRD raises most of its funds on the world's financial markets, IDA is funded largely by contributions from the governments of richer member countries. Donors get together every three years to replenish IDA funds. IDA lending is a cost-effective way for the US government to promote its development goals, since each dollar contributed by the United States is matched by over seven dollars from other donors and repayments...
Page 40 - Despite many years of policy reform, barely any country in the region has successfully completed its adjustment program with a return to sustained growth. Indeed, the path from adjustment to improved performance is, at best, a rough one and, at worst, disappointing dead-end. Of the 15 countries identified as 'core adjusters...