Minister Adam urges more interest in island states - 16.11.2010
Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Paul Adam has urged that more attention be given to small island states after Seychelles and 11 others countries were left out of this year’s Human Development Report.
He said the omission followed inadequacy of data under the terms of new methods of compilation. He was addressing delegates at a workshop to present the first draft of a common country assessment report of key development challenges facing the country. The assessment is being conducted by local consultant Benjamin Vel with the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Mauritius-Seychelles Country Office. The workshop, held on Thursday at the Seychelles Trading Company’s conference room, was meant to pave the way for the formulation of Seychelles’ next country programme to be implemented between 2012 and 2016. “Seychelles continues to highlight its concerns about the need for support for small island states. We need to create space within the international development architecture for small islands to be able to continue with their development,” said Mr Adam. “Small islands often develop fastest, but also are the first to accumulate large unsustainable debt and to have the most difficulty in accessing mechanisms to sustain their progress”. He said the fact that islands have been left out of the report highlights the lack of attention that Small Island Developing States receive in the international development system and the lack of understanding of SIDS specificities.
“The new country programme will help us to address some of these misunderstandings,” he said, thanking our partners in the UNDP representative office for their strong support. UN resident coordinator Leyla Tegmo-Reddy said last week’s exercise was meant to review hurdles to socio-economic developments in areas like gender balance and human rights issues. She said there are 15 UN agencies in Seychelles which need to work together towards shared long term visions. “Seychelles is a net contributor country with a high gross domestic product and does not benefit from UNDP and other core resources. It is therefore through targeted technical assistance at the policy level that the UN can have a real impact on the lives of ordinary Seychellois,” she said. |
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