McLeod Group Blog, June 20, 2016
A year ago, in July 2015, the great and the good of the world’s development community gathered in Addis Ababa to talk money at a conference on “financing for development”. It had become clear, in the lead up to the agreement on the Sustainable Development Goals, that the world’s foreign aid budgets were not going to come anywhere near the price tag. Action was required.
What emerged was an “Action Agenda” that had 134 paragraphs, ...
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McLeod Group Blog, May 11, 2015
In the 2015 Federal Budget, the Conservative Government announced the creation of a Canadian development finance ‘initiative’. Details remain scanty. In the name of ‘coherence and effectiveness’, the budget states that the government has established the new initiative to enhance private sector development, achieve meaningful development outcomes, and raise people out of poverty.
Despite claims about advancing ‘new’, ‘innovative’, and ‘blended’ financing by involving the private sector, neither promoting the role of the private sector ...
Continue Reading →Clan McLeod was out in force at this event, sharing the limelight with Joe Clark, Development Cooperation Minister Christian Paradis and a broad mix of Canadian development actors drawn from the memberships of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation (CCIC) and the Canadian Association of Independent Development Professionals (CAIDP).
The highlight of our participation was a session, ‘Taking Stock: the Changing Context for Development’. The event was informal, even if the room was packed. It was a set of frank and lively conversations ...
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January 21, 2014
On December 5, 2013, Canada’s International Development Minister (yes, there still is one) Christian Paradis spoke to the Montreal Board of Trade about the Harper Government’s approach to foreign aid. The speech was chock-full of myth, urban legend, half-truths and what can only be described as a bunch of whoppers.
Mr. Paradis began by saying, “I want us to be recognized as a world leader in poverty reduction and humanitarian assistance.” That may be what he wants, but ...
Continue Reading →December 12, 2013
The government’s new trade plan is not serious policy. It’s just repackaged old ideas, a crude political attempt to be seen to be doing something.
Let’s clarify the obvious. Canada needs to be a global trader and investor to remain a viable, competitive economy for the future. Critically, global market growth will not be in Europe or the US, but rather in developing countries with which we once had healthy trusting relationships as a development partner – something the ...
Continue Reading →July 26, 2013
For decades development practitioners, including CIDA, have recognised the critical role of the private sector of developing countries in creating jobs for the poor.
We did not need the 2012 House Report to confuse the issue of strengthening the role of that local private sector with the promotion of Canadian offshore investment. Now, just as the very name CIDA is scratched from Canada’s international face to be replaced by the ugly acronym DFATD, there may be plans afoot ...
Continue Reading →December 4, 2012
The recent Foreign Affairs’ Parliamentary Committee report entitled ‘Driving Inclusive Economic Growth’ presents an often confused mix of the old and new: poor regulation, weak transparency (and associated corruption), micro-finance, the innovative role of the cellphone in banking, etc. Much is interesting, some is worryingly ambiguous, but little is innovative.
The Committee should have focused on how Canadian support for the private sector can foster stronger, pro-poor, inclusive growth in CIDA’s low-income priority countries.
But their final text focused on ...
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