MMUNWorld News & Report

Thursday, Feb. 17, 2011

The Fourth Committee saw some cooperation among regional groups collaborating to combine working papers, while other regions struggled to come to a consensus in caucus Thursday afternoon.

The Latin American and African blocs began to combine their working papers together, while the delegate from Sweden said he was disappointed in the lack of cooperation among European Union nations.

Peru said he attributed the relationship between the Latin American and African blocs to their similarities in social and economic status.

“I think the main thing is we’re all developing countries, we all have very common priorities,” Peru said. “This is the General Assembly so everyone only has one vote. You need to use your collective strengths. You need to cooperate with like-minded countries.”

Peru also said the similarities between the papers of the two regions helped to ensure a smooth collaboration of the two papers. However, the nations of the European Union struggled to exhibit the same joint effort as the Latin American and African blocs.

The delegate from Sweden said this type of effort was lacking in the countries of the European Union and there must be more solidarity among the nations of the European Union in order to come to a compromise and begin working together on common goals.

“Each nation has its own ideas, its own issues, and sometimes it is hard to

Africa, Latin America take lead on resolution cooperation

MMUN News & Report Volume 5, Issue 3

negotiate,” Sweden said. “I think we just need to be more open-minded and try to accept opposite points of view and try to come to an agreement, a consensus.”

Sweden also said they would like to see the nations of the European Union begin to work together because this would be conducive to the whole process being addressed by the discussion.

“We really hope for more cooperation,” Sweden said. “That is a crucial part… for peacekeeping to work as one united force. In particular (to work in) regional groups such as the European Union, African Union and other groups, it is easier to coordinate it that way.”

The delegate from Bulgaria, a European Union country that decided to align itself with predominately Asian and African countries, attributed part of the problem to the size of the European Union, and not just a reluctance for the countries

Times of India17 February 2011ST. LOUIS

The Peruvian delegate works with fellow delegates to finish working papers.

to cooperate.“The real problem with the European

Union was that it is very large. It is very unorganized,” Bulgaria said. “We decided that working in a more diverse group of countries would maybe accomplish more things, allow more opinions to come out.”

However, Bulgaria did say they agree with Sweden’s statement over the difficulty to agree on certain issues discussed in caucus.

“When you get such a big delegation, you have so many opinions and views going in, which is good, you want a lot of opinions and views, but sometimes people want to override and not listen to the others,” Bulgaria said. “I think that became the big problem for the short time Bulgaria was involved in it.”

Micro-financing leads ECOSOC discussion

The debate on micro-financing was tense in the Economic and Social Council Wednesday night and Thursday morning.

Opposition quickly formed and lively debate broke out. Developing countries expressed the need for an oversight mechanism to protect against exploitation by financial institutions.

The Bolivian delegation made their fears of the International Monetary Fund and the US known.

“Imperialism has not ended; it has just changed from the old system of colonialism to economic imperialism where richer countries can dominate poorer countries,” the Bolivian delegate said.

Bolivia also consistently said no country should have an economic system forced upon them, regardless of the situation.

The United Kingdom said the Bolivian delegation was not being productive or constructive.

“Bolivia is not interested in finding solutions,” he said.

Despite the shake up early on in the session, delegates stayed committed to

making progress.Four working groups were loosely

formed, each one working on a different aspect of micro- financing. The working groups were divided among regional blocs, though a few delegations crossed the regional barriers.

The decision to work towards multiple working papers was made collectively after consensus was hard to develop.

Only one working group had their working paper submitted to the dais for editing by the end of the evening session, although it is likely that many more will be submitted soon.

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Xinhua 17 February 2011ST. LOUIS

ECOSOC continues its progress in addressing the topic of micro-financ-ing as an approach toward eradicating poverty. Through extensive debate and caucusing, four main working groups evolved.

China has teamed up with the Unit-ed States, France, the United Kingdom and numerous other countries on devel-oping a structural framework for micro-financing across the globe. According to the Chinese delegation, the working paper includes provisions for both regu-lation and privatization.

A key component in the working paper is a rating system called the GI-RAFE Methodology. Created in 1999 by the worldwide rating agency Planet Rating, the GIRAFE Methodology rates micro-finance institutions on set criteria.

China said by using a well-estab-lished rating method it will be easier to decipher between good and bad micro-finance institutions.

With the support of the US, United Kingdom, China and France, the work-ing paper has received backing from

c o u n t r i e s across the c o m m i t t e e and carries a great deal of weight.

“ T h e r e is broad sup-port and many of those who are hesitant to support it,.Bolivia be-lieves (others) will support it once they are given a copy and their questions are answered,” said the delegate, who after being cautious of the strong economic countries, has joined them in an effort to bridge the divide between the different factions in the committee.

Other working groups also made headway during the morning session. Under the leadership of New Zealand, Egypt, Brazil and Norway, another working paper began to show signs of life.

The working paper puts emphasis on education for all levels in the micro-finance chain. According to the Brazil-

ian delegation, education is the key. The delegate addressed the body saying, “By teaching the art of micro-finance, you can then use it.”

Slovakia agrees with the need to ad-dress the issue of interest rates to pro-vide micro-finance loan participants ad-equate protection, but they disagree with the specifics.

Along with Russia, Poland, and Cameroon, Slovakia said that interest rates need to be set at a specific percent-age. Support is divided among the com-mittee on which approach to interest rates is the most effective and both sides seemed set in their positions.

Xinhua17 February 2011ST. LOUIS

Delegates caucus during ECOSOC in Thursday’s afternoon session.

Delegates in the Second Commit-tee seek to use science and technology in developing countries to improve education, agriculture and business in the private sector.

Several working papers were in the works Thursday morning. As of Thursday afternoon at least three have made it to the floor.

Delegates suggested that the im-plementation of improved technology in developing countries will better educate students and allow them to be-come more technologically savvy.

“We are working on transferring technology from developed countries to developing countries,” a delegate of the Republic of Congo said.

This will lessen the digital divide

between these countries and allow citizens to more easily communicate socially and professionally.

Improved technology will also allow for an improvement in agricul-ture. Some delegates hope to pass a plan to implement broadband Internet in developing countries.

“It would improve agriculture be-cause it would make technology more accessible and make it a lot easier for them to produce the goods that they need to export and get them around the nation more easily,” a delegate from Liechtenstein said.

The hope is for an increase in GDP, quality of life, crops and exports.

Many delegates addressed the problem of infrastructure as one of the main hindrances to these propos-als. The implementation of current technologies used in developing coun-tries will not be possible immediately, as most do not have the resources re-

quired. Instead, some nations are fo-cusing on improving infrastructure and the education of citizens.

By educating citizens on the use of ICTs, more citizens will be able to use technology as it is implemented. Increased infrastructure, such as im-proved roads and facilities, will also facilitate the spread of technology to both rural and urban areas, increasing the number of people who benefit.

Delegates hope to receive funding from developed countries and existing organizations.

“Our particular position is to have the NGOs come in and train and edu-cate these people so that they can use their technologies to build communi-cation towers and infrastructure,” a delegate from Uganda said.

Delegates will use tax credits to encourage businesses in developed countries to donate resources, as well as voluntary donations.

2nd Committee strives to improve developing nations

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BBC News17 February 2011ST. LOUIS

Water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink

Water is a basic building block of life, yet about 1.4 milion children die of illnesses caused by unsanitary wa-ter.

“This is a serious problem, water is essential to life. As humans, if we don’t have clean water, we get sick,” the delegate from China said.

Delegates of UNICEF discussed the lack of universal access to clean water at their meeting on Thursday.

“This is horrible. We need chil-dren to grow up and become produc-tive adults. It’s a shame that healthy water is not available to all,” China said.

Delegates discussed funding and

developing volunteers who would be prepared to travel to different countries to help maintain clean drinking water. In addition, delegates stated that there was not really a need to implement new programs, perhaps UNICEF can rely on existing programs and begin to execute change.

“We do not think it is important to build new programs,” Zimbabwe said. “We feel they need to be refocused.”

The United Kingdom said a lack of programs was not the problem, funding was.

The delegate recommended in-creasing the funding to programs like UNICEF’s WASH (Water, Sanitation and Hygiene), which promotes and supports national programs to increase sustainable access to safe water and basic sanitation services.

Ireland said local involvement will assist in building the sustainability of the program.

The Republic of Korea worked to develop new solutions, including the collection of clean rainwater to supply to people all over the world.

“We have two working papers in progress right now. We are looking for a short-term solution and long-term solution for the issues concerning clean water,” China said.

The main focus of the committee was to provide clean, sanitary water for the world’s most vulnerable citi-zens.

Deutsche Welle17 February 2011ST. LOUIS

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