Job Creation: Developing Countries
Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Alison McGovern(10 years, 5 months ago)
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Lynne Featherstone
My hon. Friend makes an excellent intervention. CDC has gone from strength to strength. Not that long ago there were some question marks over it, but it has moved well away from that. As he says, because it works in the most fragile, conflict-affected and poorest of countries, its success is all the more remarkable. It has created more than 68,000 new jobs.
Alison McGovern
On that point, would the Minister be so good as to respond to my question about deadweight loss and what research DFID is undertaking to ensure that none of those new jobs represents such loss?
Lynne Featherstone
I will respond to the hon. Lady in a moment on the issue of deadweight loss.
Moving on from CDC, in the long term, the key to mass job creation is improving the environment for domestic and other businesses to invest and grow. DFID is focused on these long-term determinants of job growth.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Alison McGovern(10 years, 10 months ago)
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Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
On Monday, Catherine Samba-Panza was elected as interim President of the Central African Republic, and she has spoken encouragingly of reconciling the different groups in the country, but the threat of serious conflict remains. The new Government will need significant support, so will the Secretary of State say more about what help the UK is planning to help avert conflict and serious humanitarian disaster?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for International Development (Lynne Featherstone)
Obviously, the situation remains fragile. We welcome the fact that there is now a leader who wants to take things forward. The UK pledged a total of £15 million—we are one of the largest donors to the Central African Republic—and we stand ready, should more requests be made, to listen to them and provide all possible help that we can give.
Global Food Security
Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Alison McGovern(10 years, 10 months ago)
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Alison McGovern
I have a brief question on incomes. The Minister did not mention anything about systems of social protection. Would she like to do so?
Lynne Featherstone
I am coming to that. I have a whole list of points to get through. My right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon (Sir Malcolm Bruce) asked why it was that only 14 countries are in the programmes when there are 29 DFID countries. I hope to get to that.
The Government believe that functioning markets are a better way to manage food stocks than Government interventions. The hon. Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy) made a number of points that went above and beyond the recommendations made in the report. One idea he mentioned was the World Food Programme holding universal stocks to improve availability. He also mentioned involving neighbouring countries and so on. As he said, those ideas go beyond the report’s recommendations. The evidence we have is that universal stocks are not the most effective use of money.
I will not return to the cap as an example, because it is clear that Members did not favour that view, but Malawi, for example, has recently had food shortages. They hold stocks, but when push came to shove and they looked at their grain stock reserve, it was not as high as they thought. Much of it had disappeared. There are a number of issues outside of simply whether stocks are held for emergencies. We do not have the evidence to say that that proposal is an effective use of money, but my experience is that a whole range of unintended consequences come from stockholding.
Lynne Featherstone
If the hon. Gentleman will forgive me, I will not, because I want to give a couple of minutes to the Select Committee Chair at the end and I have a huge number of points to get through.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Gordon asked about the scaling up of safety nets, as did the hon. Member for Wirral South. DFID is more than doubling the number of countries where it supports social protection programmes. We had seven countries in 2009 and we will reach 15 in 2014. It may be that that support is the answer everywhere, but with the best will in the world we cannot scale it up on our own without the mother countries agreeing with us, and not just in policy terms. Even with 0.7% of GDP spent on aid, we do not have infinite funds to do everything in every country without research and without working with mother country Governments.
We will continue to support such programmes. We think that they are excellent and are demonstrating great benefits. We use evidence of that, where appropriate, in conversation with Governments that are new to the idea of social protection. I have been to some countries that do not want these protection programmes introduced. We disagree with that, but we are not a colonial institution that says, “You must have this.” We try to demonstrate the evidence of how successful and useful the programmes are and how they work in those countries.
Lynne Featherstone
No, because I will not get through any of these points if I do.
On the Government’s support for the Fairtrade Foundation, we absolutely recognise the important work that it does to promote smallholder access to global markets. We welcome the attention it has brought to finance for small-scale farmers. The UK provides core funding to the foundation and we look forward to working with them and discussing the Committee’s recommendations.
On meat, the key to a healthy diet is getting the balance right. That means eating a wide variety of foods in the right proportions. Red meat can form part of a healthy diet and is a good source of protein, vitamins and minerals, such as zinc and B vitamins. It is also one of the main sources of vitamin B12.
However, not all meat is good. Some meats are high in fat, especially saturated fat. I think it was the right hon. Member for Gordon who mentioned UK farmers. Encouraging people in the UK to eat less and to eat more healthily would not impact on UK farmers. UK commodity prices follow those in the wider international market, so trade flows would adjust. That, at least, is the evidence we have. The fortunes of UK producers are more dependent on their competitiveness within the wider market.
I am glad that the work that DFID does on land and property rights has been recognised. We have signed a new agreement with Ethiopia to go the same way as we have with Rwanda. We are scaling up our land programmes in at least six other countries and we intend to continue our partnerships.
I make a grateful nod in the direction of the Chair of the Select Committee for his recognition of our work on beekeeping. The “World at One” bumped me on Christmas eve, when I was going to expand on our international work on beekeeping. The weather in Britain took precedence.
I am sorry that I have not spoken to all the points, but, to conclude, my Department is working with international partners to prepare for the next series of international development goals after the millennium development goals. The IDC report helps my Department to remain challenged, focused and a world leader in international development policy and practice. I thank the International Development Committee for its continued engagement with the work of DFID and its insightful and useful observations and recommendations, and I thank all Members here today.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Baroness Featherstone and Alison McGovern(14 years ago)
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Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)
2. What discussions she has had with her EU counterparts on the co-ordination of member states’ action against human trafficking of women.
The Minister for Equalities (Lynne Featherstone)
Policy responsibility for human trafficking rests with my hon. Friend the Minister for Immigration. There have been no ministerial discussions with other EU member states on human trafficking. The UK plays an active role in combating this horrendous crime and will co-ordinate activities with our European partners where it is in the UK’s interests to do so.
Alison McGovern
Nothing undermines the dignity of women more than human trafficking and this modern-day slavery. Article 10 of the EU directive on trafficking requires all member states to provide necessary medical treatment to trafficking survivors. When will Britain set an example and sign the EU directive?
Lynne Featherstone
We have decided not to opt in to the European directive at the moment, but we are keeping a watching brief. When it is implemented, we might well decide to do so, but we are already doing most of the things required by the directive to a good standard and we do not want to be inhibited by introducing laws in this country. Several things that we do already would need transposing into legislation, but we do not need to make legislation to prove to the Commissioners what we are doing already.