FCDO Nutrition Policy Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateBaroness Finlay of Llandaff
Main Page: Baroness Finlay of Llandaff (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Baroness Finlay of Llandaff's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(2 years, 6 months ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, as I previously said, the Government are absolutely committed to returning to the 0.7% pledge. Indeed, my right honourable friend the Chancellor has already laid out the pathway towards that objective. However, notwithstanding the reduction in ODA spend, I believe we have again illustrated our commitment on nutrition. On the specific areas raised by the noble Baroness, we have examples of how our programming funding has assisted. In Bangladesh, for example, the Suchana multisectoral nutrition programme has targeted close to 240,000 households and impacted positively 1.4 million people. In Nigeria, our child development grant programme is a six-year investment that provides cash transfers to mothers during pregnancy. There are other, notable examples of in-country support specifically focused on nutrition. As I have already said, our commitment to ensuring that those markers are now integrated in all FCDO development programmes on nutrition going forward will also allow us to provide fully comprehensive reports to the OECD on our nutrition spend. I believe that some of the issues that the noble Baroness raised will be addressed quite directly.
My Lords, can the Government confirm that they will continue to work with NGOs in areas of warfare, such as Myanmar, where the military regime is preventing any aid getting through but the Shan Women’s Action Network is able to get healthcare and food into areas that are otherwise not reached? The history of doing that in that country has been very good; we provided aid to Chin State during the mautam famine, which prevented some of the mass starvation that was going on.
My Lords, I can give that commitment to the noble Baroness. I have seen over a number of years the direct impact of working with civil society organisations on the ground in terms of the support they can provide. I believe very strongly that it is part of our duty to support the infrastructure of their continued work. The noble Baroness talked of Myanmar. More recently, we have seen work of that kind in Afghanistan, Yemen and Syria. I now look after the civil society organisations portfolio within the FCDO, so I would of course be willing to hear any suggestions the noble Baroness may have relating to Myanmar and to work with her.