ID :
185951
Wed, 06/01/2011 - 18:16
Auther :
Shortlink :
https://oananews.org//node/185951
The shortlink copeid
Aid groups urge Japan not to cut ODA budget following March disasters
TOKYO (Kyodo) - Aid groups urged Japan on Wednesday not to cut its official development assistance budget, following Tokyo's decision to slash around 10 percent of foreign aid allocations for fiscal 2011 from the initial plan to raise funds for reconstruction after the devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami.
Representatives of the aid groups, who will attend a conference in Tokyo from Thursday on implementing the U.N. Millennium Development Goals on poverty reduction, called on Japan to maintain its efforts to help poor nations while pursuing its own recovery.
Thomas Chandy, executive director of Save the Children India, told a meeting of Japanese parliamentarians that while more than 25,000 people in Japan were killed or remain missing from the March disasters, the world should not forget poor people dying from preventable causes.
''I would also like to remind you that in the rest of the world, especially the poor nations, there are many, many people dying on a daily basis. It's almost like a tsunami breaking out slowly across the world,'' he said.
Chandy said around 5,000 children under the age of 5 die on a daily basis in India from preventable diseases such as diarrhea.
Masaki Inaba, secretary general of a network of civic groups advocating a global fight against poverty through the achievement of the U.N. millennium goals, pointed out that Japan will likely receive the largest amount of aid in the world in 2011, with support from about 160 countries.
Inaba said victims of the disaster in Japan were made aware of the pain suffered in other parts of the world and that Japan should earmark the amount of ODA cut this time in its future budget formulation process.
Naoto Sakaguchi, a House of Representatives member of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan, said that Japan should keep in mind the suffering of the poorest people in the world and try to secure spending to improve health and education services for them.
Representatives of the aid groups, who will attend a conference in Tokyo from Thursday on implementing the U.N. Millennium Development Goals on poverty reduction, called on Japan to maintain its efforts to help poor nations while pursuing its own recovery.
Thomas Chandy, executive director of Save the Children India, told a meeting of Japanese parliamentarians that while more than 25,000 people in Japan were killed or remain missing from the March disasters, the world should not forget poor people dying from preventable causes.
''I would also like to remind you that in the rest of the world, especially the poor nations, there are many, many people dying on a daily basis. It's almost like a tsunami breaking out slowly across the world,'' he said.
Chandy said around 5,000 children under the age of 5 die on a daily basis in India from preventable diseases such as diarrhea.
Masaki Inaba, secretary general of a network of civic groups advocating a global fight against poverty through the achievement of the U.N. millennium goals, pointed out that Japan will likely receive the largest amount of aid in the world in 2011, with support from about 160 countries.
Inaba said victims of the disaster in Japan were made aware of the pain suffered in other parts of the world and that Japan should earmark the amount of ODA cut this time in its future budget formulation process.
Naoto Sakaguchi, a House of Representatives member of the ruling Democratic Party of Japan, said that Japan should keep in mind the suffering of the poorest people in the world and try to secure spending to improve health and education services for them.
