Thank you very much, Chair. It's a real pleasure to be here this evening.
Thank you very much for this opportunity. It is an honour to be here this evening.
Let me just take this opportunity to expand on some of my colleagues' remarks, as well as those of Mr. David Mulroney in connection with his recent appearance before this committee, to give you some details on Canada's approach in relation to the six priorities that have already been discussed.
First let me touch on the issue of alignment of these six priorities with discussions in Paris and with specified local Afghan needs.
The first thing I would say on this is that we've taken great care to ensure that these six priorities are fully consistent with those of the Government of Afghanistan. These priorities are clearly articulated in the Afghanistan Compact and also the Afghanistan national development strategy, which was discussed in detail in Paris. There the government underlined their need to achieve greater prioritization within that development strategy and to be able to provide some focus, which we thought was very important and which we support. We are trying to demonstrate this commitment in earnest by working to focus our programming in turn around a very targeted set of objectives.
In Paris, the Afghan government emphasized the importance of having the international community increase its support for two elements of that development strategy in particular: infrastructure and rural development in Afghanistan, with a view to providing direct, enhanced well-being of Afghans and their access to economic opportunity.
Canada's initiative to rehabilitate the Dahla Dam will help to address this need in Kandahar province in a tangible way by providing a secure water supply of benefit to the majority of the population of the province, by generating over 10,000 seasonal jobs in relation to the rehabilitation effort, and by ensuring adequate irrigation for at least 10,000 hectares of productive land on an ongoing basis.
In addition, the development strategy highlights the need to strengthen the education sector. In recent months, the Afghan government has asked Canada to take a leadership role in this sector, a role that we have readily accepted. We are now the top contributor to EQUIP, the national program that aims to build schools, improve teacher training, gain better access for girls, and enhance the educational system as a whole. We plan to increase our support to EQUIP both in Kandahar and nationally and to complement this support with specific programs to strengthen capacity and innovation.
Canada is also mindful that to Afghans good governance, in the end, means a capable government that delivers basic services. Our program will help to support national elections and build institutions at a sub-national level, with the focus on Kandahar. A more secure and better-governed Kandahar is very much key to ensuring a viable Afghan state at the national level, so Canada is increasing its support for Kandahar programs from the current level of 17% to 50% by next year to support this overall aim.
Allow me to say a few words about security in the context of aid delivery in Kandahar.
While we have been delivering concrete development programs in Kandahar for some time—and thanks to your offices, Mr. Chair, and that of the clerk, we have just distributed our June 2008 update of our programming results for both Kandahar province and nationwide--we also want to do much more, and we recognize that security remains and will remain a challenge for Canada's overall mission.
The report to Parliament that was recently tabled stated that “security situations are expected to remain stable at best, and might grow worse in coming months in some provinces”. Security has always been, and will continue to be, a key consideration in the planning and delivery of projects undertaken by CIDA. It is one reason we have focused so explicitly and so much on ensuring full community participation, on ensuring that there is a strong leadership role for local government, and that we focus on development priorities that mobilize broad public support. Our approach to implementation will be flexible. It needs to be flexible and iterative in keeping with evolving local conditions.
Mr. Chair, please allow me to spend a few minutes talking about aid effectiveness, a subject that was addressed in Paris and discussed at length.
The international community and the Afghan government have recognized that it is critical to work better together to improve the delivery of assistance in Afghanistan. The Afghanistan Compact and the Afghanistan National Development Strategy have done a clear job of establishing the basic principles of aid effectiveness, and Canada's aid program is based on these tenets:
—first, our assistance is directly aligned with Afghan government priorities and taken fully into account by Afghan planning processes;
—second, we will work closely with the Afghan government and the donor community to ensure that assistance is transparent, accountable and focused on results.
Canada has therefore been actively engaged in various sectoral working groups to improve the coordination of initiatives in Afghanistan, including a leadership role in revitalizing the Joint Coordination and Monitoring Board that oversees the implementation of the Afghanistan Compact.
We believe, as my colleague Mr. Brodeur mentioned, that the Special Representative to Afghanistan of the UN Secretary General, Mr. Kai Eide, has an instrumental role to play in improving the coordination of development assistance initiatives in Afghanistan. He will have Canada's full support.
Let me conclude, Mr. Chairman, by talking a little bit about accountability for results. We are now the third largest national donor in Afghanistan and we do have an important contribution to make in this area. At the Paris conference, the Afghan government committed itself to ensuring full transparency in how aid is received from the international community, how it is utilized, and to improve its own capacity for domestic revenue generation.
International donors, including Canada, also have the responsibility to demonstrate accountability for results. Oversight of CIDA's development program, therefore, is a key and essential element of our work, and one through which we have a comprehensive verification process. We have now completed with our key partners over 150 audits, evaluations, reviews, and assessments of our major programs over the course of the past five years. We'll continue to measure and communicate project level results, such at the ones you see in front of you, on a regular basis and we will be contributing directly to the benchmarks that will form part of our quarterly reporting to Parliament.
We're conscious of the challenges that we face in Afghanistan. This is one of the most difficult environments we've faced in Canada's aid program. But with our new priorities as a guide, backed by a stronger field presence, very clear objectives, and the devolution of authorities, we believe that our efforts in Afghanistan will have a sharper focus, strong accountability, and with coherent planning, will bring a more effective approach to our mission from now until 2011.
Monsieur le président, I would like to thank you very much for this opportunity to brief you on the Paris conference and issues related to the long-term success of Afghanistan's development. I look forward to answering questions from committee members.
Thank you very much.