Hello, everybody. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak today.
My name is Vidhya Magendran. I'm a member of the ONE campaign in Canada.
I'm here today on behalf of over two-thirds of Canadians who believe that it is our responsibility to help others around the world. Sadly, Canada's contributions to international assistance have been in steep decline. Canada currently invests 0.26% of its gross national income to official development assistance. At this rate, Canada is lagging far behind our closest friends and allies in the G7 and the OECD, all this despite Canada's support for the Global Fund, additional investment to girls' education, and the increases in budget 2018. These were important first steps, but we are still not doing our fair share.
I'm here today to ask that in budget 2019, the Government of Canada commit to increasing Canada's spending on global development over 10 years through predictable 15% annual increases to the international assistance envelope, starting in fiscal 2019.
Thank you for your time.