Foreign Affairs Committee on May 19th, 2016

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

No, that's a problem.

Question number two. This was touched on by Mr. Cornelius, but I'm sure everyone will want to comment. Could you speak more about poverty reduction and that needing to be the specific focus of ODA. For me, and you touched on it, Mr. Cornelius, the official development assistance act, passed in 2008, established the overall purpose of Canada's ODA, that it would focus on poverty reduction. I would think that this act would guide our approach rather than a countries-of-focus approach that seemed to have built in a high priority on strategic objectives. Granted, poverty reduction was there.

Could you touch on that?

[Jim Cornelius]

I would agree with Fraser here in some sense. No matter what country you chose, you can particularly focus on poverty issues in that country. We're not going to get into whether it's a high income, middle income, low income or that. Some of these countries have very deep pockets, a chronic poverty that could be addressed.

The issue for us is, why are we working in that country? And if we are choosing to—and the reasons why can be mysterious—if we are there, then let's make sure the program is designed to address poverty. It's not designed because it might be of use to Canadian mining companies or to some other commercial interest, but it is very focused on poverty reduction.

We think that if you actually do good work on poverty reduction, dealing with inequality, that country becomes more prosperous. Canada wins from that too. There will be lots of commercial opportunities coming out of that in the bigger sense. It's not directly tied to more narrow commercial interest, but it's very focused on it. If you have other interest there, you can quickly lose sight of the poverty piece, and it really doesn't become poverty-focused programming. That will be the seal.

[Christina Polzot]

I would fully agree with what Jim has been explaining. I would also say that at Oxfam we take a very strong inequality approach because inequality is the main driver of poverty, and inequality is a main driver of fragility as well. Even within countries it's looking at where those deep pockets of inequality are, and where the poor and most vulnerable are within a country, and of course across countries and regions as well.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Fraser, you said, and I quote from your presentation, let's promote their solutions not ours.

What you're really touching on, I think, is the whole concept of decentralization. We heard from witnesses—Stephen Brown, for example—on Tuesday, from the University of Ottawa. He and the others who testified talked about the need for development systems to be decentralized, to allow local actors on the ground, working in conjunction with NGOs that have been on the ground and know the country well, to develop their own solutions.

Could you touch on this? I think you made a point that there was a finding that Canada hadn't been living up to this. Was it the OECD that ruled on that?

[Fraser Reilly-King]

Through its development assistance committee, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development brings together all industrialized donor nations. There are 28 members. Canada is one of them.

Over the past several decades they've identified core principles that are key to the effective delivery of aid, and outcomes that will have a positive impact on reducing poverty. These include aligning with a developing country's national plans, and ownership of those national objectives. I think that, to some extent, decentralization could play an important role. Regardless of its countries of focus or the themes it picks, Canada must align those themes—or tailor them, as Christina said—to national needs and priorities.

We started to do that through the decentralization of Global Affairs Canada. I think part of the challenge is that the decentralization focused a lot on putting more staff into the field, but the decision-making authority and the power over funding remained very much in Ottawa. If we can shift some of the decision-making authority to the field, where they have a better sense of local realities and needs, and can collaborate between civil society organizations or partner country governments, I think that would be effective as well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

Mr. Aubin.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank each and every one of you for being here. Your testimony is always very interesting. We have heard from representatives of other organizations since the start of this study, but I have to admit that it is starting to give me the kind of headache that a child gets when trying to put a square peg into a round hole.

Many of you support the countries of focus approach, or are not opposed to it. At the same time, you are saying that considerably more flexibility is needed, or even a thematic approach. You are in favour of a clear policy to combat poverty and pockets of extreme poverty. You are all saying that international aid should be long-term. I agree with you on these basic principles. Nevertheless, I am left wondering what we can do when I hear Minister Bibeau and the Prime Minister say that the 0.7% objective is too ambitious and that the budget increase will be modest, at least for 2016.

I admit that, in the short term, I was happy to hear about a mixed approach, and it would be interesting to hear more about that from you. It was also interesting to hear Mr. Reilly-King's comments about an exit strategy. In my opinion, in the short or medium term, the flexibility we'd like to give ourselves will be based on the 90% of funding that we currently provide to countries of focus. A progressive exit from some countries would allow us to recover some resources that could be used elsewhere.

Like you, I would like to see our international development budgets grow more quickly, but, in the meantime, how do we make do with what we have in order to work more effectively towards the objectives that you too would like to achieve?

[Fraser Reilly-King]

If I may, I will answer in English because I always have trouble with technical terms in French.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I can understand that so well.

[Fraser Reilly-King]

I want to say I think aid is an essential piece of fighting poverty. Much like you, I would insist or hope that Canada over the next five to 10 years...one of the key outcomes of this review is to establish a timetable for how it's going to increase its ODA, but it's also important to keep in mind that while ODA is the most immediate source or resource for tackling poverty, governments also have domestic resource mobilization. We collect taxes here in Canada. We collect tariffs, etc. We need to strengthen the ability of countries to collect those revenues.

One of the biggest challenges in sub-Saharan Africa is that sub-Saharan African leaks every year $160 billion in revenue through tax evasion and through the practices of multinationals. The amount of money that goes into Africa in the form of aid is probably less than half of that.

I think if we can fix the tax evasion in countries, and insist on companies paying their royalties, paying increased royalties, and paying their taxes, then that would help a lot.

The SDG agenda, the sustainable development goal agenda, tackles 17 different issues, including oceans, natural resource management, poverty, food, and security. Canada has committed to implementing this agenda at home as well. That's going to engage a whole range of different departments. We need to ensure our efforts to tackle poverty internationally aren't limited to the department of development, but that we can insist on certain coherence across all of government. There's a role for the justice department to play in terms of helping instill a rule of law in countries. There's a role for our diplomatic side, in foreign affairs, to promote space for civil society to perform actions, to monitor governments, and support civil society in holding their governments to account. I think we need to also think about how other government departments can support a sustainable development agenda, internationally and domestically, beyond just our international development department.

[Christina Polzot]

If I may add, Oxfam does quite a bit of work on tax evasion, and I'll let my colleague Kelly speak to that.

Another way to be effective is to focus on women and girls. There is a lot of is evidence that if you invest in women and girls there will be a multiplier effect. Women and girls are a lot more likely to reinvest in their families, and their communities, and their households. The impact will be greater by putting women and girls at the heart of all that we do.

I would second Fraser's comment that we need to work with local governments. A lot of the countries where Oxfam works are middle-income countries. There are a lot of resources available at the local level, but what we try to do in those countries is work with civil society and build the capacity of our local civil society partners, so they can hold their governments to account and ensure their governments are investing in social programs that meet the needs of the poorest and the most vulnerable. That's another way to multiply your impact with the limited resources we have.

[Kelly Bowden, Acting Director, Policy and Campaigns, Oxfam Canada]

To briefly echo previous comments, the Global Alliance for Tax Justice has done research that shows that for every $1 of aid invested in tax infrastructure in developing countries it generates $350 of domestic resources. I think there's a potential there in terms of understanding from a system-strengthening perspective how looking at domestic mobilization can be a key element.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Mr. Levitt, please.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Ms. Polzot, I think my first question is going to be for you because I want to explore a little the notion of what you called core competency. I would call it comparative advantage.

Looking at this idea of a thematic approach, and how that would radically alter the nature of our international development process and plan, how would you see that playing out, and why is that going to lead to a greater advantage in us getting our resources to those who are most vulnerable and dealing with issues like inequality?

[Christina Polzot]

I would just say that gender equality and women's rights have been championed extensively by Canada in the past, so definitely we have a comparative advantage there. I just returned to Canada about nine months ago from a four-year posting abroad, and in all of my conversations with government partners in the country I was in and with civil society partners, they always recognized the leadership role Canada has played in promoting gender equality and women's rights.

I think we need to build on that. That is not to say that we shouldn't work on other themes, but we are advocating for women's rights and gender equality to be at the centre of all we do, whether it be food security programming or climate change programming, or programming in other sectors.

There have also been some mechanisms in the past that have allowed civil society organizations, particularly women's rights organizations in the countries we work in, to access flexible funding from the Canadian government, such as the gender funds that were available until three or four years ago. These are valuable resources for civil society organizations that are doing front-line work in promoting gender equality and women's rights, and we would advocate for the reinstatement of such flexible funding mechanisms.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Gentlemen, can you share a perspective on this kind of change of focus to a thematic approach, and your feelings about it? Would it be more effective? Is it something that can work in tandem with what we're doing now?

[Jim Cornelius]

I don't see these as either-or. We already have three themes now, and we have a country-of-focus approach now. They're not mutually exclusive. I don't want us to get into a sort of box whereby it's either this or it's that. I think we can have countries of focus.

I see value, however, in some thematic focuses that allow us to build expertise across Canada. I think Canada gets—how would I put it? If you just want to look in crass commercial terms, it's more brand awareness—more influence globally through a thematic approach than through these country approaches.

The country approaches are good—they can deliver good programs—but they don't actually create a lot of sort of global profile for Canada in themselves, whereas these thematic things allow us to be engaged in conferences and in some of the critical issues in which Canada is taking a leadership role. This makes a difference in terms of Canada's presence in the world.

[Fraser Reilly-King]

I would add that one of the welcome things to come with the new Liberal government is its focus on continuity with change. We've had 10 years of working around maternal and newborn child health and support for food security for growth, so let's build on that. I think the policy review should focus on the way we can build on what we've already generated without making too many changes.

As Christine has mentioned, regardless of the themes we pick we need to look at the countries we're focused upon and tailor these themes to the needs, to what the people we're working with actually require, and pull those elements from the themes.

One other comparative advantage, and maybe this is a little bit self-serving, is that Canada has a rich experience in civil society organizations working in international development. We have 85 members. We know there are approximately 5,400 organizations across Canada working on international development, with centuries of experience and expertise. I think that's a real comparative advantage; we were recognized, in the decades of the seventies, eighties, and nineties, when there was responsive programming, when civil society organizations could innovate and deliver and work with front-line workers to make a huge impact.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

As a follow-up question, we just finished a study on women, peace, and security. A theme that came up time and time again from a number of speakers was the importance of accessing local, grassroots experience and knowledge within the countries and the sense that we were hit-and-miss in achieving that. Do you have any suggestions, as we review the process, for incorporating local actors into our bilateral assistance; for the way we can build it in and achieve a greater degree of success in doing this?

[Fraser Reilly-King]

Christina or Jim can probably add more, but I would say that we're already doing it. All of our members work with local partners. They work with their experience and their expertise.

[Christina Polzot]

Yes, I would say it's critical to continue working with local partners who are focused on working with civil society in the countries. In every country Oxfam works in, everything we do is with local partners. We do not do anything is isolation or do any direct implementation. It is critical to continue supporting Canadian civil society organizations that work with partners overseas.

Also, one of our mandates is to channel institutional funding to civil society organizations in the countries in which we work. Sometimes the accountability mechanisms for institutional funding are a little bit too heavy for local partners to manage. This is one support that we can provide to our partners as well. We can access the funding, channel it to them, and then help them with the accountability mechanism.

We think that having local funds, flexible funds, which don't have to be very large scale—the gender funds were not very big funds, the Canada fund is not a very big fund—for local organizations is critical, and it's accessible right there in-country, and the accountability and reporting mechanisms are a bit lighter. We would also recommend, then, that this be looked at and reinstated, if possible, because it's very useful funding for local partners.

[Jim Cornelius]

On the bilateral program, I made the case before around responsive programming; I think that's a whole other stream.

But if you're looking at the bilateral programming, which is meant to be country to country, there are challenges. The country partner governments actually don't want money to go to local civil society. They put in place all sorts of barriers and constraints that make it difficult for some of the bilateral programs. There are ways, however, in which Canadian partners can help with some of this. We have long-standing partnership arrangements. We can help in ways that the direct bilateral programs can't on their own, just because of constraints.

There are some country environments in which it's quite possible for the bilateral program to set up fairly robust support for local groups. We would encourage that; we think it's great. Aid doesn't have to always be channelled through a Canadian partner. If we can create local funds and various structures, I think those are good.

We work in many environments in which the space for local civil society is getting smaller and smaller. We feel the space constraints on us as international NGOs. That worries me less; it's the constraint on space for the local groups that is worrisome. The governments are trying to control it. It's important that we find avenues to continue to support those people, because they need support and resources if there is going to be a vibrant economy and a vibrant social fabric in those countries.

[Michael Levitt, Liberal, York Centre, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

Colleagues, I'll have to leave it there today.

I want to thank Canadian Foodgrains Bank, the Canadian Council for International Cooperation, and Oxfam Canada for making this presentation. Time goes by a little too quickly, but I very much appreciate the opportunity to dialogue and we want to do a lot more of it, I'm sure.

Colleagues, we'll just take a small recess to set up for our next witnesses and then will carry on with our witnesses of the day.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Colleagues, we're going to resume.

I want to thank all of you. We're going to try to keep this on schedule, as hard as it may seem.

In the video conferencing, if we have this right, we have the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, with Eva Busza. As well, we have John McArthur, professor, Brookings Institute, and and we have Philip Oxhorn, professor of political science at McGill University.

Philip, you're going to start. You're first on the list, so I want to turn the floor over to you for your opening remarks. Thank you for coming.