Foreign Affairs Committee on May 31st, 2016

[The Chair (Hon. Robert Nault (Kenora, Lib.)), Liberal, Bob Nault]

Colleagues, before we hear from the witnesses, perhaps I could take five minutes of your time to deal with some business.

You will find in your package the fifth report of our committee. I wanted to get that approved. We went through it this morning in subcommittee and got unanimous consent to submit it to you for your perusal. On behalf of the committee, I want to present to you the fifth report. Your subcommittee met this morning to consider the business of the committee and agreed to the following recommendations:

1. That a travel budget in the amount of $147,484.90 to travel to Colombia and Guatemala, in relation to the studies on Women, Peace and Security and the Canadian Government’s Countries of Focus for Bilateral Development Assistance, be adopted.

2. That the Committee hold meetings with witnesses in Ottawa on June 9th and potentially June 21st in relation to its proposed travel to Colombia and Guatemala.

In the package you will find a proposal for the witnesses. These witness lists are always subject to change. So we'd like to start with that.

3. That the Committee adopts the second option detailed in the document prepared by the Library of Parliament and entitled “Options for a Report on the Countries of Focus for Canada’s Bilateral Development Assistance”.

You may want to have a quick look at option number two.

4. That the News Release for the comprehensive review of the Special Economic Measures Act and the Freezing Assets of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act be agreed to.

This is to indicate to the general public that early this fall, once we're back as per the order of the House, we will review these two acts. There is an understanding that the acts need to be reviewed after five years of their implementation. Then we'll make recommendations to the House on their effectiveness.

Are there any questions relating to the report?

Yes, Garnett.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I understand that it takes a lot of money for a committee to travel. This is what I have been told. Can I get a bit of an understanding of what goes into a figure that large for a trip? It looks like 11 or 12 people will be going for a week. It seems pretty high.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

I can do it or the clerk can do it, if you like. This is pretty much standard from my own experience. It's done by the clerk and their officials. It's not done by us. This is a request for a travel budget. It hasn't been approved, but I would see it as a standard process.

The only thing different from normal is the armoured vehicles in Guatemala. We may not need those. I have requested, however, that the committee not stay just in the cities but also travel into the countryside to see the projects and how they operate. This would necessitate that kind of security. Not having been there myself, I'm taking the advice of others who have been to Guatemala. The budget includes the flight costs, the hotel rooms, and the usual per diem. There is nothing untoward in that regard.

Are there any further questions? Hearing none, all those in favour of the full report?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you very much for your indulgence. We're trying to get these things moving.

I want to thank the witnesses for putting up with that little sidetrack. We will have bells at 5:15 p.m. and the vote will be at 5:45 p.m. It's a 30-minute bell. We will be out of here I hope no later than 5:30, probably even a bit earlier, because it will take us a while to wander on up the road. We'll try to keep this moving.

Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we have a study of the government's countries of focus for bilateral development assistance.

We have with us today Hunter McGill from the McLeod Group; Denis Côté from the Association québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale; and by teleconference from Kampala, Uganda, we will have James Haga, vice-president, Engineers Without Borders Canada. We will hear from all three witnesses, starting at the top of the list.

Mr. McGill, you have the floor.

[Hunter McGill, The McLeod Group]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you to the members of the committee for this opportunity to speak with you this afternoon to provide the McLeod Group's views on your assessment of Canada's bilateral development assistance program.

The McLeod Group is made up of professionals with many years of experience in government, civil society, and academia, working across the fields of international development, diplomacy, and foreign policy. We work with others who value human rights, inclusion, equality, and sustainable development to advance Canadian policy and action on international co-operation and foreign affairs. We are not a program delivery organization. Some people have graced us with the title of “think tank”, whatever that means.

My own background includes a career at the Canadian International Development Agency and five years at the OECD development assistance committee, where I was in charge of peer reviews of member countries. I am currently a senior fellow at the School of International Development and Global Studies at the University of Ottawa.

The theme of my presentation today is that focus is not important, as some would argue, and that what really counts are other factors which do not, in our view, get enough attention.

The Canadian development co-operation program needs, first and foremost and in line with legislation, the Official Development Assistance Accountability Act of 2008 to be poverty focused. In its 2013 report, “Investments to End Poverty”, Development Initiatives, the international think tank, reported that in 43 countries development assistance was the largest single source of international finance.

This means that in those countries with populations totalling over 400 million, aid played a catalytic role and was the main external resource flow intended explicitly to promote development and welfare. Thus, in a world where there is a confusing array of financial flows, including royalties, remittances, foreign direct investment, civil society transfers, and development finance movements, development assistance still has a crucial role to play for a significant number of countries. In the countries I've just mentioned, and in many other countries, poverty remains deeply entrenched despite the reports that the number of people living in extreme poverty, that is, below $1.25 U.S. a day, has dropped.

In making its selection of partner countries for its bilateral assistance program, Canada should commit to the long haul. Pick countries and stick with them. Don't lurch from one list of so-called focus countries to another every couple of years, as seems to have been the case for the last decade. If the push is for focus and it is irresistible, then focus on the poorest countries, the least developed countries. Don't shy away from countries that present challenges to development:, those that have the label of “fragile state” or “donor orphan”.

By committing to long periods of co-operation, Canada will have the scope to build relationships and develop knowledge and expertise, which will help us work with the leaders of our partner countries and contribute to their strategies and programs—their strategies and programs. If difficult issues arise, perhaps with respect to human rights or democratic development, Canada will have the scope to openly and directly raise our concerns rather than arbitrarily suspend our aid amid a flurry of criticism.

It has been suggested in testimony, which I believe you have already received, that what we need is a generation-long attention span for our countries of focus. Predictability and reliability are also very important, as is aid volume. Money talks, and you get what you pay for, but that is for another discussion.

In terms of managing Canada's development assistance, there is scope for much improvement. Rather than treating Canadian non-governmental organizations as contractors or service providers, Global Affairs Canada should treat them as proper partners in the relationship with developing countries. This applies also to multilateral agencies. Respect their multilateral character and work to enhance their capacity to deal with development challenges, which increasingly are multicultural and multi-country in nature and demand regional and global approaches. Make sure that we are supporting these institutions as much as supporting the programs they deliver.

I recommend that decision-making be accelerated. Canada has a reputation as being very slow to make up its mind and commit. The impression is that the aid administration in Canada is enmeshed in many, many rules and procedures in the paralysis by analysis which seems to influence decision-making.

Accept that development assistance involves risk and be prepared to encounter failure, but then make sure that we and our partners learn from that.

Properly pursue aid effectiveness and implement the international commitments that Canada signed on to in 2005 through the Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness. In 2012, in its review of Canada's development co-operation programs, the OECD development assistance committee observed that Canada had invented its own definition of aid effectiveness which seemed to the peers, who were the Netherlands and France, to be all about accountancy and efficiency rather than actual effectiveness.

Recognize that all three principal channels of development assistance, bilateral, multilateral, and civil society, contribute in their distinctive ways to progress in partnered developing countries.

Canada's aid strategy, which we very much look forward to seeing, should acknowledge this and explain the reasons that we support each channel and what we expect by way of outcomes. When results are being set for Canada's aid program, be very deliberate. Recognize that development co-operation is a partnership and that we accept that the achievement of outcomes and goals takes longer than we might hope, but that the sustainability cannot be rushed.

If among the themes chosen for our bilateral assistance is capacity development and support for democratic development, where we do have a certain expertise, we should commit, again for the long haul, but let's make sure that our engagement is needs driven, not just on the basis that it is what we are good at.

In conclusion, Mr. Chairman and committee members, the McLeod Group wishes you great success in your deliberations. We hope that you can help build a national political consensus on development co-operation. It is our hope also that your findings and recommendations will help move the Canadian development assistance program from charity to solidarity.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you, Mr. McGill.

Now we'll go to Monsieur Côté.

[Denis Côté, Political Analyst, Association québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale]

Thank you very much. I will do my presentation in French.

Thank you very much, esteemed members of the committee. On behalf of the Association québécoise des organismes de coopération internationale, Quebec's association of international cooperation organizations, AQOCI, I thank you for inviting us to testify this afternoon in the context of your study on Canada's countries of focus for bilateral development assistance.

AQOCI, which is is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year, is a network that groups 68 international cooperation organizations based in 13 regions of Quebec, who work, both abroad and locally, to foster sustainable and humane development. Through the strength of its network, AQOCI dedicates itself to eradicating the causes of poverty and to the construction of a world based on the principles of justice, inclusion, equality and respect for human rights.

Before beginning my presentation, I would like to point out that AQOCI is also a member of the Canadian Council for International Cooperation, the CCIC, and that we support the recommendations Mr. Fraser Reilly-King, senior analyst at CCIC, presented to this committee on May 19.

In my presentation I am going to try to reply briefly, in order, to the four main questions that were submitted to us for this study.

The first question was whether Canada should focus its bilateral development assistance on a small number of countries and specific sectors. In fact, there does not seem to be a direct link between concentrating development aid on a small number of countries and sectors, and the effectiveness of the aid.

In an article published in 2005 on this topic, Mr. Lauchlan Munro concluded that although too great a dispersion of projects is not the right path either, there is no link, necessarily, between concentration and effectiveness. Rather, it is the proper selection and management of projects, among other things, that produces the best development results, and not necessarily the number of countries chosen.

This point of view was in fact also raised by The McLeod Group—I did not know they were represented here today—as well as by Stephen Brown, a University of Ottawa researcher, in 2015.

Now, that does not mean that we need to completely abandon the idea of countries of focus or that we need to review the whole list. On the contrary, we think we must encourage and support long-term programs and projects, and foster the long-term relationships international cooperation organizations in Quebec and Canada have maintained in many countries in Africa, Latin America and Asia, including with developing countries in the Francophonie.

Development is a long-term process. It is counter-productive to frequently overhaul the list of countries involved and to expect too much from short-term projects. We think we need to encourage a program funding approach, with a five-year horizon, for instance, to allow for the development of real partnerships and allow us to attain sustainable development objectives.

As for concentrating on specific sectors, we must remember that aid should be allocated to support priorities set by the poor and marginalized populations themselves. Although Canada may have expertise it wishes to share in various sectors, Canadian aid has to be aligned with the democratically determined priorities of the populations of the developing countries. These must not be imposed on them by the donor countries.

That said, AQOCI thinks it is very important to promote equality between women and men, and to advocate for and defend women's rights. If new thematic priorities are established for Canadian aid, we think it is essential that gender equality be on that list.

As for the criteria Canada should use in choosing countries where we intervene, we could suggest a few, such as the following: aid must contribute to reducing poverty and inequalities; it must focus on the poorest and most marginalized, so as to leave no one behind; it must respond to the needs expressed by the poor and marginalized populations themselves; it should promote human rights; it must be predictable, and we should aim for medium and long-term horizons.

The second question concerned the effectiveness of the countries of focus model. As mentioned previously, analyses seem to demonstrate that there is no direct link between countries of focus and the effectiveness of the aid. We do not have a specific figure to suggest as to the proportion of development aid that Canada should grant to the chosen countries. However, the 90% figure for aid to be granted to 25 countries seems like too high a proportion to us. Canada's bilateral aid has to maintain more flexibility and nimbleness, so that we can respond to changes and situations that evolve rapidly in countries that are not on the list.

The third question asked how Canada's international aid should take into account the situation of the least developed countries, the countries with middle incomes in the lower bracket, as well as fragile states in conflict situations.

International aid should target the poorest and most marginalized countries. In that context, particular attention has to be paid to the least developed countries, and fragile states. Objective 17 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which discusses the means to put in place the world partnership for sustainable development, proposes that developed countries such as Canada devote between 0.15% and 0.20% of their GDP to helping the least advanced countries. As a supporter of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, Canada should reach that target.

However, persons living in poverty are not all in least developed countries. As the CCIC mentioned in its presentation before this committee, we estimate that the majority of persons experiencing poverty live in moderate income countries and that in those countries the inequalities are getting progressively worse. And consequently, some Canadian aid must be allocated also to programs and projects in those countries. However, the choice of countries must be made on the basis of an analysis of the needs of the poorest and most marginalized populations in those countries, and not as a function of Canadian commercial interests.

The fourth and last question was about how Canada can line up its bilateral aid programs with its commitment to support the implementation of the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Objective 17 of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which I referred to earlier, points out that developed countries must honour all of the commitments made regarding official development assistance, particularly the commitment made by many of them to allocate 0.7% of their GDP to aid for developing countries. That is one way for Canada to support the implementation of sustainable development goals, or SDGs—through a substantial, gradual, predictable increase in its level of development assistance until it reaches the target of 0.7%

One of the main objectives of this program is also to leave no one behind. By putting the emphasis on the poorest and most marginalized people, Canadian aid will also contribute to the attainment of the SDGs.

However, it order to implement this ambitious program, we will need commitments that go far beyond official development aid.

Canadian policies will also have to be more consistent, particularly when it comes to international development policies and trade policies. Currently, several trade and investment agreements are strengthening the power of large Canadian enterprises at the expense of the poorest populations in developing countries, rather than helping those populations to get out of poverty and assert their rights. To achieve those sustainable development objectives, we need to revise the free trade and investment agreement model, tackle tax evasion and tax avoidance, and ensure that our international aid policies are consistent with development objectives rather than commercial ones.

In conclusion, some of the best researchers and analysts in development assistance in Canada maintain that there is no direct link between choosing countries of focus and the effectiveness of our aid. Devoting 90% of bilateral aid to a list of countries of focus seems like too much to us, because such a high concentration will hinder the flexibility and nimbleness of the assistance, and our capacity to respond to changing needs on the ground.

However, dispersing the aid too widely also does not lead to effectiveness. In the final analysis, the exact number of countries of focus is not really that important. The important thing is to find the right balance between consistent and predictable support for long-term partnerships on the one hand, and maintaining enough flexibility to be able to adapt to changing needs in the field, on the other.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you, Mr. Côté.

I'll now go to Engineers Without Borders Canada. Mr. Haga is on teleconference out of Kampala. I understand we'll hear him and not see him.

Mr. Haga, do you hear us?

[James Haga, Vice-President, Engineers Without Borders Canada]

Yes. I hope everyone there can hear me okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Yes, we can hear you loud and clear.

The floor is yours.

[James Haga]

Okay, beautiful.

Thanks very much for inviting me on behalf of Engineers Without Borders and making it possible for me to join from Kampala.

As you all know, my name is James Haga, and I serve as the vice-president of strategy and investment at Engineers Without Borders. EWB is a Canadian NGO that provides seed funding, talent, and mentorship to social enterprises throughout sub-Saharan Africa.

I'm going to focus my comments on four points. First, what can aid do? Second, where should Canadian aid go? Third, how should we spend Canadian aid? Fourth, beyond aid, what else can Canada do?

First, I want to make the very obvious point that aid is only one of the tools that can contribute to development. Obviously there are many other equally or arguably more important factors beyond aid. These include a thriving private sector, addressing illicit financial flows through tax reform and co-operation, and dealing with things like global public goods such as climate change. Obviously aid is not a silver bullet and is not able to address all issues that drive sustainable development.

That being said, what can aid do?

Despite having given aid for many decades, there is very little evidence that aid, taken as a whole, promotes economic growth in poor countries. Instead, it's better to think of aid as a tool designed to provide people with basic human dignity and to meet their immediate needs. Critically, aid can limit inequality as the conditions for growth take shape, making balanced economic growth much more likely in the long run, rather than allowing economic growth to be captured by a concentrated elite. Frankly, living in Uganda, I see that play out day by day.

Aid can also be used as a tool to catalyze and mobilize other forms of capital and can be used effectively to take on risks in a targeted manner, to prove and derisk scalable solutions NGOs aren't structured to take on and that commercial enterprises don't have access to sufficient patient capital to test.

Second, where should Canadian aid go?

We should all recognize that it's going to take several decades for countries to have governments that have enough resources to deliver basic social services for their people. That is true here in Uganda as it is in many other countries throughout sub-Saharan Africa where we're working. While we should continue to be supported and encouraged by growing private flows in investment in many parts of the world, in the meantime, we should focus our aid, as others who are appearing before you today have said, on providing basic minimum standards for the poorest and most marginalized people, spending aid frankly where private money won't go. We think there is something unique and special about what concessional money can do to reach people who are otherwise largely unreachable.

The question of countries of focus for Canadian aid is, in my view, a second order question. More important is targeting the most vulnerable with our aid because we know that aid can make a difference to them and is well-suited to meet their needs. Despite the fact that there isn't a great deal or very much at all in the way of evidence that supports the fact that no countries that concentrate their aid in the narrow or geographical scope are more effective, it does lend to reasonable logic that economies of scale and a more focused approach makes sense for a country like Canada.

Certainly, choosing to have countries of focus doesn't seem like a terrific idea to us by any measure, and I would agree with my colleagues that how we choose those countries is what's most vital. Again, the most vulnerable countries and people who are struggling in the most severe states of poverty is where we would focus.

Still, despite having said that, the first order question that we think is most critical should focus on how much aid Canada as a country should give. We're saying that as an organization which for many years has advocated and spoken out about the cause of aid effectiveness and delivering best results for our money, but discussions of effectiveness alone can't detract from the importance of increasing the amount of aid that countries like Canada can offer.

I won't go into great detail on the statistics, but if you compare us to other OECD countries, we are not doing particularly glowingly on the merits of how much we give as a proportion of our GNI. We think that this needs to go up. If we don't start making increases to our aid budget soon, we won't get to count ourselves as leaders in the global development conversation. I would also point out it is not just about giving as much aid as is humanly possible because that is what other countries are doing and it is something that is within our strategic interest. As emerging economies continue to grow and become more active participants in world affairs, being a part of this conversation is really going to be a significant opportunity for our country to help shape the world that our kids and our grandkids will inherit. To be a leader and to be considered a leader, we have to be ambitious and inspire others to be ambitious in meeting their challenges head on.

The next point I want to make is about how we should spend Canadian aid. I am not going to comment specifically on which issues or sectors are best suited for Canada to invest in. I think there isn't necessarily a big case to be made for Canada having a unique position in any one sector. It is simply about mobilizing the resources and the most effective talent towards a given issue. We are a smart enough country to be able to do that on any number of issues. Instead, more importantly, we would counsel that Canada pick a small number and stick to those for an extended period of time. In our view, having dozens and dozens of focus and sub-focus areas is akin to having no real priorities at all, despite the fact that they all merit attention. If the government can select a small number of areas, based on a simple and logical set of criteria, the impact of Canadian aid will have a much better chance of growing, along with a deeper understanding of the system dynamics we are working within as a country and as a government.

In practice, unfortunately, this means making tough decisions to stay out of certain areas. Undoubtedly, this will be politically hard to do, because NGOs similar to my own will hammer you and your colleagues and tell harrowing stories about the suffering people experience as a result of issue X, imploring the government to do something and to direct resources towards that issue. Obviously, we have a lot of sympathy for that, but we all know and can agree quite easily that making decisions like that is not the smartest way to go about doing things. We would really urge a bit of a hard line on making some calls around what we want to do and what we are not going to do. That is what coordination and having a level of focus are all about.

Similarly, we want to acknowledge that bilateral aid is likely overrepresented as a percentage of our total aid package. Changing this would have implications, of course: fewer aid initiatives bearing the Canadian flag, but more investment going into multilateral institutions, the best of which, but not all of which, are viewed as more efficient, less susceptible to political winds, and less likely to be captured by commercial interest.

In the absence of a lot of strong evidence to the contrary, one way to have a more harmonized and less duplicative system is to invest in these global institutions, and we would advise that. Ultimately, we should make it an evidence-based decision, a rational trade-off between multilateral and bilateral systems. If there is evidence that says one is better, we support going in that direction. Still, we think bilateral aid has an important role to play, and it is uniquely positioned to test new and innovative ideas, for instance, integrating outcome-based funding arrangements such as development impact bonds into the government's tool box. Additionally, by spending more money through multilaterals, Global Affairs Canada staff resources can be freed up to focus on other global development issues like tax co-operation, illicit flows, environmental issues, immigration, and trade policy. This is an area where the merger of CIDA with Foreign Affairs can bear some fruit, allowing development professionals to have an impact on development beyond the mechanism of just foreign aid.

I will move to my last point, which is about what Canada can do to advance the sustainable development goals beyond aid.

We know that in the coming months Canada will put into operation a development finance initiative, which is a private sector investment vehicle that is complementary to aid and aimed at fostering sustainable economic opportunities in challenging markets. Let's make sure we get this right. It's designed to reach its mandate by privileging high-leverage investments and by monitoring and measuring its social impact against the SDGs, a key part of how we move that forward.

Similarly there is an immense need to modernize the rules governing the non-profit and charitable sectors to enable and encourage more impact investment and revenue-generating activity, particularly in the seed stages of social enterprise development, which is an area we are on the leading edge of in Canada and internationally. About a year ago there was a report by the Monitor Group about the case for impact investing. It outlined the fact there are very few impact investors willing to assume the high risks and uncertain returns associated with investing in the earliest stage, socially impactful businesses in the developing world. J.P. Morgan has put out a study saying that only 9% of total impact investments under management are committed to seed and very early stage start-up businesses. We think that if Canada looked at changing the regulations around non-profit and charitable structures to enable to more impact investing, that very early stage could get much better service.

We agree with the recommendations made by the MaRS Centre for Impact Investing, that recommend a capital matching program to help foster more impact investment funds. This could take the form of a fund, capitalized by the government, which would co-invest with private investors and philanthropists in impact investment funds that require additional capital to close a funding round. This would also provide a proof point on the value, both social and economic, of impact investing. I think it is something that, if we're going to modernize and get our Canadian development agenda better, is a critical and innovative way to make some progress.

That's it for me. Thank you for listening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you very much, Mr. Haga. We very much appreciate your time and commitment to be here. I think it's the evening where you are.

We're going to go right to questions, and we'll start with Mr. Allison.

Dean.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Hi, James. Welcome. I realize it's about 11 o'clock there, so thanks for staying up past your bedtime.

[James Haga]

My pleasure.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

James, one of the things that has always impressed me about Engineers Without Borders is that you guys talk a lot about transparency. I know you were decisive in encouraging us to sign the International Aid Transparency Initiative in 2011. That's one of the things I like about what you guys do in terms of the whole transparency piece, but I think one of your latest initiatives is trying to get governments to be more self-sufficient. Is that not correct?

[James Haga]

Yes. We work with governments in the public sector and in the building class sector ecosystems across Africa. Part of what we've been working on for the past two and a half years is this idea of a development finance initiative, which the previous government committed to in the 2015 budget. This government seems to be ready to execute on that plan as well.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Good. The reason I bring this up is that I think you guys address one of the issues. Whether it's vaccinations, health, child and mother mortality, or nutrition, these are all important pieces. Where I'm going with this is that we are talking about countries of focus. We've had academics here talking about looking at a more thematic approach in terms of where we go and what we talk about. One of the things you guys helped try to work on is the sustainability piece, right? Once again, we need to deal with nutrition. We need to deal with humanitarian aid, and all these things, but what happens once we've dealt with this? How do we help countries be sustainable?

Maybe you could talk a bit about what you guys do in terms of your thought process, and whether you think that part of the tool kit, as you talked about, should involve helping countries be sustainable through the economy, etc.

[James Haga]

I think there isn't a lot of evidence to suggest that aid programming is an effective way to change the way that, frankly, less than responsible governments make decisions about public policy and how they choose to govern. There are a lot of people, in our view, who try to overstress what aid can do and accomplish. They say that it can really reform the way that governments use their resources and build public capacity to support service delivery for their citizens and create a thriving economy.

Part of what I am trying to say in my few words here is that we don't actually think there's very much evidence to that point. That's not just my saying that. I spoke with people who are smarter than I am in advance of this presentation today to really discuss those ideas. At the same time, that's why we say really let's pinpoint aid and use those aid resources where they're most needed, and that is around addressing the most essential needs that people in poor countries have, and people who are experiencing poverty have.

If anything, that at least addresses the insecurity that those people are experiencing, whether it's food insecurity or it's otherwise today in their lives. At the same time, there's a massive burgeoning interest in what the private sector, for instance, can enable within these countries, whether that's internationally infused with private companies coming in from abroad.... Frankly, more importantly, it's about building strong ecosystems of business within these developing countries particularly at small and medium-sized levels, so that there is a strong foundation of entrepreneurs and people who are able to provide jobs. [Inaudible—Editor] in the first day in Kampala looking around at probably 150 mostly young men, probably below the age of 25, sitting idle in the middle of the day because they don't have any work.

We certainly try to take an approach that addresses the underlying issues of extreme poverty, and the fact is, we think that aid is really well positioned to address those, and at the same time we know that private capital can come in through investors, through companies, and that is going to be a big part of the development equation and solution in the long term. Both are important. That's why we take the position to advocate more for smart aid that addresses the needs of poor people and is a substantive aid agenda. Also, we take the point of talking about a development finance initiative that can really help to spur private sector growth in these countries.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Thank you.

I don't have much time left for questions.

Mr. McGill, this is a quick follow-up. I know you weren't saying one way or another...countries of focus, and maybe more is better.... Do you have any additional thoughts on the countries of focus versus a thematic approach which we've heard differently about from several witnesses around the table?

[Hunter McGill]

Certainly, I think we would encourage the energy to be spent on thematic or sectoral choices and appropriate funds. I very much like the remarks that Monsieur Côté was making. Have a few, but make sure that they really correspond to the needs of the partner countries we're working with, and that we are in a position to be properly responsive, and to be engaged over the long term, as I think James Haga would admit.

The predictability element, the reliability of Canada as a development co-operation partner, is in many ways as important as the theme or the sector that we're engaged with.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bob Nault]

Thank you.

We'll go to Mr. Sidhu, please.

[Jati Sidhu, Liberal, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you to all three of you for coming in front of the committee.

My take on the policy side of it can be taken as a twofold question. Do you believe our international assistance policy should be or could be more aligned with Canadian interest in terms of trade, international development, and foreign affairs? The second part would be, how can Canadian development policy contribute to Canada's international policy more broadly?

Any one of you can jump at it.

[Denis Côté]

Could you repeat the first question? I missed the beginning of the first sentence.

[Jati Sidhu, Liberal, Mission—Matsqui—Fraser Canyon, BC]

Do you believe that could be more aligned with Canadian interests in terms of trade and international development and foreign affairs?