This is something the New Democrats should want to hear, Mr. Speaker. I do not know why they are trying to slow me down and cut me off.
I often commend their comments on the OAS. When I was at the OAS with them, I was amazed at the good input they had. They should let everybody have their say here.
The foreign affairs minister said that I was on vacation in Panama. Yes, I was at a hotel, but I went down to check on the farmers. I checked out what they were doing. It is amazing what they are growing there. Now they are starting to grow flowers, which they will be exporting, and the airports are booming. People who have any concerns about the OAS and how well our money is being spent should go to Panama and see the transformation that has happened within 20 years. It is an economic miracle. It is like the miracle we saw in Europe when it went through the Marshall Plan. It is where there is ownership of property and rules of governance, and all these things come together. Then people have faith and they invest.
I will now talk about some of the countries in the OAS. I am sure many of my colleagues know about them. I will go through them alphabetically.
There are Argentina and Antigua. I have some of the numbers on how much money they are contributing. They are not big dollars: Argentina, almost $2 million; Barbados, $36,000; the Bahamas, $50,000; Bolivia, $40,000. Even these four or five countries are doing a little better and they should up the ante a bit. Barbados is doing quite well now.
Brazil is not doing badly. It is putting $8 million on the table. Canada is putting almost $10 million on the table. When we look at that comparison, Brazil has a couple of hundred million people and we have 30-some million. For us to come up with $10 million, we are doing our share, when we look at the total budget. I know Brazil is $8 million and some are only $100,000, but for a country that size, having these other countries around that have good governance and good structures in place is important.
Chile puts a $1 million on the table. That could be up a bit, too. Colombia is $800,000. Costa Rica is $180,000. That country sells that amount in bananas to us in one week. There is no reason why it could not come to the plate with a little more. The Dominican Republic is $290,000 and Ecuador is $200,000. I am sure the Canadian public wants to hear this. Canadians want to know how much everybody else is paying. It is very important because we are paying $10 million.
I will go down the list: Grenada, $17,000; Guatemala, $137,000; Guyana, $17,900. Then there is poor little Haiti. I know it is going through a hard time. One would ask why Haiti should even pay, because it is going through such a hard economic time, but it is paying $27,000. It is very important that Haiti pays that money. Why? Because it then has a voice at the table. It is a country that is going through the most difficult time in the Americas right now and it is very important that it has a representative at the table, so it is paying some money.
Mexico is $6 million and St. Kitts is $20,000. The United States is where the money comes from. It pays $48 million. I am guessing it is a total of about $100 million needed to run this organization. A hundred million dollars is a lot of money, but it is very important money. All the countries in the Americas have to up the ante a bit to make this better because it is good for those countries and democracy. We should think about what would have happened with the Americas if we did not have the OAS.