UN General Assembly
2005

quantifiable vision of human dignity and solidarity, as well as of important economic and social rights. Yet, important objectives, such as employment, critical for developing countries, are excluded. India’s use of innovative financial instruments for rural infrastructural investment, as well as our Rural Employment Guarantee Bill — recently passed in Parliament — I believe may be of interest to other developing countries. Most of us had much higher expectations of the summit in the area of development, particularly in agreeing on a definite timetable for the achievement of the 0.7 per cent target for official development assistance. Unfortunately, that has not been achieved, and we have gone down to 0.5 per cent. That is equally true of innovative sources of financing because developing countries cannot break out of the cycle of poverty without enhanced resource flows and the application of science and technology to meet their developmental challenges. As India’s own economy develops — at about 8 per cent per year — and its technological advancement comes of age, we are expanding our economic and