The new development assistance must focus on being synergistic with private sector development and the strengthening of civil society as a whole. Second, the relationship between industrial and developing countries needs to be redefined. Common interests and complementary needs of the rich and the poor, as well as global goals forged through the United Nations, must provide the basic rationale for new partnerships and compacts. Global challenges require cooperative, global solutions, none more so than global climate change. We must act in concert, preventively, to attack the root causes of today s threats because we cannot afford to cope with the future tragic consequences of neglect.
Development assistance is an essential part of the cost-sharing needed for global compacts.
Third, a new development framework is needed to consolidate the emerging concept of sustainable human development. Too often, development cooperation has been shaped by short-term military, political and economic interests. Past aid has far too often not been used for poverty eradication, human development, and environmental regeneration. We must now ensure that scarce funds address the most pressing needs of people and their environments. The challenges of growing poverty and widening inequity will not be met without democratization and good governance.