document: Sir , Mr James Skinner -LRB- Letters , April 11 -RRB- charges me with misuse of statistics and understanding the debt burden of poor countries . He cites Africa to support his contention . The statistics I used refer to Latin America , the principal thrust of the argument of the Bishop of Oxford , which focused largely on Brazil . The bulk of African debt is owed to official lenders under various aid agreements . The debts represent loans with a substantial grant element . The limiting case is the international development association loans , 50-year loans , unindexed for inflation , at zero interest . The debts of African countries have often been cancelled or rescheduled , frequently several times for the same country . To treat debt as necessarily burdensome also ignores the initial transfer of resources . This is like saying that banks , building societies , and governments issuing saving certificates are burdened when they pay interest . If the funds are used productively , debt service is not a burden in the critical sense that the debtors would be better off if they had not borrowed . I do not know what Mr Skinner has in mind in referring to institutions serving only western interests , and by clear implication inflict suffering on the poor . What I do know is that throughout Asia , Africa and Latin America the level of material achievement declines as we move away from the effect of western commerce . To harp on alleged external causes of Third World poverty diverts attention from the real factors behind this poverty which are domestic , and thereby from the possibilities of addressing these . These factors include , among others , government policies and extensive , often enforced , dependence on precarious subsistence production . It is pertinent also that the poorest are low among the priorities of the local rulers . State help for the poorest , especially the rural poor , conflicts with the political and personal interests of the rulers , and may not accord with local mores . Such considerations are reinforced by ubiquitous civil conflict . An Arab-dominated Sudanese government will not help the poorest blacks hundreds of miles away with whom it is in armed conflict ; the Sinhalese government will not help the Tamil poor , nor will the government of Ethiopia the poor of Tigre . As I said in my letter , harping on alleged western causes of Third World poverty reflects and reinforces feelings of guilt , which is a self-centred sentiment . Encouraging Third World countries to default inhibits the inflow of productive commercial capital , which , together with the skills that went with it , over the last 150 years transformed life in many poor countries , notably in south-east Asia , west Africa and Latin America . Bauer House of Lords , Westminster SW1
extractive_keyphrases: third world poverty james skinner debt burden african debt government policies real factors