Turkey aims to help eliminate world poverty

By Anna Wood for Southeast European Times in Istanbul — 16/05/11

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”]In hosting the 4th UN conference on the Least Developed Countries and funding the attendance of delegates from Least Developed Countries (LDCs), Turkey underscored its commitment to eradicating global poverty. The event also served as another opportunity for Turkey to emphasise its growing role as a global power and international mediator.

“Istanbul has come to be known as a meeting point of continents, but it would make us more proud if Istanbul came to be remembered as the place where the misfortune of almost a billion people has taken a positive turn,” said President Adbullah Gul, reiterating his country’s commitment to this issue.

“Turkey has assumed the responsibility of putting LDC-related topics into the agenda of the international community and contributing to efforts for finding solutions for the problems of LDCs until 2020, ” said Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu at the final press conference, adding that “In a way, Turkey has been the voice of the LDCs, and we continue to be the voice of the LDCs.”

Gul spoke somberly of conditions that face the LDCs, reminding the audience that at the first LDC Conference in 1971 there were only 35 countries of concern; now, there are 48, and only three have improved enough to be taken off the list. So long as such inequality remains, he said, “no one will be able to live in peace or prosperity”.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has become known for his fiery rhetoric on the international stage, attracted attention for saying that this summit, and the issue of poverty at large, has been largely ignored by the international community.

“To be honest, in a world with millions of people with daily consumption under $1.25, nobody is innocent,” he stated, going on to criticise Western and Northern states for their “racist and discriminatory tendencies”.

In regard to Ankara’s own role in fighting poverty, Turkish officials held their country up as both a model donor state and as a country that has overcome financial straits itself in the recent past. Gul cited Turkey’s annual contribution to LDCs of nearly $12 billion, made up of both state and NGO aid.

Erdoğan touted Turkey’s own domestic battle against poverty, one that has largely been waged under his watch. “The ratio of people whose daily consumption was less than $4.30 was 30% in 2002, and, take note, we dropped it to 4%,” he said, going on to describe the improved infrastructure, schools, homes and health facilities created for Turkey’s impoverished citizens.

Growth of the economy averaged 6% between 2002 and 2008, and the country has managed a relatively swift recovery after the global financial crisis. Critics, however, have raised concerns over the country’s reliance on short-term inflows of foreign capital.

This content was commissioned for SETimes.com.