G-8's Broken Promises to Africa

Economic Crisis Not An Excuse?

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has already gone on record with his dismay about the shortage of aid.

G-8 leaders convene for a class photo at the summit in L'Aquila, Italy.

(Andrew Medichini/AP Photo)

"The economic crisis cannot become an excuse to abandon commitments," he said last month. "It is even more reason to make them concrete."

Some summit attendees took an indirect stab at the G-8 leaders' past commitments.

Commending the group's latest pledge of $20 billion in farm aid to developing countries, Nigerian Agriculture Minister Abba Ruma said it must be "disbursed expeditiously. It is only then we will know that the G-8 is living up to its commitment and not just making a pledge and going to sleep."

In an apparent effort to shame countries not following through on their previous pledges, the G-8, for the first time, will publish the data of money pledged and money delivered to enhance accountability. But many say that will provide little comfort to those who have heard so many promises before.

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The United Nations estimates the number of malnourished people in the world has risen in the past two years and is expected to top 1.02 billion this year. The global recession is expected to make 103 million more go hungry. The World Bank estimates that the gross domestic product of developing countries, except for China and India, will decline by 1.6 percent this year, with fragile African countries being the most at risk.

These dire statistics and Obama's first visit to Ghana as president has the potential to once again make aid to Africa a cause celebre.

As Bono wrote Friday in an op-ed in The New York Times: "The not-so-good news -- that countries like Italy and France are not meeting their Africa commitments -- makes the president's visit all the more essential. ... The president can facilitate the new, the fresh and the different. Many existing promises are expiring in 2010, some of old age and others of chronic neglect. New promises from usual and unusual partners, from the G-8 to the G-20, need to be made -- and this time kept."