G8 Debt Cancellation a Major Step - But G8 Leaders Still Have a Lot of Unfinished Business

April 8, 2005

2005FIN153718

Mr. John Mihevc and co-signatories
Chair
Halifax initiative Coalition
104-153 Chapel Street
Ottawa, ON KIN 1H5

Dear Mr. Mihevc and co-signatories:

Thank you for your correspondence of January 28, 2005 regarding debt relief, additional financing and other development issues. I apologize for the delay of my reply.

“Addressing Unsustainable and Illegitimate Debt—Strategic Options for Civil Society”

Money, money everywhere, but nary a drop to drink

Civil society in G7 countries charge finance ministers with saying little and doing even less to support the poor
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

An information kit containing 11 factsheets discussing different issues related to the G8, including what is the G8 and he New Partnership for Africa's Development.

• Who we are [ 555 Kb ]
• Key Messages on NEPAD from Africa Canada Forum [ 1.9 Mb ]
• New Strategies, Old Loan Conditions: The Case of Uganda [ 1.4 Mb ]
• G7 Response to Financial Crises - Another Band-Aid [ 1.4 Mb ]
• What's shutout of the G7? - The Tobin tax and Mountains of Money for Development [ 2.6 Mb ]

The Problem
The on-going debt crisis of developing countries is integral to the perpetuation of an unjust economic system, one that concentrates wealth and power in the hands of a few. EVERY SINGLE DAY in 1999, $128 million was transferred from the poorest countries to the richest in debt repayments. For every one dollar in aid to developing countries, more than seven dollars comes back to rich countries in the form of debt servicing.

Ottawa Premiere of the award-winning documentary "Life and Debt"
A scathing indictment of economic globalization

Ottawa - Life and Debt, winner of the Critics Award at the Los Angeles Film Festival 2001, will be shown on the same day as the World Bank and the IMF meetings in Ottawa. Life and Debt offers a clear analysis of globalization and its negative impacts, focusing on the impacts of the World Bank and the IMF on Jamaica. Canada represents the World Bank and the IMF on the Board of Directors of both of these institutions.

This film is being shown by World Inter-Action Mondiale and Halifax Initiative following the November 17th Day of Action for Peace and Justice calling attention to the failures of economic globalization.

Roger Ebert, in a review of this film for the Chicago Sun-Times, wrote: "If you're curious about why the demonstrators are so angry, this is why they're so angry."

Movement criticizes irresponsibility of IMF and World Bank
Activists Issue 4 Demands & Rebuttal to World Bank’s Defense

World Social Forum - Porto Alegre - Jan 25-30, 2001

Robin Round
Policy Analyst
Halifax Initiative Coalition

We use money everyday. Money is a tool; a means to simplify transactions in an economy based on the exchange of goods and services. But the way most of us use money is old fashioned, out of date. Money is no longer a means of exchange but an end in itself. We live in the era of the commodification of money, an era where money has become divorced from the real economy it was originally designed to serve.