The 16th Annual Canadian Conference on International Health

Speaking Notes for the Honourable Beverley J. Oda, Minister of International Cooperation at The 16thAnnual Canadian Conference on International Health

October 27, 2009
Ottawa, Ontario

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.

It's my pleasure to be here with you today at your 16^th Annual Conference on International Health.

Welcome to our international friends and colleagues.

Many of you are Canada's strongest partners in our efforts to improve the health and health care of those living in developing countries.

At this Conference, you are continuing on an incredibly important mission - important since so many lives depend on your work to reduce global health inequities, strengthen health systems around the world, and build knowledge networks in global health.

As we all know, the greatest burden of disease is borne by the poor.

Your dedication and determination responds to the hopes of nearly 1 billion people living in poverty.

Today, we are experiencing the impacts and realities of living in a growing global society.

The world wide economic recession has moved millions more into poverty.

These are the most vulnerable, among the hardest to reach and those who are the least equipped to deal with the challenges we now face.

Canada has always been a strong supporter of improving health and health care systems in its international work.

It represents approximately 25 percent of all of our development assistance.

And, over the past 40 years, by working with our partners, we have all seen improvements in health care outcomes.

Data from UNICEF, the World Bank and the WHO show a reduction, since 1990, of approximately 25 percent in the number of deaths in children under age of five.

This positive outcome can be credited to immunization programs, Vitamin A supplements for children, and the wide distribution of insecticide-treated bed nets to fight malaria.

I am proud that Canada was the lead donor country in Vitamin A programming and bed net distribution, as well as a significant supporter of immunization.

And Canada has strongly contributed to the effort to reduce measles by 75 percent in less than a decade.

Our government made the biggest health contribution in its history to the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, which has now mobilized more than $14 billion and saved millions of people.

Over the last decade, the number of people receiving treatment for tuberculosis has tripled.

And Canada is the largest donor country in the world to support basic TB drugs provision.

I know many of you in this room are working hard to meet the challenge of HIV/AIDS.

For our part, between 2005-2006 and 2007-2008, CIDA provided more than $500 million to address this epidemic in the developing world.

Of that, close to $111 million is going to the Canadian HIV Vaccine Initiative with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, to help in the development of a safe, effective and affordable HIV vaccine.

As part of its AID's programming, CIDA is helping to provide medical services, education and community care to 2.8 million AIDS orphans.

In Afghanistan, our government committed $60 million to polio eradication, vaccinating more than seven million Afghan children under the age of five.

The World Health Organization has now declared the North and Northwest regions of the country to be polio-free.

And, we have taken a leadership role in global health initiatives such as the Canadian-led Initiative to Save a Million Lives.

This initiative will increase the capacity of health care systems with the training of 40,000 health workers in Africa alone, building the skills and experience to provide basic health services.

Canada's 10-year commitment to the Africa Health Systems Initiative supports African-led efforts to implement their national health sector strategic plans to address critical national and cross-boundary challenges.

These are significant milestones in our joint efforts to improve the health among the most poor, and Canada has done its part proudly.

Last fiscal year, CIDA spent approximately $785 million on interventions critical to good health outcomes.

As you know, Canada itself is dealing with the impact of the global recession in a responsible manner.

And I am proud to say that Canada is among those countries that has not - not - reduced its international assistance this year, but in fact is increasing it.

However our collective strength should not only be measured in dollars, it must also be measured in outcomes - outcomes that are long-lasting, sustainable and effective.

That is why our government has taken a number of concrete steps to ensure that our aid is more efficient, more focused and more accountable.

Our first steps were to focus our work geographically and thematically.

We also announced that all of Canada's food aid was to be untied and our non-food aid would be untied by 2013.

And earlier this month, I outlined our Food Security Strategy, one of our thematic focuses, along with securing a future for children and youth, and stimulating sustainable economic growth.

Our Food Security Strategy includes many aspects that will be of interest to you as they cross over into improving the health of the poorest in developing countries.

The Strategy will follow 3 paths - food aid and nutrition, agriculture and research.

And as the head of the World Food Program has said, "Food is at the basis of human survival."

In fact, hunger and malnutrition cause more deaths than HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined.

Last year, in 2008, Canada was the 3^rd largest single country donor to the World Food Programme.

And Canada will continue to respond to urgent food-related emergencies and we will work closely with our partners on new and better ways to procure and manage food stocks so that they can respond in a timely way to emergencies.

Our recent support for the WFP's new P4P program, led the WFP to call Canada one of its "most secure and creative partners on the frontlines of hunger."

Canada is currently the Vice-Chair of the World Food Aid Convention and was able to have micronutrients added to the list of food items under the Convention.

Millions of the world's most vulnerable are malnourished leading to illness, blindness, mental disorders, and death.

In 2008 the Copenhagen Consensus found that investment in micronutrients was the single most effective use of aid dollars in the world.

Under our Food Security Strategy, CIDA will build on our current activities, such as our Initiative to Save a Million lives, and increase our micronutrient programming as well as promote nutrient supplements, such as vitamin A, and food fortification like salt iodization as an integral part of worldwide food security programs.

And our support for agriculture recognizes that smallholder farmers produce about 80 percent of the food consumed in many developing countries.

CIDA's plan is to increase its support for agriculture to achieve sustainable long-term food security, while contributing to better health and economic growth.

In July of this year, the Prime Minister announced our commitment for an additional $600 million for agricultural development over three years.

Canada's support will help smallholder farmers, the majority of whom are women, improve their business practices, rehabilitate their farmland, access finance, and develop their markets.

However, agriculture at its best is challenging, input costs are high, livestock are stricken with diseases, yields and nutritional value must be improved and the climate constantly tests the year's harvest.

In developing countries, this means constantly finding new solutions to achieve and sustain food security.

And so in addition to our increased commitment to agriculture, only 10 days ago, I was happy to announce the creation of the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund, (CIFS) in partnership with IDRC, to support applied collaborative research with developing countries.

The CIFS Research Fund will finance applied research that seeks to solve immediate and concrete challenges on the ground in developing countries.

Our Canadian expertise and knowledge will contribute greatly to work addressing crop resilience, enhancing the nutritional value of crops, and finding ways to stop diseases that affect plants and animals and may be transmitted to humans.

As I said earlier, food security is just one of this Government's new thematic priorities.

We will be outlining our new Strategy under Securing the future for Children and Youth very soon.

I would like to thank those of you who contributed to CIDA's roundtable consultations on our three themes.

Needless to say the health of the children in developing countries will require our continued efforts, while 8.8 million children, under the age of five, are still dying every year.

But our work, in every area of thematic focus must be efficient, transparent and accountable to achieve the sustainable results we all want to achieve.

CIDA will continue to follow its AidEffectiveness agenda and seek out ways to increase its impact to improve the lives of those in developing countries.

And so as you deliberate and discuss your future work at this conference I encourage you to seek out solutions that:

• are sustainable, include building local capacity and supporting local ownership;
• are developed through consultation with local governments and local communities, integrated with national poverty and health strategies where they exist; and
• clearly identify expected outcomes and strive to achieve real results, both quantifiable and qualitative, that can be reported to all Canadians.

Because while we all agree that much remains to be done, Canadians can be proud of the leadership we have shown in international health.

CIDA will work even more closely with organizations like yours to transfer knowledge and expertise to developing country health sectors.

Conferences like this one are central to finding new solutions to the challenges that lie ahead.

I wish you fruitful and productive discussions, and look forward to finding new ways to collaborate, so that the health needs of the most vulnerable people in the world can be met, with the help of Canadians.

Thank you.