Rescuing the “Americas Strategy”
When Prime Minister Stephen Harper launched the Conservatives’ “Americas Strategy” in July 2007, the government identified the region as a “critical international priority.” Increased attention to Latin America makes sense, given the increasing maturity of the region’s democracies, the rising prominence of countries like Brazil and Mexico, the growing economies of many countries in the region, the longstanding links between Canadian and Latin American civil-society organizations, and the presence of many Canadian mining companies in the region.
Unfortunately, the strategy never reached its potential and is now in need of a reboot. No new resources have been allocated, and the main focus has been a series of trade deals with Colombia, Peru, Costa Rica, Panama, and Honduras. The heavy focus on trade suggests that the strategy is designed to promote the prosperity of a few Canadian companies rather than the people of Canada or of the region. Meanwhile, Canada’s image is becoming increasingly tarnished as mining companies face a range of criticism from environmental, human-rights, and indigenous organizations throughout the region.
Out of Africa
Apart from some well-publicized humanitarian funding for victims of the drought/conflict in Somalia, the Harper government’s interest in sub-Saharan Africa since the 2011 election has continued along the trajectory established after it was first elected in 2006. It froze and then cut foreign aid, closed four embassies and consulates, and Canada’s contribution to UN peacekeeping in Africa is at an all-time low. Ditto our reputation across the continent.
Former Canadian diplomat John Schram deplores the closing of embassies. “In effect,” he says, closing an embassy is “walking away from 50 years of Canadian investment,” abandoning hard-won credibility and ceding ground to “Chinese, Indian, Brazilian and European competition in the race to win markets and influence.” Today, Canada has embassies in fewer than one-third of Africa’s 54 countries, while Brazil is represented in more than half and China in 47.
This is not to say that Canada has no interest in Africa. On the contrary: According to the Canadian Council on Africa, since 2000, Canadian mining companies have spent $15 billion in mineral extraction and exploration on the continent, and the current value of fixed mining assets owned by the Canadian mining industry in Africa stands at $32 billion, a ten-fold increase over the past decade. The Harper government applauds this kind of investment, but is openly reluctant to rein in the worst excesses of Canadian mining companies abroad.
Net Canadian official development assistance to Africa grew significantly during the first years of the Harper government, but in 2010, then-foreign-minister Lawrence Cannon announced that there would be no more increases. The Canadian International Development Agency’s (CIDA) “countries of focus” in Africa have been reduced from 14 to seven. Four of them (Senegal, Ghana, Tanzania, and Mozambique) are what the donor community likes to call “better performers.” As a result, they are on every donor’s priority list, leading to donor crowding and co-ordination problems. But CIDA has a mania, these days, for “results,” and where better to get results than in countries with fewer problems than others?
Asia: Putting on the Flip-flops
Finally, Canada needs to play catch-up in Asia, home to the world’s fastest-growing economies. Disregarding Asia may have been forgivable when its population consisted only of three billion-plus very poor people, but Europe and the U.S. noticed a decade ago that Asia was going to become either their new rival or – preferably – their partner in global affairs, especially trade.
With Canada’s huge immigrant population from this mega-region, we should have been ahead of the game, not the last to notice. During the early Harper years, we were coy with the Chinese and ignored the Indians as we chased trade with Colombia and worried about the threat from Hamas. Now, with a stalled world economy, Harper belatedly joins the supplicants, asking to be allowed to sit among the observers at ASEAN Summits. Even then we arrive invisibly, as the junior yes-man to the U.S., forgotten by friends we made in decades past. Asians respect dignity, wisdom, and – perhaps most of all – consistency in their friends. In this regard, Canada has a lot of lost ground to make up.
In sum, after years of neglect (or worse), Canada needs a sustained engagement with the “developing” world – and not one based solely on ad hoc or narrowly defined self-interest.
Original Article
Source: the mark news
Author: Laura Macdonald and John Sinclair
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