Mr. Kemal Dervis, Administrator of UNDP and Chair of the UN Development Group.
- photo by Pincas Jawetz  www.SustainabiliTank.info)

The December 21, 2006, 1 p.m.. Press Conference announcement presented Mr. Kemal Dervis as Chair of the UN Development Group, and stated that “he will be speaking about progress towards the Millennium Development Goals, trends in official development assistance, and the need for inclusive economic growth.”

Mr. Dervis is a former Minister of Economy of Turkey, and a former Member of the Board of the World Bank. He was very successful in his previous jobs, and is credited with having lead Turkey to become an economic success story. He got appointed as Administrator of UNDP, when the previous Administrator, Mr. Mark Malloch Brown moved across the street from UNDP, to the UN Secretariat, to help the UN Secretary-General out of his Oil-for-Food Iraqi program PR and real disaster - first as Chef-de-Cabinet, and later as Deputy Secretary-General. In his 14 month as head of UNDP, Mr. Dervis did not consider visiting the UN Secretariat second floor media offices.

Slowly, UNDP started to be looked at by some of the resident journalists that realize the UN is more then its Security Council. Matthew Lee of InnerCity Press got the wind from UNDP people that not everything is right there, and realizing that information was not forthcoming through the official channels, and seemingly the folks of the Administrator’s office were sandbagging their fortress, a good investigative journalist tends then to become rather more aggressive. When he asked the former UNDP Administrator some questions about events that involved one of the people he had appointed during his tenure there, he called the journalist a jerk, and this got worse and worse when the Spokesman for the UNSG also snowballed.

Eventually, some at the UN came to their senses. The Spokesman called out for peace, and Mr. Dervis was thus booked for his first visit to the Press Conference room. The Excuse was that he will be speaking about the most popular topic - the MDGs, but everyone realized that he will answer some questions from InnerCity. Why did he not say simply that he will be speaking about the work of the UNDP - a very important UN Agency that is in effect executing Development Projects for the UN and the World Bank?

To be accurate, the long delayed process of bringing Mr. Dervis to the Press Room was in effect started a week earlier by bringing to us first the Associate Administrator of UNDP, Mr. Ab Markert, in effect the No. 2 man at UNDP, and as we shall see, a very important person in his own right - who at UNDP is managing all day-to-day operations on the country level. But he is not the person responsible for UNDP policy.

December 21, 2006, the day following Professor Jeffrey Sachs’ Press Conference, the room was full. Much of the time was obviously taken by his over-arching introductory speech, so less time was left for the Q&A. I wanted to ask important questions about the essence of the work of UNDP - do they regard Sustainable Development as an asset or an impediment to development? How much attention do they give to energy from non-fossil carbon sources? I had quite a list of questions in my mind to chose from, and more questions came to me while he was talking - but neigh - I was not given the chance to ask a question. I figured that he was being lovingly guarded, so no new disasters befall him - specially as this PC was just one day after the Jeffrey Sachs event - and Jeffrey, though without saying anything against UNDP, seeded enough material to keep the Administrator quite busy looking for answers, had there been a chance to ask him the questions.

Mr. Dervis started: “I thought, at the end of the year, this time of transition at the UN, it would be a good time to say a few words and to share a few words with you. Of course I do travel a lot and have many opportunities in the field, but this is a good time to take a look what happened in 2006, and to look forward to 2007.”

“Very generally, apart from the issues of the UN as such, we really are living in a period that the world economic growth is faster then almost ever, perhaps the only period that it was equally rapid, globally speaking, was right after the Second World War, during the reconstruction period, but the last 5 year period we have seen record global economic growth. So, in that sense, we can see that globalization, the diffusion of technology, investment, global markets, all this are leading to huge dynamism in the world economy, and also in many developing countries. At the same time, however, we can also characterize our age as one of exploding inequality. One issue that is interesting because it sums up the picture is the ratio of the income of the 3 largest countries to the 10 poorest countries. It was roughly 3 in 1820 and it was 45 at the turn of the century - it is now 50. So in that sense, the fact that many southern countries, China, and Korea before it, and others, are catching up; many others, and the poorest countries indeed, are not benefiting at all from the globalization process. So that is the real challenge, and that is the real worry.”  SustainabiliTank.info wonders here who are the largest 3 - did he mean that today it would have been US, Japan and Germany? Why 1820? I take for granted that the turn of the century was the beginning of the 21st century - so it is interesting that the ratio he talks about grew from 45 to 50 in just 5 years!)

“The second dynamism of the exploding inequality story is the exploding inequality internally in the countries. It is growing almost everywhere, with a few exceptions, almost everywhere, in rich and poor countries. In the US and in China, in Turkey and in Mexico, and that is a problem because you know - every increasing inequality brings with it whatever ethical stand or political stand you take, it brings with it tension, social problems, frustration, alienation. So I would say making globalization and growth more inclusive is really the overarching objective of the UN Development Program.”

“The MDGs are a very powerful concrete formulation of exclusive growth. There are targets that can be measured, there are targets that relate to peoples concrete lives and therefore make it easier to track and to get support and bring of this full process, then if we structure it with averages of economic growth. The MDGs have been a tremendous mobilizing force and we remain committed to the MDGs. Summer of 2007 will be the midpoint between 2000 and 2015, and we are going in UNDP to make a lot of analysis and news towards the July 2007 midpoint. What we have achieved, and what the world has achieved, how do we get forward? We will really focus - we hope to have your interest and your support in looking how the world is really doing.”  SustainabiliTank.info feels that we will rather go to Jeffrey Sachs for this sort of information - sorry Mr. Dervis)

“In terms of the UN itself, in this overall context, I sense a tremendous actual increase in the demand for multilateralism, for multilateral approach to the world problems. I am not of course concerned with the purely political and security aspects, my field is development, but I see it very much on the development side.”

“The Spanish contribution we had from Prime Minister Zapatero, two days ago, I think, is a wonderful expression of commitment of cause, to the MDGs, and to the role of the UN in this effort, so I would like to take this opportunity again to thank Spain a lot for this opportunity of extraordinary commitment and contribution, which is to the whole UN development system not UNDP as such.”

From here the lecture moved to the topic of “the high level panel for UN reform and coherence in humanitarian development and the environmental area.” The panel established by UNSG Kofi Annan late February 2006, and it included three Prime Ministers still in office at that time, and further wise political people like the retired Chilean President Ricardo Lagos, and the retired President of Tanzania, Mukata. The vision of that panel was made available in early November 2006, and it is now with the Secretary-General-Designate and it has some powerful proposals for UN coherence in the future. Some of that vision includes: “THE UN IS CENTRAL TO THE DEVELOPMENT AGENDA” - that means it is not just a question for the multilateral development banks, the Breton-Woods Institutions, but to the UN itself is to have a key role in global development, and country development issues.

The second vision Mr. Dervis brings up is: UNDP, according to that vision, should as it is already - but in a reinforced way - be made manager of the resident coordinator or the in-country representatives of the UNDP, that will get also a dual role, according to that vision, as chairing the UN country teams in that country. This is not in a line authority sense, but rather in a convener authority sense.

The third vision of the panel, this after having decided that the UN is important, and multilateralism is the way, deals now with the inefficiencies. It found a lot of duplication in the system, “resources could be used much more efficiently if we cut down on duplication, if we were able to organize ourselves in a much more cohesive way.” It did not recommend merger of agencies as some people did recommend (God forbids - that would have been a too great dose of efficiency for the UN - SustainabiliTank.info comment).

“Why don’t you merge the 28 agencies of the UN system that are active in one way or another in development into three - a humanitarian, a development, and an environment functional agencies?” asked Dervis quoting one solution that was put forward and was not retained by the panel for all kinds of reasons, he said. (This completely beats the light out of my brain - has the gentleman heard of SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND ITS THREE LEGS - social development, economic development, and the environment legs of one tripod - just one and only one agency? - Pincas Jawetz comment for SustainabiliTank.info).

Dervis continued by saying that the panel talked just of more efficiency - you have to be more coordinated, you have to be more cohesive, they said. If you want to fulfill your potential you have to do that. So we are now facing recommendations of the high level panel. “The Panel is not a governing organ of the UN, or UNDP, or any other organization. These are mere recommendations of very wise and powerful people said Dervis, and continued - of cause, we have now this on our side, with the leadership of the UNSG, to take this to our organizations, and the leadership of other organizations, the leadership of ILO, UNESCO…. are NOT part of the Secretariat, but are autonomous with their boards. We will be involved to take this forward, decisively as possible, but it takes some time, being mindful and respectful of the fact that every governing organ, this is an international family of nations - these UN - there is the need for a governmental process. We cannot make decisions - this is in the domain of the nations of the UN.”

“We can do certain things, we can move ahead on certain things which we can do within our mandates in cooperation with the member States, in particular developing nations, and other things such as the new Sustainable Development Board, for example, or other proposals, such as the 27 proposal in terms of a new leadership for ECOSOC, those are things way beyond the UN Secretariat, or the management of the Funds and Programs, and has to be dealt with at the Inter-governmental level.”

In terms of what we will do, of what we are already doing to fulfill the high level panel - “WE ARE GOING TO LAUNCH PILOTS - PILOT COUNTRIES, where new procedures for UN cohesion are going to be put in practice at country level,”

“WE have received letters from 8 countries experiencing strong interest or actually asking us to be pilots from the national government - so if the National Government wants to go ahead, so this is the first condition, we must have a national government that wants to move ahead. On the other hand, the UN organizations at the country level, funds, and programs, and the specialized agencies, also want to go ahead, then we have the conditions in place for launching these pilots. My feeling is that this is a very good way to proceed, because we will learn from these pilots a lot of details of how to do this, and what we learn from these pilots, in 6-8 months. we can then digest all of this and take it to the intergovernmental process, and say - here is what we learned and looking towards 2008, should we now generalize this? Or perhaps try to correct this somewhat, and do it in somewhat different way? One example - each funding program and agency has a country program. The country programs have to go to the respective boards, i.e. UNDP program is a particular country has to go to the board of UNDP, the same is true for WFP., for example, one thing the panel recommended, is that we merge the country programs into one program - that is fully coherent and where there is no duplication with the authority of the resident coordinator to manage that integrated program. OK, fine, however of course, when we go to the Boards, we still have to take each piece of that program to that particular agency requested by the particular part of the program, to that particular board. What we want to dwell the Board is - can we pilot this in such a way that for the pilot country we just take one program to all those boards?”

The devil is sometimes in the details, while in general it is good to move to more coherence, given the governments’ structure, we have to be mindful how we do this precisely.

Finally, let me share with you, because I got some indirect questions - let me make this clear - I have a dual role as UNDP Administrator and overall responsibility for UNDP, but I have also the Chair responsibility for the UN Development Group, which now has 28 Agencies, and Funding Programs as members - the convening authority and the duty to deal with the whole UN reform agenda.

“Moreover, the international community, and the high level panel, have asked us at UNDP to make sure that the role of coordinating agency, and the UN reform catalytic institutions, does not get too mixed up with the day to day work of UNDP programs. So, the way we were approaching this, Ab Markert, who is the Associated Administrator, whom you have met last week, is really the Chief Operating Officer of UNDP. He directly oversees what happens at the country level, at the country programs, the day-to-day operations. The regional bureaus’ report to him, he does at the end, of cause, report to me, but he is the Associate and that is even more then Deputy - it is an Associate and we are a team in the Executive Office with a division of labor. I focus on the global policies, the global management, which is so crucial to UNDP, the Bureaus of global nature such as the Bureau of Development Policy, there I have to play my role as Chair of UNDG.”

I want you to know, as you of cause know, Ab Markert is an extremely senior person - former Minister of the Netherlands, Member of the Executive Board of the World Bank, Head of one of the two major political parties of the Netherlands, candidate to become Prime Minister, that kind of person, that kind of experience, in an important country such as the Netherlands.
I am privileged to work with him, to have him on the board, since 8 month now, and to have this kind of division of labor with him, I feel, it makes us more effective as a team.

I take that this is an introductory comment, and now Mr. Dervis was available for questions from the Press.

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As expected, the first question went to InnerCity Press: “Thanks for coming. It is 14 months without a press conference. We were asking somethings for some months…it was very difficult to get an answer from the UNDP communications office.” The question was about funding by UNDP of the disarming of a faction in Eastern Uganda - eventually it was said by the UNDP that the funding was stopped, but Ab Markert said that there was no disarmament - there was nothing to it.” I just looked at the project documents and it very much referred to disarmament. My question is what steps are taken to avoid shifting answers and get more routine answers from UNDP in the briefing room?”

A. “Well, yes, I knew you were asking about it. That part of Uganda is a tough one and it concerns us a lot. I checked with the country team and the region - in terms of what we were doing - it was that at no time there was funding with disarming activities - contrary to what some publications were saying. I checked on this and that seems to be a fact. There may be at the country level allegations that some people somehow were indirectly giving some support - as far as I know there was not such support. I think Ab answered that.” Then he added: “We welcome questions of that sort because we want to be totally transparent to our activities. It is also true that sometimes given the communication it is not always clear, but so far as UNDP, we were never involved in arms activities in that part of Uganda.”

Further Question: “This idea that UNDP audits are not available to the member states of the UNDP, only available to the 36 member states of the Executive Board, and only in a summary fashion, is this going to change in the upcoming January Executive Board Session?”

A. “Really a very important question. Evaluation and Audit is two very important parts of my large organization’s activities. I want to explain the real situation. There is an external audit and these audits are available to board members and are available indeed on the web-site. A thing that is very critical here is that external auditors have full access to all our internal audits. OK. So the external auditors can access every single piece and then they work with that and information they gather and report to the board and member states - in this sense there is a great deal of transparency. Coming to internal audits, that, as in many organizations, are also management tools, the range of issues, from financial issues to allegations of mismanagement conduct or simple style issues, are not necessarily made available except to the external auditors. Now we are looking at ways to make even these audits more available to larger audiences, more available directly, without however undermining the internal management tool nature of those audits, and also of cause, protecting staff.. Because sometimes, if it is available without making sure that certain things in these audits are well understood, it could lead to misunderstandings…. It is my feeling that this is not final, we also consult with the rest of the funding programs, because we all have the same policy at this point. It is that probably there should be an intermediary body, that has representation from member states’ bodies, that looks at these, and then decides what is appropriate to make generally available in some form…”

Q. You have mentioned that in the last 5 years the poor have not benefitted from globalization. Do you think globalization is the right way to reach the poor?

A. Well, globalization makes opportunities larger, it allows technologies to diffuse to larger parts of the world. It brings in the the world economy parts that were left outside, and through this integration, I think, it creates a great stimulation of growth. The World Bank has just published last week a very optimistic 2030 scenario for the world economy, were it stresses all the positive sides of globalization. But at the same time, globalization is also a process of very dramatic change, and those that cannot adjust to the change sometimes suffer very seriously….. There is international tax competition where capital, which is highly mobile, can seek whichever tax regime or tax area, is most favorable, and therefore I think globalization has shifted the balance of power between capital and labor, where labor is less mobile and capital is much more mobile. Therefore, in the bargaining between the two sides, as compared to 30 years ago, capital is stronger and we see the impact of that on wages, tat are growing much less rapidly then they used to do. Wage growth has actually lagged now behind the productivity growth, in many countries. All these things are happening simultaneously. I don’t say this is good or bad. Globalization is Happening! It is like technology. technology is wonderful when it is used to save lives, and to have medical breakthroughs, it is terrible if it is used to produce horrible armaments, so I would say globalization is not good or bad by itself…,Manage it in a way that the poorest and the most vulnerable also benefit from it, and that we compensate with other mechanisms some of the problems that it generates.

Q. (from Washington Times) About UNDP and countries that have graduated from UNDP programs What kind of checks and balances are there for the moneys’ accountability for the UN and for the tax payers in the countries themselves?

A. “This is a very interesting and important question. The UN role in countries like Mexico, Brazil, Turkey, is very different from the role it plays in poor countries. So called middle income countries finance themselves most activities that UNDP does as development in their own countries. Except very small amounts, no UNDP money is used. However, and that you are absolutely right, UNDP is still responsible for programs there even if they are financed by these governments, and the same basic policies that applies to UNDP operations apply to middle-income countries as in low income countries. .. We believe in country ownership, so to speak the country is in the driver’s seat. Of cause, the particular mix of activities that are chosen by Chile or Mexico is very up to Chile and Mexico. Ex President Lagos of Chile said at the high level panel, ‘even when countries were there is zero development aid, such as Chile, we want the UN there as representing multilateralism, multilateral approach, and or helping us think through how we deal with issues such as fighting global issues such as global disease, financial instability, climate issues, and questions of that sort’ - so the nature of our work in middle income countries is very different and that is what is happening.”

Q. Is there any way to check the financial accountability for the money they spend in their own country?

A. The external audits apply to all countries. No difference from where they are financed and how.

Q. A very general question on the MDGs from a correspondent from Turkey.

A. “There are two dimensions to the MDGs. One is the global progress in the 7th and 8th goals - let’s say hunger and poverty. We will be well on our way to half poverty by 2015.
Many of the other goals, mostly we can say there is progress. Why? Because many very large countries are making large progress.
China of course. If China makes progress, then globally we have progress. We can say the MDGs are on track. However, if one looks at the fact that the MDGs are goals for each country, here it is difficult. Many countries, some of them are very small, so they have no weight, over the average - some of these are left further behind. If we look at it country by country, we have to say that progress is well too slow, and either we must make a dramatic increased effort together with the country, because from the outside one can not achieve those goals, one can help, this of course at the end of the day. Hugely accelerated effort is needed, or some of these countries will not make it in time. That is the broad answer.
In terms of Turkey: Turkey is actually making good progress, but there are problems in particular goals - gender equality and maternal mortality. These are two areas that remain.
 SustainabiliTank.info finds it interesting how important in all of this looms the size of China. In effect China goes it very much alone, so if China makes great strides, and the UN wants to count this as part of the measurement of its own success - we are ready to cry out foul. China is no yard-stick for UN program-success.)

Q. ( from InnerCity Press) On the Discretionary Administrator’s Fund at the UNDP.

A. All funds are audited by the external auditor. I worked at the World Bank for 21 years. Always the Director had a discretionary fund that he or she can use for particular purposes.
This is a leeway the Board gives to the Director so he can give a particular impulse to an activity he thinks needs it. The present fund was established at UNDP before my time, it gets replenished every 2 years. it is for $1.3 million. As a percentage of the budget in my organization it is very small and of course totally transparent.

Q. What has happened in newly democratizing nations?

A, I think that the fact that markets have become so wild, everything is at a bigger scale, and you can reduce costs of production. … there is a need to retrain .. and not every job survives.
While I think we should take advantage of the changes, I think wealth must be more equitably distributed then we have it today.

In term of democracy, supporting democratic government is one of the big priorities in UNDP activities, UN activities, elections, and this sort. Often democracy does not deliver the tangible benefits at the lower income. We have seen it in Latin America. Totalitarian dictatorships were in place in all places, but in the last 25 years it was democratized…yet the poor in Latin America - the lower 30 - 40 - 50 percent of the income distribution, have not benefitted at all of the progress in the last 15 years in Latin America. There is a challenge here….
One of my favorite topics is that democracy is not just elections for parliament and a president. Democracy is about handling down power, a strong judiciary, the right balance between regulatory bodies and feedback from citizenry - deregulate water, deregulate central banks, deregulate prices, - the US is actually the country where there is strongest feedback from the citizens to regulatory bodies. The cost of water and electricity in the US, compared to other countries, is a part of the reason that there is a tremendous feedback in these areas. ..UNDP wants all these institutions to work for all.

Q, (follow up question to the point) “Do you see the globalization is jeopardized in the economies in transition?”

A. I think much can be done to make democracy work for the poor when it is done. I do not think we should go back to autarchy, protectionism, close borders, or that sort, but one has to realize that policies have to have democratic mechanisms in order to work. Just to have an election is not enough.

Q. (from InnerCity Press) UNDP and transparency of Government shareholders? To whom do you see yourself responsible to? Governments, or to the citizens of those governments?
Are you responsible to the Press?

A. Fundamentally you are right. Fundamentally I think transparency where the money goes - that is fundamental. I think we made great strides towards that. For example, our country programs are not at all confidential. You can know exactly where the money is spent, in Turkey, in Brazil, or wherever. There is , of course, still the fact that UNDP, or any UN organization, has been set up by nation states. By sovereign nation states, and in that sense our governing boards are these nation states. In that sense, our governing board are these sovereign nation states. I can’t run in election with the citizens of the world or even the UNSG, you know. We are of course appointed by nation states and that does put certain constraints on our behavior - and on the way we operate. Our Board sets down the rules and how money gets allocated to which countries. We have some leeway, but it is the board that has the final decision and as long as the world is made up of Sovereign States, and as long as our financial contributions come from these nation states, we are of course primarily bound by the rules these nation states agree to.

However, I really do believe that the strength of the UN finally is that we must appeal to the emotions of citizens across the world. In that sense you know that I agree with you that we must establish those links and the better we do, if we do that.

Q. Will you favor …

A. Look. In terms of transparency conditions. the conditions for the allocation of the UNDP budget are set by the UNDP Board. So quite honestly, I certainly think that pretty strong transparency conditions should be in place.

The Board has certain rights and we have no way to take it away from them.

Procedures - if a certain member objects to a certain program, they can take it to the Board - we have no discretionary authority over that. We have some limited authority only.

Q. On the EU and Turkey’s accession? (question from Financial Times)

A. Individual political issues between the EU and a country is not something I should comment on - and I will not!

In the case of my meeting the editor of the Financial Times, whom I met about 6 weeks ago, I do believe that the relationship between the world of Islam, the Moslem Countries, and the west. is one of the biggest issues of today’s world, also for development, not only in terms of security. I do believe that the relationship between the EU and Turkey, which is a very old relationship, has significance beyond that country and the EU, and the way relations are handled has global implications the way the UNSG has also said on many occasions. I also think that on both sides it is important to think of these global implications for peace and stability that an alliance of civilizations we talked about two days ago, with the visit of the Spanish and Turkish Ministers here, has tremendous positive implications, so of course, I shall say that I am very much in favor of relations on equal terms.

Q. ( A question from an obvious very frustrated Danish correspondent that sat through all of this) You said that your responsibility is to the governing boards, but we thought the responsibility of UNDP is to the countries it helps. Can you mention in concrete examples that you helped countries?

A. We are not an NGO - this is all legally established by Sovereign Nations.

“Don’t misunderstand - I said that our strength will be greatly magnified if there is a bound between the people and the UN, but we are legally established by governments and governed by Danish Government, by Swedish Government, by Turkish Government, by the US government, you know. We are not an NGO. The NGO can decide we are going to be…..
we are an intergovernmental body established by Sovereign Nations, and so, I must make sure.

It does not mean to say we should not get feed-back by people. Whenever I travel, civil society, meeting with people, but we must understand that legally speaking we are governed by Sovereign Governments. Specific tools - there is no silver bullet, we have to be aware of what is really happening. The Super rich get Super-richer and the poor are not getting richer at all - and I think this is a real issue. Therefore, for an educational policy to reach the real poor, to make health care available to all, empowerment, this is not about charity. The real issue is are people empowered over their life?

Our adviser (and I assume he is talking now about Jeffrey Sachs - SustainabiliTank.info comment) taught us that democracy is part of this. Without democracy empowerment is very limited.
Democracy can take various forms, but there has to be a basic democratic participation.

Pure economic policy is very important. When one has macro-economic policy that does not create patterns of inflation, prices, interest rates, exchange rates, that is not favorable to the poor, you are indexing your inclusive growth process, and what you do via taxes and compensation - you are trying to compensate something that goes in the wrong way anyway.

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This was a fascinating press conference, and at the end you can hear on the tape the voice of Matthew Lee from InnerCity Press calling to Mr. Dervis: “Can you come back in 2-4 months?”

So far as I am concerned, this press conference was a real awakening to what the real UN is like.

Just a day earlier we had before us Prof. Jeffrey Sachs who gave us some hope for the world explaining how he “UNPACKS” the world problems and creates practical step-by-step solutions to the MDGs. To my question, he also pointed out in his answer the problems with the environment that the world does not start yet to deal with. He made it clear that statements are not the real medicine, it is this “unpacking” of the problem, and the search for the practical simple steps that will save us from ourselves - eventually this will also have to be done in the environmental arena and he pointed out that three treaties are already in existence, but no-body honors them yet. All of this without digging into the inherent weakness of the UN, that was created by the so called SOVEREIGN MEMBER STATES - many of whom are indeed usurper governments and interest-supported dangerous practical jokes.

Now, today, we had before us a high UN official - perhaps the most important UN official - and he declared in full site his total impotence of doing anything that is more valuable then collecting a stack of papers - unless above Sovereign Member-States Governments allow him to do it. The man has personal value - this is clear - he most probably has also personal integrity - otherwise he would have avoided many of the questions. To me he proved at the end, in his answer to the Danish question, that he is no fool, he is clearly aware of the perception his statements created - and in effect broke down by saying a lot of good stuff in answer to a question that was quite limited in its scope. Mr. Dervis, is an old style good classic economist. As we noted, he did a lot of good to Turkey, but does he understand fully the terrible situation that his analysis of the capital versus labor relationship creates in the globalized world that looks for higher profits, but does nothing about the compensatory measures that he was mentioning?

Will he, and Washington based economists, be able to come up with real programs before the poor get armed with more Kalashnikoffs and eventually with suitcase dirty bombs? The World Bank economists had to be pushed into small scale programs and into environmental issues - they are still not good in those areas, and the Washington US economists with influence at the White House are not better either. The one economist that understood the issues eloped from Washington, he is now also at Columbia University - I think of Joe Stiglitz.
Dervis needs to beef up on Sustainable Development concepts and take them to his Sovereign Member State Governments and put it down in clear programs that explain why they must start doing things for their own people.

The MDGs are great ideas, what Jeffrey Sachs has designed does not really need the UN at all. It is based on foreign aid funds from enlightened governments (those famous 0.7 percenters), great foundations, and famous individuals. They could have their own organization to deal with the poor of Africa - this outside UNDP or the other 27 UN Agencies.
The UN is overstuffed, bloated, and the high-level panel will bring about results in a decade or two - Dervis made this crystal clear.

So, last parting words for what was for me two days of work intended to summarize the high and low of the UN activities, as they stand before a new incoming UNSG takes over the institutional reins, it is now for Mr. Ban Ki-moon to look not only at the Security Council issues, but also at the humanitarian aspects that are fundamentally responsible for those humanitarian issues. His predecessor has established the MDGs as a fighting slogan - we may not have liked it earlier, but we buy now the Jeffrey Sachs angle at looking at their possibility for success. Having listened to the UNDP presentation, I must give the new Secretary_General advice in the form of a pun:

MR. BAN KI-MOON - PLEASE DO NOT BECOME MR. BAN KI-NG - that is do not listen exclusively to the “banking crowd” of UNDP.