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Christina Finn reports from New York:
COMEDIAN TOMMY TIERNAN has rightly been highlighting the issue of global hunger, according to Foreign Minister Simon Coveney, who said next week’s budget will see a significant increase in overseas development aid.
The Irish comedian last week launched an urgent hunger appeal with Trocaire to save the lives of millions of people at risk of Famine in the Horn of Africa after travelling to Somalia.
Speaking on his podcast, ‘The Tommy, Hector and Laurita Podcast’, Tiernan said the public should be “frustrated, annoyed and disappointed” in the Irish Government for not hitting a UN target of allocating 0.7% of Gross National Income (GNI) to overseas development aid.
Tiernan said on his podcast that in the Programme for Government, “Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael said we will deliver on 0.7% and they haven’t”, adding they are only giving 0.37%.
“This doesn’t have to be this way,” said Tiernan, who called on people to make their voices heard ahead of next week’s Budget.
People are rightly speaking out about the cost-of-living crisis, said Tiernan, but he said people living in the Horn of Africa have “an edge of death crisis”.
When Tiernan’s comments were put to Coveney by The Journal in New York, where Coveney is attending a number of key UN events, he said:
“In terms of international hunger, malnutrition, the kind of things that Tommy Tiernan and others have rightly been talking about, just to say this week alone, Ireland will be announcing significant increases in funding to two very important initiatives,” he said.
“I hear the point in relation to 0.7%. All I can say is that since I took over the privilege of being Minister of Foreign Affairs, we have seen hundreds of millions of Euros extra spent on overseas aid. By the middle of next week, when the budget is announced, we’ll see another big increase next week.
“Ireland will have effectively moved from spending about €700 million euros to spending about €1.2 billion euros a year on overseas development aid,” he added.
Targets
The Programme for Government does commit to making annual, sustainable progress, and “ultimately achieving the UN target of 0.7% of Gross National Income by 2030.
“We will set a monetary expenditure floor on the basis of 2019, to be calculated over a rolling current three-year average,” the document reads.
“The commitment of 0.7% is still there,” Coveney said today, adding:
It’s a commitment to get to that by 2030. And we’ll try and make the contribution towards moving in that direction next week, but I can assure you, the increased contribution in real terms to overseas development aid next week will not be insignificant. In fact, it’s a very large sum.
Speaking about the two funding initiatives Ireland is involved in at the UN this week, Coveney said Ireland will increase its funding by 30% to the Global Fund, which is about responding to AIDS, Malaria and TB.
“That’s €65 million over the next three years,” said Coveney.
Ireland will also be announcing its participation in a new fund, which has been set up by UNICEF, to protect children that are being impacted by famine and malnutrition, said the minister.
Minister Simon Coveney at a USAID/UNICEF event hosted by Ambassador Samantha Power, administrator of USAID.
— Christina Finn (@christinafinn8) September 21, 2022
Coveney due to announce a significant new donation of €50 million over the next three years from Ireland. More on the funding here: https://t.co/iRSk2h7PfL pic.twitter.com/yYGIcgtDjo
“We will be committing €50 million of new money over the next three years to that UNICEF fund for the malnutrition of children, which is about getting important food directly to children who need it, who otherwise may starve,” said Coveney, stating that Ireland has been working with Samantha Power, the administer of USAID, on the plan.
“Just to give you a sense of it, the USAID are putting a big chunk of money into this, but they’ve asked for international contributions of €250 million, Ireland is contributing €50 million. So just to give you a sense of just how big a part we’re playing in those international efforts, about 20% of the fund is coming from Ireland.”
Despite all the challenges that Ireland has faced the last number of years, from Brexit to Covid, to the cost-of-living crisis, the Irish Government is still increasing its overseas development budgets by very significant sums, said the minister.
Donations to the urgent appeal Tiernan launched last week can be made through www.IrishEmergencyAlliance.org
Christina will be reporting from the UN throughout the week. You can follow her updates on Twitter @christinafinn8
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Sorry but do we have to suspend our intelligence with every headline? Pensioners are told we have to balance our budget but foreign aid doesn’t have to balance? That simply doesn’t compute on any level. Computer says no. Cut foreign aid and pay pensioners who have paid into the system.
@Owen: these are some of the poorest people in the world, some of whom are at risk of starving to death abd you want us to cut our funding to them? Says a lot about you and the people liking your comment.
@DK: sad, but they’re never far away…. The whataboutery people.. The same whatabouts wouldn’t offer a hungry person a morcel of food, they would just continue with the whataboutery, cross the street and walk away
@JG: say what you, I stopped reading when I came to Trocaire. How much money goes the CEO and other staff, before one hungry person sees a grain of rice. Why anyone would want to support these organisations is beyond me. Has to be better ways of distributing this aid.
A good start would be to stop funneling millions to anti democratic regimes who use it to fund terrorist attacks on their own people and their neighbour’s civilians.
@Stephen Kearon: Or when FF was in government donating money to a country who bought fighter jets, Also just happened to happen while on Irish company was looking for a licence for exploration and a FF member was a share holder in same company.
@Stephen Kearon: do you have any specific examples of this?????
Fairplay to you Tommy, a sometimes unpopular stance to take in the eyes of your audience I’m sure.
Even though mightn’t seem like it for the average Joe, we’re a rich country and we should be meeting UN aid targets considering how much of our national wealth is due to dubious tax treatment of multinational corporations.
10 years ago corporation tax take was €4b per annum, now it’s €20b
@Stephen Kearon: and yet, we’re still playing coy with the international community over a 15% minimum corporation tax agreement that would benefit the world, because we’d lose our special Irish brand of bending over to suit big corporate (even criminals and warmongers), as long as we get their valued business.
@: @: we are a poor country according to the other headline in the news, we can’t afford pensioners. So which is it, please let us know.
@: Sure he’s working for Trocaire, were they the ones who donated a private jet to a leader, so as to be able to go into his country to garner more sympathy for more funds, to the board of that organization.
@: Why have Organizations looking for money, to help other countries who don’t have democratic standards, something wrong with that method. Those same countries with food problems have no problem having a modern Army. By organizations looking after their poor Hungry people, these organizations are contributing to or allowing despotic rulers build up their own armed militia, mostly consisting of their own clan members. Charitable organizations are used as a cover, to allow these despotic rulers abuse outside charities to come in and provide for a section of people they don’t care about. Allowing the elite get richer , and the charities get wealthier, it’s a win, win, situation.
Jesus Tommy. Get a grip. 50,000 Ukrainians in the house and Irish people can’t get houses.
Stick to the funnies Tommy.
@Tony Shaw: He’s no better at that FFS?
So if 25 of the millionaires gave a milion each, we could use the money at home for the old and disabled, just a thought
@Ian James Burgess: Charity begins at …..
@ÓDuibhír Abú: This is not charity. It’s justice.
Ireland has a National Famine Commemoration Day held on the 3rd Sunday in May inaugurated in 2008 15 An Gorta Mor Commemorations held to date. 2022 the government excluded the people from the Commemoration held in Strokestown no reason giving for the exclusion of the public. The National Famine Commemoration Day is unique in the world as Ireland is the only country in the world that has a commemoration to Famine and starvation in any Nation’s calendar. Ireland has a annual platform to highlight global Famine and hunger when we remember over a million innocent victim’s who perished in the year’s of Ireland’s Great Hunger 1845-1853 and two million exile’s.
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