(WATCH) A Message from Douglas Alexander

Douglas Alexander, the United Kingdom’s Secretary of State for International Development, was in New York City today to deliver an address regarding the relationship between conflict, fragility and international development.

He also taped a short message on the importance of ONE and other global poverty organizations around the world and spoke powerfully about why international aid is even more critical in the face of the global economic downturn.

From the speech:

[In 2000] 187 global leaders gathered to make a solemn pledge to the World’s Poorest People. The leaders gathered that day agreed to eight goals - on health, on education, on poverty and hunger - to help the poorest people in the world to achieve a better life by the year 2015. And since that time real progress has been made:

• 300 million people have been lifted out of poverty;
• 40 million more children are in education;
• the number of people on antiretroviral treatment has risen from just 100,000 in 2000 to some three million today
• 500 million more children have been vaccinated against killer diseases.

But these gains are today under threat from economic crisis and enduring conflict. Just last month the G20 gathered in London to reaffirm their commitment to tackling poverty and getting the global economy moving. And I have just come from the Spring Meetings of the World Bank and the IMF in Washington where donor countries agreed action to try to stop that crisis becoming a calamity.

The early years of this century have shown us that only by strengthening a government’s capacity to govern and helping to build strong and effective states can we overcome the challenges faced by those countries suffering from conflict and violence.

This is our opportunity. That is our responsibility. And working together it can be our achievement.

For the entire text, click here.

-Christopher Geer, Field Organizer