Dina Ezzat talks to the woman who is trying to get the Arab world to focus on development matters -- urgently The first-ever Arab Development Summit might still be a year away. However, preparations are already underway for the convocations of this atypical Arab gathering that will steer clear from the controversial, and often dividing, political issues and dedicate full attention to matters of socio-economic development. In her capacity as the Arab Development Summit Coordinator is in charge of streamlining these preparations to make sure that the target is not overshadowed -- or for that matter over-ridden -- by the many unending political ailments that the Arab world is always consumed with. As far as El-Talawi is concerned, all political issues, even those with direct impact on development matters, are to be left for the attention of the annual Arab summit that convenes in March. "The focus that Arab countries need to collectively accord to the development is what this [new] summit will give all its energy to. The cause of development in [and across] the Arab world cannot be put on hold for longer [while] awaiting an answer to every political problem," she said. Even the occupation of Arab territories, which is admittedly a serious development handicap, will not be precisely put as an item on the agenda -- on the basis that is addressed in the annual Arab summit. "But we are going to take the Arab [territories/countries] suffering from occupation into concern and we are going to design for them special development programme that should help them overcome the consequences of this occupation," El-Talawi said. Addressing development and economy issues, El-Talawi argued at her Arab League headquarters office, is as a priority as addressing political matters. Indeed, she argued, socio-economic development is strictly a matter of security for the entire Arab world. "Arab countries are becoming increasingly aware [especially during the past few years] that they cannot overlook collective coordination. It is an imperative for their collective interests -- irrespective of their many political differences and for that matter irrespective of the wide economic and technological gap that separate some of these countries." And it is the front of socio-economic coordination, El-Talawi argued, where Arabs can establish solid collective coordination. "We are not inventing the wheel with this Development Summit. The approach of coordinating development plans have been successfully pursued in other regional groupings in many parts of the developing and developed worlds," El-Talawi said with an eye on the successful examples of ASEAN, a Southeast Asia economic grouping, and MERCOSUR, a similar South America grouping. "Obviously, we are not there yet but we are becoming increasingly keen on and capable of getting there," El-Talawi said, with reference to limited but sustainable Arab economic success stories such as the enlarged Arab Free Trade Area that combines 17 out of the 22 Arab states and the sub-regional groupings such as the Gulf Cooperation Council and the Maghreb Union. The decision to pursue a collective development agenda with a vision for a future where Arab states should enjoy sufficient prosperity does not overlook that there are ultimate development and economic gaps that would continue to separate countries like Somalia and Djibouti from countries like the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. However, as El-Talawi insists, this decision is based on the very obvious fact that it is the collective regional development that can offer the sufficient security required for the sustainability of prosperity of countries like the United Arab Emirates. It is through the entwinement of development efforts with the political reconciliation schemes that a country like Somalia reaches a much elusive stability after decades of civil war, El-Talawi argued. "Such stability could certainly offer wider chances for economic development for all the countries of the region." It was during the Riyadh Arab League Summit last March that Arab leaders adopted a resolution to hold the first Arab Development Summit. According to the resolution of the Arab leaders, the Development Summit should address the development concerns of the entire Arab world from "a holistic perspective". According to Arab diplomats who drafted the resolution, the richer Arab countries are now parting ways from the traditional perspective of locking themselves away from the poor Arab countries. It has become clear to all, these diplomats add, that being a rich country in a poor neighbourhood does not necessarily serve the interest of the rich. So while the rich Arab countries, mostly oil producing states, would be working on diversifying their economies to secure a sustainable level of GDP beyond the insecure oil booms, they would also be trying to contribute to the development of poorer Arab states, to make sure that cross Arab migration is conducted in line with the interests of the labour importing states, mostly in the Gulf area. Meanwhile, the works of the Development Summit and the resolution specified should provide concrete plans of action to be pursued jointly by both the governments and the civil society. "For us, it is clear that the achievement of development for our countries would require the complementarity of state and civil society efforts. Both will have to work together for the interest of the development of their societies," El-Talawi said. She added, and in the same line of complementarity, the rich and poor Arab countries should serve the purpose of collective regional development. Indeed, when Egypt and Kuwait jointly proposed to the Arab leaders meeting in Riyadh last year the convocation of the Development Summit, they were hoping that such a high level meeting would help address a combination of problems that affect a high GDP country like the United Arab Emirates that enjoys a favourable ranking on the world's list of competitiveness and those that affect countries with serious economic difficulties like Somalia that has been practically disintegrating into smaller entities. "There are certainly some common challenges, especially in relation to the limited scope of inter- Arab trade that stands at a limited eight to 10 per cent of the total Arab trade," El-Talawi said. She admitted that this is practically a very disappointing figure compared to the close to 65 per cent of inter-European trade, the over 30 per cent in the case of Asian states and the over 20 per cent for countries of South America. "Improving this figure is a real challenge that all Arab countries rich and poor will have to work together for. And this is one of the issues that the first Arab Development Summit is going to focus on," El-Talawi said. To address this all Arab countries would need to pull human and financial resources to make sure that they are better linked through international roads and adequate railways. They would also need to make sure that very humble trade harbours at some of the Arab coasts would need to be developed so as to match with the capacity and performance of the seven-star trade ports already existing in some Arab countries. Meanwhile, the Development Summit would need to address obvious files related to levels of poverty, unemployment, illiteracy and access to the requirements of the Knowledge Society. The Development Summit is also designed to address some of the basic development handicaps that the UNDP Human Development Reports dissected during the past four years in a series of consecutive reports including the generally un- stimulating systems and poor quality of education which undermines the Arab countries' intellectual capital, the mostly un-sophisticated and gender insensitive health care systems and indeed lack of equity among women and men in almost all Arab societies. As for issues related to good governance, freedoms, democracy and human rights -- which are all indicated by the same reports as missing or insufficiently available pre-requisites for human development, El-Talawi is not willing to comment much beyond referring to what she qualifies as a keen Arab will to move forward on these fronts in accordance with the priorities set by every society. "When we get to the summit we will not be getting into a process of qualifying the status of development in the Arab world and identifying the challenges. This has been already done for years," El-Talawi said. "What we will be doing is adopting programmes of action that will address specific areas on agreed upon socio-economic priorities," she added. According to the coordinator of the Arab Development Summit the convocation of this event would not be one-off. Rather the opposite, follow up meetings and mechanisms would be pursued. During the coming months, El-Talawi should be holding extensive meetings with members of the Arab League Economic and Social Council. She should also be meeting with development experts and field workers as well as businessmen from across the Arab world. This exercise is meant to decide the agenda of the Arab Development Summit that is expected to convene in Kuwait in the autumn of next year.
