IHS & the Dutch Foundation KidsRights

IHS Director at the KidsRights Millenium Development Goals Conference

On Friday July 9, the Dutch foundation KidsRights organized the KidsRights Millenium Development Goals Conference in Johannesburg. Mr. Kees van Rooijen, Director of the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS) I was invited to give the presentation in which he has focused on the importance of foreign direct investments (FDI) and the correlations between the FDI and the level of human development. Hereby we presents you the Director's story on the meaningful event.

"On Friday July 9, the Dutch foundation KidsRights organized the KidsRights Millenium Development Goals Conference in Johannesburg. The purpose of this conference was to put the Millenium Goals, which have to be achieved by 2015, back on the top of the international agenda.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu and former President F.W. de Klerk jointly chaired the meeting and were speakers this day  as well.
Graca Machel-Mandela was invited to speak, together with representatives of the United Nations and the Food and Agriculture Organization. And so was I.
As the new director of the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS) I was asked to focus on Goal 8 about aid, debt relief and fair trade.

In 2000, the 189 countries that are part of the UN, agreed that the world’s major problems have to be tackled by 2015. The conference had been neatly timed at the end of the summit for political leaders organized by the South African president Zuma on July 7 and served as an opener to the UN-world summit in September on this topic.

"IHS is currently building a database of the major investments between firms worldwide in which the impact of Multinationals activity on urban development can be measured."

With the support of these famous South Africans Kids Rights wanted to take advantage of the special opportunities presented by the world cup of football and the presence of the global media to focus attention on the plight of children and on the steps that must be taken to ensure that they will benefit from the implementation of the UN Millenium Development Goals.

In my presentation I focused on the importance of  foreign direct investments which have taken over trade as the key driver of the global economy over the past 30 years. The great majority of these investments in the world are generated by multinationals and represent about 90% of trade and gross domestic product.
There are strong relationships or correlations between foreign direct investments and the level of human development (education, life expectancy and gross domestic product) .

At the IHS we are interested in understanding the relationship between corporate economic flows and international aid. IHS is currently building a database of the major investments between firms worldwide in which the impact of Multinationals activity on urban development can be measured.
Based on this knowledge, we are interested in how new corporate awareness, global engagement, policymaking and training programs can be developed that are complimentary to mainstream aid approaches and which encourage a more integrated, proactive relationship between firms, communities, NGO’s and local government. 

"...But the topic of the conference made me realize that where everyday again billions of people are suffering from diseases and poverty, losing a World Cup Soccer Final is not so bad after all."

I felt very privileged and honoured to be a speaker among those famous and influential people. And I was so lucky that I didn’t have to speak directly after the Archbishop. Because Desmond Tutu (and so is former president de Klerk) is such an enormous personality with an impressive performance that the speaker after him has definitely a challenge to get some attention.

And by the way, yes I made it to the finals in Soccer City and was very disappointed by the performance and result of my own dutch team. But the topic of the conference made me realize that where everyday again billions of people are suffering from diseases and poverty, losing a World Cup Soccer Final is not so bad after all."

Thursday, 29 July 2010