NEW YORK, March 19: Pakistan believes that the developing countries should not get used to living on the dole, and that aid should be directed to those countries who learn to help themselves, finance minister Shaukat Aziz said here in an interview.

Aziz, who left New York for Monterrey (Mexico) on Sunday to attend the global conference on finance and development, stressed that the gap between the rich and the poor was expanding rather than reducing which had serious implications and asked the developed world to increase the quantum of aid to the developing countries.

However, he underscored: “We believe that throwing money in the bottomless pit is not good for the donors or the recipients.”

“Money should only be given when the countries show seriousness about reforms, show good governance and transparency and there is no element of corruption in how the money is spent,” Aziz said.

Aziz, who will represent Pakistan at the Monterrey summit which will be attended by 60 heads of state and 300 ministers, said while the quantum of aid should be increased the terms should be made softer.

“Pakistan’s view is that poverty should be looked at holistically. Poverty is not just income poverty; lack of health facility is poverty, lack of education and social services is poverty, lack of access to justice is poverty, and lack of the ability of the people to reflect their views and have their input into how the government functions is poverty,” he said.

Speaking about the Official Development Assistance (ODA) which will be the main focus of attention at the conference, Aziz said, “if you look at the trends at ODA they are coming down. There was a consensus between various countries that 0.7 per cent of GDP of the developed world will be given as aid but so far only five Scandinavian countries are meeting that target. The contribution of rest of the world including the US is low.” The developed countries must increase their aid and they need to target the countries which have poverty as a major issue, he said.

ROLE OF MULTILATERAL INSTITUTIONS: Aziz said it was time “to re-look” at the role of the multilateral institutions like the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, UNDP.