Brown's Marshall plan for world poor

[illbill]

http://www.realopinion.com/realboards/showthread.php?t=1360


<snip>Gordon Brown launched Britain's campaign for a Marshall plan for Africa yesterday when he called on the international community to harness the "passion of compassion" generated by the Asian tsunami disaster to make 2005 a breakthrough year for the world's poorest continent.

Unveiling the government's three-pronged plan for greater debt relief, more generous aid and better trade access, the chancellor said the global response to the tsunami disaster was an expression of the public's demand for action to tackle poverty.

"While 2004 was a year which ended in the horror of a natural disaster, 2005 is a year that can start with the hope of human progress," Mr Brown said in a lecture in Edinburgh, which conjured up the spirit of the postwar American plan to rebuild the shattered economies of Europe. "2005 is a year of challenge but also a year of opportunity when - from the foundation of hope - we can, I believe, see real change."

Mr Brown's launch of the year-long campaign coincided with a similar push from Tony Blair to harness the upsurge of public sympathy following the tsunami to a wider mission to tackle global poverty.

At his monthly Downing Street press conference, the prime minister warned that Africa suffers "the equivalent of a man-made, preventable tsunami every week". <snip