1) The Special Session must reconfirm the primary responsibility of governments for implementing the Action Programme. The main consideration is ownership: countries must be able to steer their own development. The focus of Dutch development policy has shifted in recent years, to give precedence to the concept of ownership. It is no longer a matter of how we think other countries should develop, but how they see it themselves. The consensus reached at Copenhagen – and at the other major UN conferences in the 1990s – forms the shared basis on which development cooperation is grounded. Aid should support – and thus be tailored to – recipient countries’ own national policies.

This implies far more than donor coordination. It requires a much broader development strategy, which embraces the entire range of instruments a country deploys in pursuit of development. In this context, the Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) currently being promoted by the World Bank merit the full support of the Special Session. The World Bank and other donors must beware of the old reflex response that they have a monopoly on wisdom and that it is up to them to explain to recipient countries what they should do and how. The recipients should play the leading role in coordinating activities and in drafting PRSPs.

2) Every development process must be founded on a sound system of basic social services. Reproductive and regular healthcare, nutrition, drinking water and sanitation, and basic education provide a solid foundation for societies and make them more resilient in times of crisis. Copenhagen underscored the importance of this and set concrete aims for the year 2015, including a substantial reduction in child and infant mortality, and universal access to reproductive healthcare and basic education.

The Special Session must go a step further than just reconfirming these targets. 2015 may sound a lot closer now than it did last year, but it is still way beyond the horizon of day-to-day politics. It is a long road, and there must be benchmarks that enable us to see whether we are on course or if we need to change our direction. That requires planning, clear criteria, financial support and, above all, the capacity to measure results.

We have an expression in Dutch, meten is weten, which roughly translated means ‘to measure is to know’. But measurement requires accurate instruments. I see the UN playing a leading role in the development of these instruments, together with the World Bank and bilateral donors. What we need is a coherent set of generally accepted indicators, which make social development visible and comparable. To this end, the ‘measuring’ capacity of national governments should also be strengthened.

Jointly with the World Bank and the UNDP, the OECD/DAC has taken the first steps towards drawing up relevant indicators and building up the required measuring capacity in developing countries. The UN should also embrace this initiative, known as PARIS21. The Netherlands will, in any case, devote greater attention in its own development policy to building up statistical capacity in developing countries.

In addition, I would urge the international community to work out a more permanent system of monitoring and evaluation. This could include the submission of regular national reports, similar to those that have been drafted for the Special Session reviewing the implementation of ‘Copenhagen’. The UN Statistical Commission could play a role in this.

3) There needs to be further elaboration, within the UN context, of principles of social policy – and development of best practices and lessons learned in implementing these principles. They could serve to support UN member states in pursuing social and economic policies aimed at sustainable development. The World Bank has taken initial steps in this direction. It is now up to the UN to achieve global agreement. It is not, as some fear, a matter of creating new conditionalities, but of distilling new principles from existing agreements, which are of use in policy formulation. We need to agree on these principles, so that we all speak the same language when drawing up and working out development strategies.

4) Sustainable development will be unattainable as long as women remain in an inferior position and suffer disproportionately from poverty. Special attention must be given to the position of women in development strategies, particularly in social policy and in the decision-making procedures that relate to it. Education and healthcare (especially reproductive healthcare) for women and girls should be given priority.

The aims set in Copenhagen must be pursued with renewed vigour: gender equality in education by 2005, reproductive healthcare for everyone and a significant fall in maternal and infant mortality by 2015. The review of the World Social Summit must, therefore, also take account of the results of the Special Session reviewing the Fourth World Conference on Women, to be held just before it. Dutch development policy already devotes ample attention to the position of women. The two reviews can enrich this policy further.

5) Although governments bear primary responsibility for creating an enabling environment for sustainable development, the social development of individuals and groups should, as far as possible, be informed by the guiding principle of ownership. An indispensable factor in this is the participation of civil society (particularly NGOs and the social partners). NGOs have a leading role to play, as critical partners in the policy-making process, as catalysts for the transfer of specific knowledge, and as implementing agents of government policy.

In a democratic society, the support base for policy – in itself a component of ownership – is greater, and therefore the impact of that policy will also be greater. In this age of simultaneous globalisation and decentralisation throughout the world, the need to involve stakeholders has increased. The Jubilee 2000 Coalition for debt relief proves that NGOs can make their presence felt at international level. The Special Session should confirm this role.

Participation of the private sector and the trend towards social responsibility of business are also relevant within this context. The UN Under Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs has called for negotiations on international guidelines relating to this issue, within the framework of the Commission for Social Development, to be completed by 2002. The ILO and the OECD are working along similar lines. A commitment to social development from the private sector could only help to expedite progress. Fundamental standards for work and trade are indispensable in a just society, in which reduced inequality yields benefits for all. The Special Session should also endorse this aim.

6) If, however, there is nothing to distribute, it cannot be distributed fairly. Without macroeconomic support, the poorest countries cannot learn to stand on their own feet. Too many developing countries are still weighed down by the yoke of debt. The Special Session must make a strong appeal to member states to support the HIPC initiative, under which the rich countries agree to cancel the debts of the poorest countries if they use the money to reduce poverty.

This initiative is a best practice in social development: it benefits all actors, while leaving the poor countries a certain degree of freedom and ownership regarding the precise steps they take to reduce poverty. Debt relief is a precondition for finding structural solutions for poverty eradication. That is why the Netherlands has been a fervent advocate of the HIPC initiative and remains a committed participant. I would like to emphasise, however, that debt relief must be accompanied by improved access to the global market. If developing countries cannot sell their products, debt cancellation is just a drop in the ocean and poverty reduction will never get off the ground.