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ADB, SEAMEO Sign Education Agreement

Manila, Philippines. ADB and the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO) signed on 25 June a memorandum of understanding to improve cooperation on education issues for the benefit of common member countries.

Exchanging the signed agreement at ADB headquarters in Manila were ADB President Tadao Chino (left) and Edilberto de Jesus (right), President of the SEAMEO Council and Education Secretary of the Philippines. The ceremony was attended by senior officials of ADB and SEAMEO.

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ADB and WHO Sign Agreement on SARS

Manila, Philippines. ADB President Tadao Chino formally signed on 18 June 2003 a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the World Health Organization (WHO) to cooperate in the fight against the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and other emerging diseases. At the same time, ADB said it was focusing on longer-term issues of the outbreak.

The MOU, which had earlier been signed by Dr. Gro Brundtland, Director-General of the Geneva-based WHO, formalized a partnership that was formed soon after the SARS outbreak, with ADB providing finance and WHO the technical expertise.

Meanwhile, with WHO reporting that SARS is on the wane in Asia and other parts of the world, ADB is “concentrating assistance on the longer-term issues of surveillance and prevention, both to prevent a flare-up of SARS and to be better prepared against similar epidemics in the future,” said Geert H.P.B. van der Linden, Special Advisor to the ADB President, who is coordinating ADB’s anti-SARS efforts.

ADB has already fully allocated its emergency support to fight the outbreak. In response to proposals received to enhance surveillance and infection control, ADB said it will support programs in 14 countries: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Fiji Islands, Indonesia, Kyrgyz Republic, Lao PDR, Nepal, Mongolia, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, and Viet Nam.

In addition, ADB will support a regional proposal for Pacific countries from the Secretariat of the Pacific Community.

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Infrastructure and Growth Key to Reducing Poverty in GMS

Washington, DC, United States. With 50 million or more poor living in the Greater Mekong subregion (GMS), poverty reduction is still the key challenge facing the cooperation initiative, a senior ADB official told an ADB-sponsored economic conference on the GMS in Washington, DC, on 26 June.

Finding the right mix of essential growth-supporting interventions and those that directly target the poor is thus essential to tackling poverty in the subregion, said Rajat Nag, Director General of ADB’s Mekong Department.

“Both infrastructure development and economic growth are essential for poverty reduction,” Mr. Nag told the ADB-sponsored 2003 Conference on Economic Cooperation and Opportunities in the Greater Mekong Subregion.

“Geographically, attention would need to be paid to lagging regions within the Mekong countries, in which many poor people live. Disparities in income and opportunities between these remote places and urban centers are stark.”

The conference, which was held at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington, DC, was hosted jointly with Foreign Policy magazine.

It focused on economic opportunities created after a decade of cooperation among the six countries that share the Mekong River—Cambodia, People’s Republic of China (Yunnan Province), Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar, Thailand and Viet Nam—with ADB assistance.

Mr. Nag said that as growth has been the primary driving force for poverty reduction in the GMS, a critical question is what needs to be done to support markets and growth?

“First, the GMS needs to develop domestic financial systems that will provide the incentives and security needed to encourage higher levels of saving, and their efficient use,” he said. “Second, within the subregion, there still exists a constellation of legal, administrative, and institutional obstacles to the efficient functioning of the markets.”

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