NGOS URGE ADB TO SPEED UP POVERTY ERADICATION PROGRAM

Denpasar, Bali Province, May 2 (ANTARA) - At least three NGOs, namely the Global Union (UNI), the Public Service International (PSI) and Building and Wood Workers' International (BWI), have urged the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to improve financial infrastructures meant to reduce poverty and unemployment.

"It's impossible to reduce the unemployment and poverty rates if the ADB remains a conventional financial architect, which hunts profit through the free market mechanism," Dr Kun Wardana, director of TelkomSector 's Asia Pacific Unit, said after attending a press meeting with ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda here on Saturday.

The labor unions in their joint press statement said public investment is the most important part of all strategies for economic recovery.

Increased public investment must be able to create jobs, reconstruct public service infrastructures including the fields of sanitation, health, education, energy and public transportation.

They also urged the ADB to revise its 2020 Strategy which over emphasized on the private sector as a machine of growth.

Workers must be protected from greedy lenders and regarded as a basic social policy of ADB, they said.

They also suggested that ADB should set up a labor desk in the ADB headquarters.

ADB is holding its 42nd Annual Meeting at Nusa Dua, Bali, May 2-5, which is scheduled to be officially opened by President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. The meeting is being participated in by around 3,500 representatives of 67 countries.

Earlier ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda said ADB was to make US$3 billion in funds available to help developing member countries (DMCs) cope with the impact of the global economic crisis in 2009-2010.

"We hereby announce that the ADB's Board of Directors has approved the establishment of the Countercyclical Support Facility (CSF) with funds amounting to US$3 billion," ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda said at a press conference here on Saturday.

He said the CSF would provide short-term loans faster and cheaper than under ADB's existing special program loan (SPL) facilities.

"I believe this will be a very welcome initiative to assist faltering economies and, most importantly, protect the poor from the worst impact of the crisis," Kuroda told journalists.