#23 - JRL 9061 - JRL Home
TO END POVERTY RUSSIA NEEDS REFORMS NOT AID

MOSCOW, February 14 (RIA Novosti) - Institutional reforms are much more important than overseas aid in Russia's fight against poverty, said Vladimir Mau, Rector of the Moscow-based National Economy Academy under the federal government. He was addressing a roundtable at the Strategic Research Center, which made a public introduction of the UN program Millennium Development Goals. It focuses on the value of human life and on efforts fighting poverty.

"We should not wait for international organizations to come and settle our own problems for us. That will be of no help in fighting poverty. Beneficial terms for private investment is what we need," he emphasized.

To meet that goal, Russia needs thorough judicial, administrative and military reforms. "Meanwhile, we have very weak arrangements for administering the law. Our political system is extremely weak, too," he said.

As for international organizations, "they are feeding us fish, but not teaching us how to catch them," Mr. Mau said.

"It is simpler to distribute ready money than to promote earning, and even the efficiency of money distribution leaves much to be desired," Mr. Mau stressed.

Present-day Russian life expectancy is ten years shorter than that of Cuba, other roundtable speakers pointed out. Russia is lagging behind many East European countries in the human resource development index.

The expert community has no ready prescriptions to offer how to make Russians' life longer, and where to invest capital to that end-there are too many urgent necessities: health services, education or traffic lights. An annual average of 40,000 Russians die in traffic accidents with their scarcity.

Russians are totally indifferent to their own life and health. That's a pressing national problem, said the experts, and quoted the Russian medical proverb: "Americans go to see the doctor two years before they fall ill, and we Russians two days before we die."