Richard Lamm Quotes

Energetic action on debt would make a radical difference to the prospects of many of the poorest countries in the world, at no practical cost to creditor countries.

I mean, the world has already done a big, big effort to forget debt to countries heavily indebted and with low income. And that has given good chances to countries to get out of poverty.

One of the things that Africa needs, everybody seems to agree, is some measure of debt relief.

Many developing nations have such severe debt and budget problems that the money given by developed nations will never be spent the way it is intended.

Let us, above all, be clear that, without a convincing program of debt relief to start the new millennium, our objective of halving world poverty by 2015 will be only a pipe dream.

People from the world's richest countries should be prepared to accept the burden of debt reduction for heavily indebted poor countries, and should urge their leaders to fulfill the pledges made to reduce world poverty, especially in Africa, by the year 2015.

What we ask of the developed countries is to let the Third World find a third way.

I have dedicated many years to economic study, up to the Ph.D. level, to analyze and understand the inherent weaknesses of aid and why aid policies have consistently failed to deliver on economic growth and poverty alleviation.

Foreign aid might be defined as a transfer from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries

Debt relief without the opening of markets will not relieve third world countries from their poverty.

The call for debt cancellation is welcome, but debt does not just go away.

The question before the advanced nations is not whether they can afford to help the developing nations, but whether they can afford not to do so.

As someone from a developing country, I have a problem with rich countries thinking they can tell us anything, simply because they are giving money.

We're going to have to forgive a great deal of the Soviet era debt. There's no question about that. Let's face up to that. We're going to have to put in money if Russia is really going to consolidate a democracy.

Toward the middle and end of the Fifties, West European countries became somewhat more important as providers of aid to underdeveloped countries. It was partly due to the prodding of the United States that these countries, as they regained economic viability, should shoulder their share of the aid burden.

Germany, Japan and, to a lesser extent, Britain and Italy, were lifted out of the debris of war by the Americans who poured in billions of dollars and forgave other billions in debts.

Global poverty is falling faster today than at any time in human history.

We seek to move from aid to trade.

All over the globe the U.S. is fighting to protect and develop at least a minority who consume what the U.S. majority can afford.

The developing world is poor. It needs capital.

The only remedy for Mexico's poverty which has appealed to our politicians has been to contract foreign loans, which have never been paid, and to invite foreign capital to invest in Mexico.

The only really effective means of enabling States to deal with the grave problem of poverty is to provide them with the necessary resources through foreign financial aid - public and private - granted under reasonable conditions, within the framework of international commercial relations regulated with fairness.

What is gained by debt relief and aid can be lost if we don't get a proper trade agreement in Hong Kong.

Foreign Aid is like opium. There are withdrawal pains if you remove it.

We don’t have to send in troops; we can just call in loans.