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US
warns Asian Development Bank it risks becoming ‘irrelevant’
MADRID, (AFP) - The United States,
the Asian Development Bank’s second-biggest donor, warned
the institution on Tuesday it risked becoming irrelevant if
it fails to adapt to the region’s rapid economic expansion.
“It’s important for the ADB to stick to its overall
mission, but at the same time it’s important for it to
realise that it’s an institution that needs to be almost
continuously evolving,” said US Assistant Secretary for
International Affairs Clay Lowery.
“If it fails to evolve it’s going to become irrelevant,”
said Lowery, who is heading the US delegation at the bank’s
board of governors meeting in Madrid.
“Our view is that the ADB is doing a pretty good job
and it can do an even better job going forward, but it is
going to have to evolve with the times,” he told a news
conference.
The United States is the second-biggest donor to the ADB after
Japan, and the two countries are jointly the largest shareholders.
In a statement to the board of governors meeting on Monday,
Lowery called on the ADB to make “institutional reforms,”
including steps to end what the US sees as a bias toward nationality
over merit in its hiring practices.
He also urged it to “adapt to changes” in middle-income
countries, referring to India and China.
“As time progesses and China becomes even wealthier,
I think the ADB needs to figure out how it changes its products,
how does it work in a different way with China,” Lowery
said Tuesday.
The ADB is facing an internal row over its role and relevance
in a region that has been transformed since the bank was founded
42 years ago to help developing Asian economies fight absolute
poverty.
Washington also opposed the ADB’s “Strategy 2020”
long-term plan, which was approved by the bank’s board
this month.
“We worked with the management and other shareholders
to try to get a strategy document that we were comfortable
with, but we just never got there and so we voted our conscience,”
said Lowery.
“This is a financial institution, and financial institutions
can put together strategic documents, but we usually want
to see what are the resources that you are allocating against
that strategy, what are the different types of scenarios that
you are looking at in terms of lending volumes, in terms of
operational products and how do they evolve over time.
“In this case the management did not really do that,”
he said.
ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda said on Monday the “Strategy
2020” envisages a region “free of poverty”
through “inclusive growth, environmentally sustainable
growth and regional integration.”
“We at the ADB have set the stage for powerful change
in the way we serve our developing member countries,”
he said in an inaugural speech to the board of governors.
The bank’s long-term strategy has been largely overshadowed
at the meeting by concerns over soaring food prices in the
region.
Based in Manila, the ADB is owned by its 67 member countries
-- 48 from the Asia-Pacific region, and 19 from elsewhere
around the world.
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