Canada’s Aid to Third World CountriesWhat are some of the major problems faced by “Third World” Countries today?Who should be held responsible for these problems? Why? What has Canada doneto help “Third World Countries”?There has always been a dominant country in the world that sets theeconomic standard throughout powerful countries. Canada has always been a toprated economic country, usually behind the United States and other largeCommonwealth countries. Starting back in the early to mid 60’s, Prime Ministerof Canada, Pierre Trudeau decided to use Canadian revenue as foreign aid.
Theseincluded “Third World”. Some of the major problems faced by “Third World” countries today includepoor towns which have had a lack of food sources due to the serious poverty,lack of clean drinking water, lack of good sanitation systems, lack of goodliving conditions, lack of jobs and there is no industry, therefore no import orexport revenue. The governments of the “Third World” countries have donehorrible jobs of creating good living conditions for their people and in allhave not tried to bring their country out of their economic slump. As Canada entered it second century, Prime Minister Trudeau called for acomplete review of Canada’s foreign policy. Starting in 1968 interestedCanadians including politicians, journalists, professors, business leaders,financial experts, as well as church and labour leaders were invited to offeropinions and advice in what was called the Trudeau Review. The ending of thismeeting brought about six foreign policy booklets which outlined the benefits ofCanadian foreign aid.
Some of these benefits included to help the Canadianeconomy grow stronger, to keep Canada independent, to work for peace andsecurity, to promote fairness and equality for everyone and to improve livingconditions for all people throughout the world. The Canadian foreign policy review suggested that Canada strengthened it’sties with Latin America. Trudeau visited Mexico, Cuba and Venezuela in 1976. Canada’s trade with Latin America increased from $1099 million in 1970 to $3418million in 1976.
Also Canada gave an increasing amount of development funds to anumber of Latin American countries. Canada, in 1973 had a major concern about the middle east and made aneffort to bring about a lasting peace to the Arab-Israeli conflict. 1050Canadian military specialists became part of the United Nations emergency forcewhere they tried to maintain a cease fire by providing supplies, transportationand communication during the 1973 peacekeeping role. The Trudeau foreign policy review recommended that Canada was to work hardto support the United Nations and make it an effective organization forinternational co-operation.
Canada contributed heavily, and still does so, toall the U. N organizations that are striving to help poor nations and are workingtoward the disarmament of nuclear weapons and human rights. Canada contributedthe ninth largest share of the regular annual budget to the United Nations. Another issue that faced Canada was the fact that China’s membership in theUnited Nations brought Canada into conflict with some other U. N members,especially the United States. Since 1966 Canada had said that it was becomingincreasingly more important that China be represented at the U.
N. At the time,the U. N only recognized the former government of China which was established onthe island of Taiwan. The Canadian government prides itself on sending foreign aid to developingcountries.
In the 1970’s there was an estimated 4. 2 billion people on the earth,more then 2. 5 billion of them were starving. It was also estimated that by theyear 2000 the starving population could double.
Canada tried very hard toprovide these needy “Third World” countries with the best possible aid. Without the help of Canada as well as other “First World” countries such asthe United States and Australia the “Third World” countries would not be aroundfor this long and would have absolutely no hope of survival.
