I am grateful to you, Mrs Moon, for giving me the opportunity to speak. I will keep my remarks brief. First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Jeremy Lefroy), who has over a number of years shown great passion, commitment and dedication to international development, and brings a huge experience and knowledge to this place. I have known him for a number of years. We have been to Rwanda, Burundi and Sierra Leone for Project Umubano, and I can vouch for his commitment to international development and in particular to entrepreneurship, livelihoods and jobs. This is a timely debate, following the debate in this Chamber earlier this week about the 0.7% target and the report on the implementation of the SDGs from the International Development Select Committee, of which I am a member.
I will keep my remarks to one simple fact: if we truly are committed to the 0.7% target, which I believe we are, and to the sustainable development goals, the way to move beyond aid and to move countries away from a dependency on humanitarian aid, with which I fundamentally agree, is through encouraging sustainable development and economic development. That means giving people a life chance, whether it is in our country or abroad. As the hon. Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans) said, if we teach a man a fish, he will feed several people. We must give people an education, which they need if they are to get on in life, just as they need to be able to earn incomes to look after themselves and their families.
DFID has a very good reputation for supporting many business projects. I have seen some of them, in particular in Nigeria. We need to keep our focus on enterprise and entrepreneurship. We need to keep women involved in this agenda as well, and above all, we need to recognise the value that business and enterprise can bring.
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