Cooperation days

 Good morning colleagues here in Brussels and in Delegations

My name Is Juan Garay, I am now Head of cooperation in Cuba.s

I want to kindly challenge addressing inequalities with the impossible goal of equality, for instance failed in Cuba, and propose the focus on equity :

Before I joined the EU twenty years ago, I was a rural doctor in Africa and a lecturer in Global Health.

Fifteen years ago I coordinated the health team in DG DEV and the thereafter work towards the communication and council conclusions on global health, which advocated for health equity.

Soon after, and escaping the DEVCO merger which disregarded the expertise of many colleagues, I went on with the EU Fellowship programme to do research and teaching on health and equity in UC Berkeley.

Ever since I combined my work in HQs and last ten years I  Delegations (Mexico and Cuba) with academic work on equity.

I'll

Let me summarize in 5 minutes,  5 premises and 5 conclussions of my research of ten years :

1- Equity is the ethical distribution of equality. A shared goal which is feasible becomes an ethical must.

2- Wellbeing and health -physical and psychosocial- are common aspirations accross cultures. The shared objectivel on global health by all countries, from 1947 in the constitution of the World Health Organization- is the "best feasible health for all".

3- Life expectancy is the best indicator of human wellbeing and the best levels are feasible when economically replicable if GDP is below average and ecologicalky sustainable by respecting planetaryppp boundaries as carbon  and ecological footprint per capita.

4- This method allows the identification of replicable and sustainable development models, the setting of dignity thresholds (vs. poverty) enabling best feasible levels of health for all people and the estimation of the burden of health inequity by regions and population groups.

5- Equity metrics allopw the setting of levels of territorial and fiscal redistribution required for the mentioned ethical goal.

The conclusions of the pinternational analysis of equity are revealing :

1- Our EU development model is economically non replicable and ecologically non sustainable. We need to be humble, learn from others and progress to lifestyles with lower levels of consumption and global trade if we want to be carbon neutral, including carbon border assessments.

2- The international burden of health inequity, around one third of all deaths, 16 million annually at present, has remained rather stable since the 80s, the dignity threholdenabling best feasible health is 10 times higher than the international poverty threshold and requires a scale of global redistribution of resources 30 times above the ODA levels.

3- The subnational identification of regions that have economically replicable and ecological sustainable levels of wellbeing, allows the setting of thresholds, measure of burden and guidance of levels of fiscal equity and territorial cohesion enabling social and economic rights.

4- While we as EU move to a replicable and sustainable model we have, even if with room for improvement,  the highest regional level of life expectancy and wellbeing, the lowest regional levels of inequality measured by GINI, the highest levels of fiscal equity and of territorial cohesion. This is what really makes the EU a reference in the world, and what I believe is our main added value, our social model which combines regulated markets with socioeconomic equity and social protection.

5- I am passionate about the ethical principle of equity, the power of equity metrics and the potential to apply it internally in EU policies and in our dialogue and  cooperation with all other countries.

Based on this methodology I have prepared international equity profiles of each country and shared with all Heads of Cooperation hoping it may help your challenging work.

I am happy to continue to contribute through this work with colleagues in Brussels and  in Delegations interested AMD committed un the ethical primciple of Equity.