To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he has any plans to review the operation of the tropical forestry action plan; and if he will make a statement.

We have endorsed the strengthening and reform of the tropical forestry action plan—the TFAP—called for by the independent review of the plan commissioned by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation—the FAO. We are working to see reform implemented; a good start was made at the FAO's committee on forestry last month.

The plan has perhaps been a disappointment, although we recognise that it was set up in good faith and with good objectives. The right hon. Lady has been quoted as saying that she will not let up pressure to change it; will she tell us in which direction she would like the change to move? Does she agree that the local pressures for the exploitation of the forests can be abated only if, at the same time, we tackle the fundamental problems of poverty, trade and aid?

The local problems of forestry are uppermost in our minds. We seek to tackle sustainable development and the whole question of the poverty of those people living in the forest. As part of the reform we have urged strongly—and I have got my EC colleagues to do likewise—that the forest people should be involved in the plans for forestry. The review called for a greater priority for the tropical forestry action plan within the FAO. The TFAP covers 81 countries, and is far more than the FAO. We have asked for revised guidelines for clearer aims and objectives. We also asked, as did the review, for better collaboration among the co-financing organisations—the World Bank, the FAO and the World Resources Institute. We have asked for increased and more timely resources to strengthen tropical forestry countries' own ability in planning policy expertise and implementation. We now await the meeting in November of officials of the FAO to see those reforms implemented in full.

Are not there more ways than one of assisting the preservation of the tropical rain forest? Should not we be looking beyond merely this action plan to the bilateral work that Britain has been doing in assisting the Latin American countries in the Amazon basin in preserving their rain forests? Will my right hon. Friend commend the project that is now going ahead in Brazil?

I most certainly commend that project, and I hope to visit Brazil at the end of this month. Britain now has some 200 projects under way or in preparation at a cost to the aid programme of £160 million—56 of those are through non-governmental organisations concerned with the environment, and 40 are research programmes. There are many ways in which we can help the environment further and my hon. Friend will find them in "Environment and British aid programme" and chapter 4 of "This Common Inheritance".

What is the time scale for the reform, particularly as the position is extremely urgent—as the Minister knows—for Sarawak and Sabah and the rest of the islands of Borneo?

I hope that the reforms will be in place by early next year. As the hon. Gentleman knows, there is some concern—that I share—that the FAO has been resistant to the types of changes that are wanted by all the donor countries. Given that there was such unanimity in the committee on forestry which met in September in Rome—I have put it on the EC development committee's agenda for the beginning of November—I have some hope that we will see fast implementation and then implementation in national forestry programmes, which is what the hon. Gentleman wants.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what fresh measures he is proposing to assist developing countries to deal with environmental problems.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what fresh measures he is proposing to assist developing countries to deal with environmental problems.

We have launched initiatives to develop new bilateral projects and to promote new multilateral measures in relation to environmental concerns such as forestry, energy efficiency, biological diversity, the ozone layer, and climate change.

Our policies are set out in the White Paper on the environment and in the ODA booklet "The Environment and the British Aid Programme".

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the opportunity that many of us have recently had to visit countries in eastern Europe demonstrated to us the importance of developing countries assuming a capitalist economic system to meet their environmental imperatives, such as sustainable management of the rain forests? What support is her Department giving to the World Conservation Monitoring Centre in Cambridge and to its work in supporting our overall objectives?

We do indeed support the World Conservation Monitoring Centre. It is supplied jointly by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, the United Nations Environmental Programme, the World Wide Fund for Nature and ourselves. The centre has an important continuous function of collection, analysis, interpretation and dissemination of data, and we have involved it in our tropical managed areas assessment project. On our behalf, it is giving advice to the Government of India on conservation monitoring; it is preparing a manual on centres of plant diversity; it is involved in the biological diversity status report; and it is doing work on the conservation and management of biodiversity.

The centre is a thoroughly excellent organisation, supported not just by us but by worldwide organisations.

What assistance does the Minister propose to give to Cambodia, with its considerable environmental problems, which include landmines that are daily killing and maiming innocent people? Can she tell us whether British forces were in any way involved in training those who laid the mines, as some people allege; and what military and other expertise we can now give the Cambodian men, women and children to de-mine thousands of square miles of their country's land which are virtually unusable because they are unsafe?

That has nothing to do with the original question. The hon. Lady will find that I have answered today a question on Cambodia asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Broxtowe (Mr. Lester). We are indeed concerned, and we are giving additional help to the non-governmental organisations to help civil-war-displaced persons in Cambodia.

The question that the hon. Lady has asked has nothing to do with me and it contains no fact. It is purely part of her campaign to discredit honourable people, including a very honourable member of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office whom she attacked at the Labour party conference, who cannot answer for himself and about whom she and her hon. Friend the Member for Sunderland, South (Mr. Mullin) have made disgraceful allegations which are untrue.

rose—

Order.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on emergency relief aid expended under the United Kingdom's aid programme.

Providing immediate and effective humanitarian assistance is one of the key areas of the aid programme. Last year we spent more than £61 million in disaster relief, help for refugees and emergency food aid.

Does my right hon. Friend realise that her answer will be warmly welcomed, and that her warm-hearted response to the problems of these countries is supported by the vast majority of people of this country?

I thank my hon. Friend for his comments. The outlook in Ethiopia for next year is bleak. The FAO and US Agency for International Development crop assessment mission will give donors more detailed reports at the end of next month. Meanwhile, I have just announced 19,000 further tonnes of food aid for Ethiopia through the World Food Programme; a further 5,000 tonnes of cereals to the NGO CARE; £500,000 to the Save the Children Fund for the purchase of trucks and spares for the southern line operation; and £600,000 worth of vegetable oil to the UNHCR for Somalian and Sudanese refugees in Ethiopia. We shall continue to monitor the situation extremely carefully and provide further help. Our total emergency aid for Ethiopia so far this year is more than £16·5 million.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the contribution made by United Kingdom aid towards reducing growth in the world's population.

Helping to reduce rapid population growth has high priority in our aid programme. I aim to increase the level and quality of all population-related assistance. We will focus bilateral support on a number of countries to improve the quality and delivery of their family planning services and to improve the health, education, income and status of women.