Philanthropist and co-chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Gates, visited Australia on May 28th for a number of high level discussions about aid and development.
He met jointly with the Prime Minister, the Deputy Prime Minister and AusAID Director General Peter Baxter, followed by a meeting with Foreign Minister Bob Carr.
Mr Gates also presented a speech at the National Press Club at Parliament House entitled: 'Smart Aid: Australia's Leadership and Innovating for the World's Poorest'.
Mr Gates praised Australia for our ongoing investment into foreign aid, writing in an opinion piece for daily newspapers: 'If you look at the curve representing Australia's foreign aid budget, you see clearly that your country has turned itself into a global leader in foreign development in the past few years.'
As a world renowned philanthropist Mr Gates is particularly passionate about health and development, and has been a great advocate around many development issues.
Australia and the Gates Foundation share key health development goals relevant to the Asia-Pacific region, particularly in polio eradication and malaria control and elimination.
Working together to eradicate polio and malaria
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Australia are both heavily committed to global polio eradication, the Gates Foundation is contributing US$1.8 billion for the Polio Endgame Strategic Plan 2013 – 2018, which is one-third of the total budget.
Prime Minister Julia Gillard and Foreign Minister Bob Carr have announced that Australia will provide $80 million over four years from 2015 to 2018 to help finish the job and achieve worldwide polio eradication.
This contribution follows a $50 million commitment to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative announced by the Prime Minister in 2011, bringing Australia's total commitment to polio eradication to over $130 million.
We are working together as key donors through a range of multilateral funds and organisations such as the Global Fund to fight AIDS, TB and Malaria.
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest non-government donor to the Global Fund, a key partner for Australia in achieving health outcomes in our region. The recent Federal Budget confirmed Australia will provide $ 100 million to the Global Fund in 2013.
Australia is also partnering with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to fund WHO activities to strengthen and coordinate the emergency response to drug-resistant malaria in the Greater Mekong Sub-region. AusAID is contributing $5 million to this initiative, and the Gates Foundation is contributing $11 million. The Global Fund has also indicatively allocated $100 million to a regional initiative to contain drug resistant malaria.
Australia and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also jointly fund global and regional food security and agricultural research programs including: the G20/AgResults initiative, Global Agriculture and Food Security Program, CGIAR, Biosciences East and Central Africa.
New forms of development financing and philanthropy such as the work of the Gates Foundation are becoming increasingly more important as a flow of development finance to developing countries and AusAID welcomes these new partnerships.
More information
Address by Bill Gates, Co-Chair of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation
Media release: Further Australian support for polio eradication [external link]