Posts Tagged ‘G20’

I went to see Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Director of the Earth Institute at Colombia University, speak last week at LSE ahead of the G20. Sachs spoke with conviction and emotion about the lack of representation of poorer nations at the G20, a total of 2.5bn of the world’s poorest with no voice at the meeting. I came away with a sadly pessimistic outlook for what could be achieved at the G20 for developing nations’ economies.

However, what actually transpired from the summit was far more positive. One outcome of the world’s rescue package was $250bn trade credit made available for the world’s poorest nations, which is a step in the right direction, and something I’m sure Professor Sachs will be pleased with, given his pragmatic approach to tackling global poverty. According to Professor Sachs we need greater investment in developing countries to avoid the flight of capital back to developed nations. Sachs also advocates investments in infrastructure and the millennium development goals as a priority. In an article in the Huffington Post Sachs praises the commitment, seriousness and efficiency of G20 leaders in what they accomplished at the summit for the poorest economies in the world.

It is clear that what resulted from the G20 was a far more sizeable package than could ever have been expected and will go some way to relieve the impact of the world crisis to those economies that will suffer the most. Gordon Brown has stated that a “new world order” is emerging. Hopefully in the next meeting of global decision making at this level, poorer nations will be represented at the top table.