GENEVA – The Group of Eight nations should not presume a global economic recovery is near, World Bank president Robert Zoellick said in a letter to G8 host Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi yesterday.
The letter, copied to all G8 leaders, said interventions by central banks and governments appeared to have “broken the fall in the global economy”.
“Yet 2009 remains a dangerous year. Recent gains could be reversed easily, and the pace of recovery in 2010 is far from certain,” Mr Zoellick wrote.
“I recognise that some developed countries are now considering a policy mix that assumes the recovery is at hand. But for the developing world, it is far too early to think of such measures.”
The G8 heads of government are expected to issue a statement on the situation of the world economy during their meeting in L’Aquila. In his letter, Mr Zoellick stressed the summit should also “focus on the plight of the poor”.
“A decline in the average GDP growth rate in developing countries by 1 percentage point can trap as many as 20 million more people in extreme poverty,” he wrote.
In the year to June 30th, the World Bank committed $60 billion in aid to developing nations, much of it for infrastructure projects. Mr Zoellick said wealthy nations should not hold back on further aid commitments in spite of the economic uncertainty.
Meanwhile, a new report warns that leaders of the G8 must put their weight behind “a new global compact to end hunger”.
ActionAid warns that the summit represents a last chance for action before increasing hunger spirals out of control in the developing world. The charity said that to be effective the meeting must agree a timetable to increase agricultural aid by $23 billion annually by 2012. Just half of the $10 billion pledged at last year’s G8 in Japan has so far actually been delivered, raising questions about the seriousness of donors’ commitment to tackling hunger, said ActionAid.
Nine years after agreement on the UN Millennium Development Goal to halve hunger by 2015, the number of people in chronic hunger has in fact risen to reach 913 million in 2008 and an estimated 1.02 billion this year – one in six of the world’s population – the report says. – (Reuters)