World leaders say globalization unfair with Africa

World leaders at the opening of the plenary session of the 2009 IMF/World Bank meetings Tuesday in Istanbul believes globalization that puts Africa at risk is incomplete and irresponsible, the News Agency of Nigeria reported.

The world leaders said the focus of globalization had been on the advanced countries, leaving the developing countries to suffer.

World Bank President Robert Zoellick said more than 90 million people would be thrown into extreme poverty in 2010.

"As a result of the global crisis, we estimate that 90 million more people will be living in extreme poverty by the end of next year, up to 59 million more people will lose their jobs this year, and an additional 30,000 to 50,000 babies may die in Sub-Saharan Africa," said Zoellick.

He said there was the need to give developing countries, especially Africa, more representation in the G20 and in the international multilateral institutions.

"If developing countries are part of the solution, they must also be part of the conversation," he said.

"The international system needs a World Bank Group that represents the international economic realities of the 21st Century, recognizes the role and responsibility of growing stakeholders, and provides a larger voice for Africa," Zoellick added.

In his speech, the prime minister of the hosting country Turkey, Tayyip Erdogan, said the developing countries would play a critical role in the growth of the global economy.

"We have to re-arrange the international economic structure to integrate the developing countries and give them greater roles," he said.

Erdogan pointed out that the international institutions would only have a global face with the integration of all countries.

"All countries will need to corporate with each other and be more open to each other," he said.

"We need to make necessary sacrifices in the international institutions otherwise we would fail in learning from the global financial crisis," he added.

The IMF managing director, Dominic Straus-Kahn, said some developing countries, like China and India, have shown that the developing countries must be considered in global negotiations.

Straus-Kahn said the developing countries played a key role in the recovery of the global financial crisis.

Source: Xinhua