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World Bank's biggest challenge is to help poor people - Zoellick

World Bank's biggest challenge is to help poor people - Zoellick
By Kabanda Chulu
Tuesday July 10, 2007 [04:00]

WORLD Bank president Robert Zoellick has said the biggest challenge facing the institution was to help poor countries share in the benefits of sustainable globalisation. Speaking on his first official day on the job, Zoellick stated that an international labour force that has grown from one billion to four billion workers and a parallel large saving pool were the developments driving globalisation since the end of the cold war.

“These two trends are creating many winners among nations, but leaving some, especially in Africa, lagging behind and one of the challenges of the Bank today is to help the poorest countries take advantage of these changes and opportunities,” Zoellick stated.

And commenting on his recent tour of Africa, Europe and Latin America and the Caribbean, Zoellick stated that the Bank had identified new challenges that should be undertaken.

“I am delighted to say there’s a very high regard for the Bank and its people, but also recognition that there are new challenges ahead and leaders of developing nations in Sub-Sahara Africa are mainly interested in social development, but they also want to stress the foundations for economic growth and building savings and investment in Africa,” stated Zoellick.

Zoellick, who is an economics and trade expert, becomes the 11th World Bank president and last week replaced Paul Wolfowitz, who was forced to resign for increasing his girlfriend’s salary of without following guidelines.

Labels: POVERTY, World Bank, ZOELLICK

posted by MrK @ 4:00 AM