Launch Lecture of UNCTAD Trade and Development Report
Date: Tuesday 1 September 2009
Time: 6.30-8pm
Venue: Hong Kong Theatre, Clement House
Keynote Speaker: Heiner Flassbeck (pictured, right)
Discussant: Radhika Desai
Chair: Dr Ken Shadlen
Heiner Flassbeck presents The Trade and Development Report 2009, subtitled "Responding to the Global Crisis and Climate Change Mitigation and Development."
The worst economic downturn since the Great Depression is having a serious impact on developing countries. . . and at this point UNCTAD economists estimate that it will be virtually impossible for sub-Saharan African nations to achieve such United Nations Millennium Development Goals as halving extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. The report recommends increased development assistance and the granting of moratoria on debt for hard-hit developing countries to limit further damage and to prepare the way for eventual recovery.
The effects of climate change, while expected to pose substantial economic and environmental threats for the world's poorer nations, should be seen overall as an opportunity for rapid economic and technological growth. Climate-change mitigation does not contradict development goals, but is a process of structural change worldwide that offers enormous economic opportunities for enhancing development, the report contends. Product and process innovation to cope with climate change is not fundamentally different from other innovation activities that emerge from the entrepreneurial spirit and the search for competitive gains -- and developing countries, if they plan well and design effective responses, can get in on the ground floor of what will be a major source of economic growth in the coming decades.
Heiner Flassbeck is director of the Division of Globalization and Development Strategies, UNCTAD and principal author of The Trade and Development Report 2009.
The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development was established in 1964. UNCTAD promotes the development-friendly integration of developing countries into the world economy. It has evolved into an authoritative knowledge-based institution whose work aims to shape policy debates and thinking on development, with a particular focus on ensuring that domestic policies and international action are mutually supportive in bringing about sustainable development.
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