Davos discusses how to address climate change, poverty alleviation

Yahoo News 25 Jan 08;

The annual Davos gathering of corporate wealth and political power turned its lofty gaze on the world's poor Friday, with delegates chided over failures to deliver on development goals.

Rock star activist Bono, billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates and UN chief Ban Ki-moon steered the conversation in the Swiss ski resort away from the global economy and geopolitics, towards issues such as infant mortality, poverty alleviation and climate change.

Ban challenged delegates to renew a commitment to the UN Millennium Development Goals, aimed at halving extreme poverty, boosting health and education and further empowering women across the developing world by 2015.

"Too many nations have fallen behind," he said. "We need new ideas and fresh approaches."

The Davos event has long prided itself on showing the caring side of capitalism, although participants have often been criticised for trumpeting big ideas on big issues in public, while actually expending most of their energy on corridor schmoozing and backroom deals.

Bono, decrying the international community's failure to live up to its promises on development, said it was time to go beyond purely "moral" statements of intent.

"I would like to turn our moral compact into legally binding contracts. Then my advice to the developing world? Get a good lawyer and haul our asses into court," the U2 frontman said.

This year's Davos event has drawn nearly 30 heads of state or government, more than 110 cabinet ministers and several hundred leaders of industry who, while applauding the cause of corporate responsibility, stressed the inherent constraints they worked under.

"If we lose sight of our core function of serving our customers and creating shareholder value... we'll be out of our jobs," said Peter Sands, chief executive of international bank Standard Chartered.

Gates, a perennial Davos participant, announced 306 million dollars (208 million euros) of grants to develop farming in poor countries, marking a major push into agriculture by his charitable foundation which has previously focused on public health.

"If we are serious about ending extreme hunger and poverty around the world, we must be serious about transforming agriculture for small farmers, most of whom are women," he said.

For Gates it was his last appearance at Davos as chief executive and chairman of Microsoft. He plans to step down in July and devote his time to running his foundation.

Attending his first Davos as prime minister was Britain's Gordon Brown, who called for major reforms of international institutions.

"The IMF, the World Bank and the United Nations were built for the problems of the 1940s and can't deal with the problems we have in 2008," Brown said, citing the challenges posed by climate change, conflict-ridden states, non-state terrorism and the threat of global pandemics.

"I can't see why we should not move immediately to the World Bank becoming a World Bank for the environment as well as development," he added.

World Bank president Robert Zoellick was also in Davos, urging a greater understanding of the threat posed by sharp food price rises that could drastically increase cases of hunger and malnutrition to create a newly impoverished generation.

"Hunger and malnutrition is not only an effect of poverty, it's also a cause of poverty," Zoellick said.

"Frankly, I hope one of the things that comes out of Davos this year, is not just talking about stocks and financial markets in developed countries, but also about this issue in developed ones," he added.

In recent years the World Economic Forum gathering in Davos has been held against a backdrop of bumper corporate profits, strong economic growth and tame inflation.

But this year, a distinctly gloomy atmosphere has prevailed, amid wild swings on global markets, fears of a US recession and rising oil, food and other commodity prices.