According to WESP 2008, the world economy is facing serious challenges in sustaining the strong pace of economic growth seen over the past few years. While the baseline forecast is for world economic growth to moderate somewhat in 2008, the risks associated with the bursting of the housing bubble in the United States, the related unfolding credit crisis, the decline of the dollar, large global imbalances and high oil prices are all pointing to the downside. The report draws some lessons from the global financial turmoil of 2007, which was triggered by the meltdown of sub-prime mortgages in the United States, and points out that the various measures adopted by central banks of the major economies did not address the root causes of the turmoil: the huge global imbalances. In an alternative scenario, which takes into account the possibility of a sharper-than-expected decline in house prices in the United States and a hard landing of the US dollar, the United States economy would fall into a recession, while global growth would be significantly lower than the baseline. In addition to trends in international trade and capital flows, WESP 2008 also covers the latest progress and policy issues related to international trade negotiations and reform of the international financial system.

World Investment Report 2007 (WIR07) is the seventeenth in a series published by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The Report analyses the latest trends in foreign direct investment (FDI) and puts a special focus in 2007 on the role of transnational corporations (TNCs) in the extraction of oil, gas, and metal minerals.

Higher prices for many minerals have led to renewed investor interest in the extractive industries. TNCs—including some of the world´s largest corporations—play a key role in the mining of metals and in the extraction of oil and gas. Privately owned TNCs dominate the harvesting of metal minerals, while State-owned companies from developing and transition economies are key players in oil and gas. Many such State-owned firms are emerging as TNCs in their own right.

The Trade and Development Report 2007, subtitled "Regional cooperation for development", recommends that developing countries should strengthen regional cooperation with other developing countries, but proceed carefully with regard to North-South bilateral or regional preferential trade agreements. Such agreements may offer gains in terms of market access and higher foreign direct investment, but they can also limit national policy space, which can play an important role in the medium- and long-term growth of competitive industries. By contrast, strengthened regional cooperation among developing countries can help accelerate industrialization and structural change and ease integration into the global economy. However, to achieve this, trade liberalization is not enough; active regional cooperation should also extend to areas of policy that strengthen the potential for growth and structural change, including monetary and financial arrangements, large infrastructure and knowledge-generation projects, and industrial policies.

The report focuses on the Buildinge-Community Centres for Rural Development Workshop co-organized by UNESCAP and ADBI, aimed at examining the various issues related to CeCs in the Asia and the Pacific region and share good practices that can be used as models for successful development and operation of these centres.

World Economic and Social Survey 2007: Development in an Ageing World

Greater longevity is an indicator of human progress in general. At the same time, increased life expectancy and lower fertility rates are changing the population structure worldwide in a major way: the proportion of older persons is rapidly increasing, a process known as population ageing. The process is inevitable and is already advanced in developed countries and progressing quite rapidly in developing ones.

The World Economic and Social Survey has also come of age as it celebrates the sixtieth anniversary of the publication, which first appeared in 1948 (then called the World Economic Survey).

Appropriately enough, the 2007 Survey analyses the implications of population ageing for social and economic development around the world, while recognizing that it offers both challenges and opportunities. Among the most pressing issues is that arising from the prospect of a smaller labour force having to support an increasingly larger older population. Paralleling increased longevity are the changes in intergenerational relationships that may affect the provision of care and income security for older persons, particularly in developing countries where family transfers play a major role. Thus, societies must also ensure that they meet the particular needs of older populations in terms of the requisite health care and appropriate living conditions. At the same time, it is also necessary for societies to fully recognize and better harness the productive and social contributions that older persons can make but are in many instances prevented from making.

The Survey argues that the challenges are not insurmountable, but that societies everywhere need to put in place the policies required to confront those challenges effectively and to ensure an adequate standard of living for each of their members, while respecting and promoting the contribution and participation of all.

More Details...

More Details...

After a solid and broad-based growth for three consecutive years, the world economy is expected to decelerate in 2007, mainly dragged by a slowdown of the United States. Growth in Europe and Japan, meanwhile, will not be sufficient for these economies to act as locomotives of global growth. The outlook remains mostly positive for developing countries, but a degree of moderation is also expected. Sustained high growth in China, India and a few other major emerging economies seems to have engendered synergy among developing countries so that growth in this group is more endogenous. However, a large number of developing countries remain highly vulnerable to the vicissitudes of commodity prices and the volatility of international financial markets. The report highlights the need for greater employment growth, which has not kept pace with output growth. The global economic outlook also encompasses a number of important downside risks: bursts in the housing bubbles in a number of countries, uncertainties in oil prices and mounting global imbalances. The report calls for international macroeconomic policy coordination in order to facilitate an orderly adjustment of global imbalances.

World Investment Report 2006 focuses on the rise of foreign direct investment (FDI) by transnational corporations (TNCs) from developing and transition economies.

New sources of FDI are emerging among developing and transition economies. This phenomenon has been particularly marked in the past ten years, and a growing number of TNCs from these economies are emerging as major regional - or sometimes even global - players. The new links these TNCs are forging with the rest of the world will have far-reaching repercussions in shaping the global economic landscape of the coming decades.

The Report examines the magnitude of this phenomenon and examines its drivers and determinants, i.e.: what economic factors and policy developments lead firms from developing countries to venture abroad? For low-income countries, FDI from developing countries can be of great importance. In some of them, it accounts for a significant share of all FDI flows. The Report also discusses the development implications of the rise of these new sources of FDI, along with policy responses, for both home and host developing countries.

As in previous years, the Report also presents the latest data on FDI and traces the global and regional trends of FDI and international production by TNCs. Global FDI inflows rose substantially in 2005. A major contributing factor to this strong growth was the marked increase in the inflows to developed countries. Rising global demand for commodities was reflected in the steep increase in natural resource-related FDI, although the services sector continued to be the major recipient of FDI. Among developing regions, Asia remained the main magnet for FDI flows, followed by Latin America, where re-invested earnings have played a major role. Africa´s share in world FDI inflows was still small, but its FDI growth rate has nonetheless surpassed those of other developing regions.

The Trade and Development Report 2006 offers relevant ideas and general principles for designing macroeconomic, sectoral and trade policies that can help developing countries to succeed in today's global economic environment. Particular attention is given to policies that support the creative forces of markets and the entrepreneurial dimension of investment.

The Report also argues that a global partnership for development will be incomplete without an effective system of global economic governance. Such a system should take into account the specific needs of developing countries. At the same time it should ensure the right balance between sovereignty in national economic policy-making on the one hand, and multilateral disciplines and collective governance on the other.

According to the 2006 World Economic and Social Survey, world inequality is high and rising. The main reason is that in the industrialized world the income level over the last five decades has grown steadily, while it has failed to do so in many developing countries. Not more than a few developing countries have been growing at sustained rates in recent decades, but these include, most notably, the world’s two most populous countries, China and India. Considering that these two countries alone account for more than one third of world population, inequality across the globe is beginning to decline. When these countries are left out, however, international income inequality is seen as having continued to rise strongly from already high levels. Because more than 70 per cent of global inequality is explained by the income divergence between countries, its causes and implications are the focus of the 2006 Survey.

The growth rate of the global economy slowed to 3.2 per cent in 2005 down from the 4.0 growth rate in 2004; the growth rate of ESCAP developing countries also decelerated moderately in 2005, primarily as a result of high oil prices and a softening of growth in global trade.

Prospects for 2006 are for growth in the region to maintain its current momentum and for price pressures to abate slightly, provided oil prices do not increase significantly and global external imbalances do not unwind suddenly. Prospects for the ESCAP region also would be affected if avian influenza develops into a human pandemic.

Efforts are needed both at the regional and national levels to ensure that the benefits of high growth in the region are passed on to the poor by creating opportunities for decent employment for all. It is only then that the problems of the working poor, jobless growth and youth unemployment, which are haunting the region, will be addressed properly.

The publication provides a summary overview of population policies and dynamics for each of the United Nations Member and non-member States for which data are available at mid-decade for the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and for 2005.

This publication shows, on a country-by-country basis, the evolution of Government views and policies from 1976 to 2005 with respect to population size and growth, population age structure, fertility and family planning, health and mortality, spatial distribution and international migration. Within the context of demographic, social and economic change. The material is presented in the form of two-page data sheets: the first page contains population policy data for each country for 1976, 1986, 1996 and 2005, and the second page provides population indicators for the corresponding years.

Since the series was launched in 1952, the Report on the World Social Situation has served as a foundation for discussions and policy analysis of socio-economic issues at the intergovernmental level. It has served to identify emerging social trends of international concern and analyze relationships among major development issues with national, regional and international dimensions.

The 2005 Report continues that tradition by addressing the subject of inequality. In particular, it focuses on some of the growing inequalities that make it challenging, but all the more imperative, to reach the Millennium Development Goals. It shows us that we cannot advance the development agenda without addressing the challenges of inequality within and between countries—the widening gap between skilled and unskilled workers, the chasm between the formal and informal economies, the growing disparities in health, education and opportunities for social and political participation.

The world economy is expected to continue to grow at a rate of 3 per cent during 2006. The United States economy remains the main engine of global economic growth, but the growth of China, India and a few other large developing economies is becoming increasingly important. On average, developing economies are expected to expand at a rate of 5.6 per cent and the economies in transition at 5.9 per cent, despite the fact that these economies may face larger challenges during 2006.

Driven by higher oil prices, inflation rates have edged up worldwide. Core inflation rates, which exclude the prices of energy and food, have been more stable, indicating that the pass-through of higher oil prices to overall inflation is limited.

Ten years after the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the lack of reliable national statistics on gender issues persists in many parts of the world. In recent years, efforts to monitor the Millennium Development Goals further revealed the inadequacy of those statistics that were available. That is why The World’s Women 2005 focuses on the state and progress of statistics. Based on what countries report to the international statistical system, it analyzes their capacity to produce statistics on gender issues, and highlights progress made in reporting those statistics over the past three decades.

The analysis shows that despite some improvements over the years, much more needs to be done to develop adequate statistics that address gender concerns. This report is intended as a guide to help Governments and other stakeholders strengthen statistical systems, mainstream gender statistics, and further develop concepts and methods for collecting statistics on gender concerns. I urge Governments, non-governmental organizations, researchers, academics and activists around the world to make full use of this valuable tool.

The conditions of globalization, including economic integration, fiscal discipline, introduction of information communications technologies and democratic governance, have increasingly forced states to redefine their role in public management and to reform the public administration system. However, there is growing realization amongst decision makers that policy and institutional reform per se will not be sufficient to revitalize the public sector. Major strengthening of the knowledge, skills, values, attitudes and leadership abilities of human capital is also needed to transform the public sector, particularly in developing countries and countries with economies in transition. This year's Report is expected to contribute to global and national debates on this important topic.

The world economy is still expanding, but there are serious risks of a setback. Several populous Asian countries, in particular China and India, have emerged as new engines of economic growth. Thanks to their vigorous expansion and their appetite for natural resources, many of their developing-country trade partners have reaped windfall profits from rising commodity prices and from surging demand for intermediate products. Some dark clouds are looming over this rather rosy horizon. Oil prices are historically high and place a huge burden on many developing countries. And there has been no multilateral action that might gently defuse global current-account imbalances. The Trade and Development Report recommends that international initiatives to alleviate poverty and reach the MDGs should not ignore the importance of a smooth unwinding of global economic imbalances that will allow the "Asian Miracle" to continue, along with its positive repercussions for other less wealthy countries

The World Economic and Social Survey 2005
focuses on the Monterrey Consensus as the current framework for international cooperation for development. The report examines the correspondingly broad agenda for action that was set out in the Consensus, recognizing numerous accomplishments to date and draws attention to the further actions—in the financing and trade areas—that need to be undertaken in the years ahead to achieve both the Millennium Development Goals, as well as the broader United Nations Development Agenda.

World Investment Report 2005 (WIR05) presents the latest trends in foreign direct investment (FDI) and explores the internationalization of research and development by transnational corporations (TNCs) along with the development implications of this phenomenon.

Part One highlights recent global and regional trends in FDI and international production by TNCs. Global FDI flows resumed growth in 2004, but inflows continued to decline in developed countries. This Part documents the fact that developing regions are leading the recovery in FDI flows. It also documents different trends and patterns between developed and developing countries as regards the financing component of FDI (equity investment, reinvested earnings, intra-company loans) as well as the modes of investment (mergers and acquisitions, greenfield FDI).

Part Two assesses the implications of the recent surge in R&D internationalization by TNCs. R&D activities at growing levels of complexity are increasingly being established in selected developing countries. In contrast to past experience, this R&D often goes beyond local market adaptation and involves highly complex activities targeted on global markets. The Report discusses the driving forces behind this trend and considers how host as well as home countries are affected. Finally, the Report analyses the need for active government policies to enhance development benefits from TNCs´ internationalization of R&D. The Report underlines the importance of coherent policies in order to create an environment conducive to fruitful interaction between the R&D activities of TNCs and those of domestic firms and institutions. A final chapter outlines the role of international agreements in this area.

Despite the increase in oil prices, the weakness of the dollar and the effects of the tsunami, in 2004 ESCAP economies grew at their fastest pace since 2000, with broad-based growth accompanied in most cases by low inflation. Growth was driven by increased exports, a large part of which were within the region, particularly to China, as well as strong domestic demand, including a revival in capital expenditures. Prospects for 2005 indicate a slowdown in economic growth in ESCAP region as the external environment weakens, but the region is expected to continue to be the fastest-growing in the world.

The rapid ageing of countries which are still developing is the most important feature of demographic transition in the next half century in Asia and Pacific. Governments are increasingly under pressure not only to devise innovative mechanisms to deal with an ageing population but also to ensure the long-term viability of social welfare programmes, while minimizing the negative effects on the economy. The diversity of ageing in the region requires different policy responses, including fundamental changes in policy design, particularly in health and pension systems.

The year 2005 was designated as the International Year of Microcredit with the objective of promoting the role of microfinance and microcredit in poverty reduction. The Survey highlights some Asia-Pacific experiences to illustrate how many of the poor people living in the region could improve their lives through their own efforts.

This report is a joint product of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the five United Nations regional commissions (Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), Economic Commission for Europe (ECE), Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), and Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA)). It provides an overview of recent global economic performance and short-term prospects for the world economy and of some key global economic policy and development issues. One of its purposes is to serve as a point of reference for discussions on economic, social and related issues taking place in various United Nations entities in the first half of 2005.

The present volume:

Part I
of the World Economic and Social Survey 2004 examines recent developments in and prospects of the world economy and addresses their implications for the developing countries in the struggle against poverty. In 2004, the world economy continued the recovery that had started in 2003 and the indications are that this progress will be sustained into 2005. Nevertheless, there are a number of immediate dangers, most notably higher oil prices and the large trade imbalances of some of the world's major economies. Economic progress in India and China is likely to enable the world as a whole to achieve the Millennium Development Goal of reducing poverty by half by 2015. At the same time, many of the poorest countries are expected to fall well short. the Survey analyzes these and other issues in depth and also includes statistical tables, which give standardised data on international trade and finance, incorporating current data and forecasts. It is essential for decision makers in government and business, and provides valuable information to all interested in the trends of global economy.

The present volume:

Part II
of the World Economic and Social Survey 2004 deals with a subject that profoundly affects the economic and social fabric of all nations - international migration.

Today, more people live outside their country that at any other time in history, and the number of people who are crossing international borders in search of a new home seems bound to increase. As a result, there is growing awareness in many countries of the impact of migration-which has, as was expected, become a matter of intense policy debate. After all, migration brings with it many complex challenges—including issues of human rights and economic opportunity, of labour shortages and unemployment, of brain drain and brain gain, of muliculturalism and integration, of refugee flows and asylum-seekers, of law enforcement and human trafficking, of human security and national security.

The volume provides a comprehensive review of developments in international migration, and of the diverse issues involved.

After three years of decline in global investment flows, there are signs of revival. With global economic growth improving in 2004, prospects for global investment look bright. This is particularly the case in services, which make up the largest economic sector in many countries, and which dominate foreign direct investment. The World Investment Report 2004 looks at the shift towards services and examines the challenges and opportunities that arise for development.