OECD plea on skills boost for the poorest
Pay schemes designed to improve job opportunities for low productivity workers will not improve their position unless coupled with measures to improve skills and competence, the OECD says in a report.
World sees 'sharp rise' in child poverty
Child poverty has risen sharply in the world since the mid-1960s because of a breakdown in conventional families, unemployment and widening income inequality, according to this year's world labour report published by the Geneva based International Labour Organisation.
Study shows freer trade helps poor countries
The World Trade Organisation (WTO), under fire from development groups which say it works against the poor, issued a study arguing that trade liberalisation can help reduce poverty. The study, written by two academics from Britain and Israel, cited post-second world war experience in Western Europe and the move to …
Greed for diamonds, other 'lootable' commodities fuels civil wars
New World Bank research suggests that civil wars are more often fueled by rebel groups competing with national governments for control of diamonds, coffee or other valuable primary commodities, rather than by political, ethnic or religious differences, says a press release. The new report, Economic Causes of Civil Conflict and …
Congressional testimony on diesel fuel
Industrial representatives and government regulators agree that significant reductions in the level of pollutants emitted by diesel engines are possible and necessary. But in testimony before the Senate Environment Committee June 15, witnesses from the trucking and petroleum industries argued that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) wants to go too …
20 p.c. U.K. children living in poverty
Britain has one of the highest rates of child poverty in the developed world, with nearly one in five living in families below the poverty line, a survey by UNICEF, the U.N. children's fund, has shown.
Gifts with strings attached
After 40 years of agreeing that it should be done, will the rich countries finally untie their aid? On June 20th the rich-country Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development will meet for a last effort before the G8 summit in Japan to cut strings from aid for the poorest. They …
More bad news
One of the Blair government's bolder aims is to eradicate child poverty in Britain within 20 years. A study released by the United Nations Children's Fund suggests that Britain has quite a problem. According to Unicef, a fifth of British children live in poverty. This compares with a tenth of …
Pakistan has become poorer
survey : The number of Pakistanis living below the poverty line has increased phenomenally 43.9 million in 1998-99, the Economic Survey 1999-2000 has revealed.
Unique AP plan to wipe out poverty
Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister M Chandrababu Naidu launched the country's first innovative Poverty Eradication Mission in Utnoor in which the beneficiaries will also double as the stakeholders.
Poverty in Pak. growing at alarming rate
survey: Pakistan's fiscal deficint will be "close to six per cent" of the Gross Domestic product(GDP) in 1999-200 as contrasted with 6.1 per cent in 1998-99 and 7.7 per cent in 1997-98, the Finance Minister, Mr. Shaukat Aziz, said today while releasing the country's economic survey for the current financial …
Naidu launches poverty eradication programme
In one of the biggest initiatives for eradication poverty in both the rural and urban areas, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu will launch "Velugu" programme in the tribal heartland of Utnoor in Adilabad district on Friday.
World Bank report author quits in protest
The author of the World Bank's annual World Development Report has resigned following a fierce internal row over the report's content. Ravi Kanbur, a former academic at Cornell University in the US, left after a dispute over the appropriate role of free markets in developing countries. The development report, published …
Ford supplies Vietnam with electric bikes
Ford Motor Co. said it shipped electric bicycles to Vietnam. The six-speed electric bicycle is a product of Think Group, an independent Ford brank aimed at developing and making zero-emissions products.
India, Japan differ on WTO terms
India and Japan on Friday differed on their approach to multi-lateral investment agreement under the WTO while agreeing to keep out social issues like labour standards from its ambit.
UNDP for govt role in poverty projects
Efforts to end poverty around the world have largely failed because they have relief on "hitand-miss" door projects that often neglect the key role local goverments must play, a United Nations report has aid.
New survey shows growing loss of arctic atmosphere's ozone
Unusual cold and a sharp loss of ozone in the Arctic stratosphere over the winter just past have heightened concern that changes in global climate may delay recovery of the earth's partly depleted ozone layer, scientists said yesterday. In three of the last five winters, stratospheric temperatures in the Arctic …
World Bank Rs 12,000 cr grant for Karnataka
The World Bank has agreed, in principle, to grant Karnataka loans worth Rs 12,000 crore for the development of infrastructure, rural irrigation, agriculture, watershed management, education, urban development, highways and poverty alleviation.
378 cr earmarked for canal
The Punjab government has earmarked Rs 378 crore for the construction of Dashmesh canal to facilitate irrigation in Ropar, Fatehgarh Sahib and Patiala districts.
