Development ministers from the richest nations as well as those of the fastest growing economies kicked off two days of talks on Saturday on ways to ease suffering in Africa and other impoverished nations. Officials from the Group of Eight industrialized nations, along with Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, South Korea and South Africa gathered here to discuss how to bolster their efforts in foreign development aid. Angel Gurria, secretary general of Paris-based think-tank the OECD, said world powers must not allow the gloomy global economic outlook to distract them from fighting poverty because the consequences would be dire. “We cannot let the international and domestic economic concerns deter us from meeting our development commitments,” he told reporters here. “This is because poverty is the ultimate systemic risk. It is a breeding ground for the proliferation of terrorism, armed conflicts, environmental degradation, cross-border diseases and organized crime,” he said. The G8 Development Ministers' Meeting 2008 – which aims to lay the groundwork for a summit of G8 leaders in Japan's northern resort of Toyako in July – comes amid growing concern about rising food prices that are adding to the burden of some of the world's poorest citizens. “The international community is closely watching results of the Toyako summit,” Japanese Foreign Minister Masahiko Komura told the meeting. “As G8 development ministers, we want to send a strong message to the international community so that we can provide beneficial input for discussions of our leaders.” Experts say that more investment is needed in agriculture to try to address food shortages. “The agriculture sector has been starved of infrastructure investment,” Ifzal Ali, chief economist of the Asian Development Bank, said this week. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development separately said Friday that most donors need to step up efforts to meet their stated aid commitments. British charity Oxfam said the figures showed that rich countries had broken promises made to substantially increase assistance to developing countries. __
