Global Financial Crisis May Hurt UN Poverty Fight

On Monday, 34 heads of state and 11 heads of government will meet in New York for a high-level UN session on African development, while UN officials warn the slowing global economy and US financial meltdown threaten to sap development efforts. Last week, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he worried the treacherous economy could have a "very serious impact" on the capacity of donor nations to help the world's poorest, those living on less than $1 a day.

"We are experiencing a development emergency," one of three crises including climate change and the global food crisis, said Ban. "This week, with the help of all world leaders, I would like to really mobilize necessary resources and galvanize political will to as high as possible as I can."

The UN's annual ministerial meeting of the UN General Assembly begins Tuesday, and Ban is urging world leaders to recommit to achieving UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), including cutting poverty by half, ensuring universal primary education, and stopping the HIV/AIDS pandemic by 2015.

Ban recently reported that the Group of Eight has fallen behind its 2005 summit promise to boost development assistance by $50 billion by 2010. The G-8 would have to increase funding by $18 billion annually to reach the target, he said.

While economies in most African nations are growing faster than a decade ago, the continent if "off track" to meeting MDGs, said Undersecretary-General Cheick Sidi Diarra, Ban's special advisor on Africa. A number of countries have met some goals, but none is on target to achieve all by 2015, said Diarra.

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