Transforming Development Pattern and Poverty Reduction

The World Summit for Social Development in Copenhagen in 1995 described poverty eradication as an ethical, political and economic imperative, and identified it as one of the three pillars of social development. Poverty eradication has since become the overarching objective of development. The world is currently facing the challenges of how to manage disparities and balancing development. Many countries have achieved remarkably in economic development. Particularly, China and East Asia have significantly contributed to the global poverty reduction. The number of people living below the absolute poverty line had declined substantially over the period of 1981-2005. However, the distribution of people living under poverty within and across regions has changed. On the one hand, global inequality has increased dramatically, and the income gap between the 20% of the world population living in the richest countries and the 20% of those living in the poorest nations was 30 to 1 in 1960, 60 to 1 in 1990 and over 75 to 1 today.

As a proven useful global platform for facilitating policy debate and exchange, the high level Annual Forum on Poverty Reduction and Development is to stimulate active discussions among policy makers, development practitioners, scholars, and other social actors on how to cope with the new development challenges and identify recommendation, further to improve public policies for transforming development pattern in the 21st century. The exchange is also relevant when the world has only five years ahead for the attainment of MDGs from now on.

Specifically, the forum will address the following issues:

1. Seek common understanding of the current development pattern2. Explore what can be done in order to transform the development pattern to better benefit the poor and their environment: what are the critical changes needed?3. Promote China's evidence-based development and harmonious society approach, and share international experiences in development approaches of different countries and their impact on poverty reduction 4. Promote MDGs 5. Mark the International Day for Poverty Eradication (October 17) and raise domestic and international concerns on poverty reduction