The world’s largest, fastest-emerging industrial economies are posing grave questions for the coming generation: for how long will the inequalities produced by the unending pursuit of economic growth remain sustainable, for how long will our finite natural resources last if they continue to be rapidly commercialised, and can the environment stand the future demand of several billion new consumers?
To set the stage for President Hu Jintao's April 2006 US visit, the September/October 2005 issue of Foreign Affairs published as its lead article "China's 'peaceful rise' to great power status" by Zheng Bijian, chairman of the influential China Reform Forum.
When we are told that our economy is growing annually at an impressive 8 per cent per annum, we wonder what it is all about and where it disappears without leaving any trace in our daily lives. The latest Forbes list of global billionaires gives us some clue to resolve this riddle. According to this list there are 946 billionaire families in the world today and there are as many as 36 Indian names in this club of the world's wealthiest. This is 14 more than the number of Indians who had made it to the Forbes list last year, and the combined wealth of these 36 families amounts to $ 191 billion, which is one-fourth of India's GDP.
On March 16, 2007, Philippine police arrested veteran journalist, activist, former political prisoner and torture victim, Congressman Satur Ocampo, on the steps of the Philippine Supreme Court. One day earlier, in Washington DC, California Senator Barbara Boxer opened hearings on the mounting death squad executions and kidnappings in the Philippines. Nearly a thousand union leaders, clergy members, lawyers, human rights activists, peasants and elected officials of the social action party lists led by Representative Ocampo have been victimized.
It was unexpected. At the Seventh World Social Forum (WSF), held in Nairobi, Kenya, in late January, the most controversial topic was not HIV-AIDS, the U.S. occupation of Iraq, or neoliberalism. The topic that generated the most heat was China’s relations with Africa.
India has higher levels of malnourished children than Sub-Saharan Africa, despite the Asian giant having more funds and better infrastructure to tackle the problem, the U.N. Children's Fund (UNICEF) said on Wednesday February 21, 2007.
It is time for India and China to move beyond a history of conflicts and start cooperating politically, economically and technologically for mutual benefits, writes Dr Aqueil Ahmad.
