HONG KONG -- James Wolfensohn, the president of the World Bank, made the most powerful speech of his career at the annual meetings of the World Bank Group and International Monetary Fund in Dubai last month. It was full of sharp sound bites driving toward a vital central theme that Wolfensohn enunciated with a great passion -- that this world is out of balance and something needs to be done urgently or we shall all suffer.
The hard part now begins -- trying to do something to remedy the deficiencies that had been pointed out. With U.S. President George W. Bush single-mindedly pursuing his own agenda and U.S. elections looming, with deadlock in world trade talks, with official development assistance at low levels and with many developing countries in no mood to listen to outside advice, Wolfensohn will need more than charm to make a difference.
"In our world of six billion people," Wolfensohn pointed out, "one billion own 80 percent of global GDP (gross domestic product) while another billion struggle to survive on less than a dollar a day. This is a world out of balance." He contrasted the paltry sums that the rich countries spend on aid -- $56 billion or just 0.22 percent of their GDP -- with the massive $300 billion given in subsidies to farmers in rich countries and the even more outrageous $600 billion spent on defense."