By NNN-UNCTAD,
New Delhi : Rises in exports from India between 2003-04 and 2006-7 led to 26 million new jobs and to women´s empowerment, UNCTAD and Indian Government officials reported during a three-day conference that opened Tuesday in New Delhi.
The meeting, titled “How are the poor affected by trade?”, has been organized by UNCTAD, India’s Commerce Ministry and the Department for International Development (DFID) of the United Kingdom. It is based on their joint project Strategies and Preparedness for Trade and Globalization in India.
Lakshmi Puri, Acting Deputy Secretary-General of UNCTAD, said trade and poverty experts, while encouraged by recent progress, cannot ignore the current dire financial and economic situation and the threats it poses to development
G. K. Pillai, Commerce Secretary of India, opening the conference, said India´s surging export performance has created new employment benefiting youth and changing their mindset towards engaging in the global economy.
Professor Kaushik Basu, C. Marks Professor of Economics at Cornell University of the United States, said in a keynote address that globalization has now become a way of life and that since 1991 India has been a significant beneficiary of the process.
And Creon Butler, Deputy High Commissioner of British High Commission, urged academicians and policy makers to analyze how the recent financial crisis and international trade are linked and what impacts this could have on efforts directed at poverty reduction.