Assistance to poor near top of summit agenda

Tackling the nagging challenge of narrowing the gap between the advanced and underdeveloped nations is to be one of the main priorities of the G20 summit Seoulis to host Nov. 11-12.

The November meeting will be the first in which development issues are placed at the forefront since the heads of state of the 20 members began convening in 2008. 

Experts said the emphasis on development issues was a reflection of critical evolution of the G20 as they expand on the type of global crises or challenges they try to meet. 

SaKong Il, chief of the Presidential Committee for the G20 Summit, emphasized that helping less-developed nations help themselves will be one of the key initiatives the summit will be pursuing. 

“We are looking for ways to help developing economies become independently competent without relying on external aid so they may achieve sustainable growth,” he said.

As agreed in previous G20 meetings, November’s summit is to be focused mainly on two pillars; discussion on building a counter-crisis global financial system and creating a sustainable growth base for underdeveloped countries. 

Initially, the summit attended mostly to policies and related technicalities for coping with financial crises since the group was born amid the 2008 global financial meltdown policy issues and the global financial organizations. 

South Korea was seen as the most appropriate candidate to handle the new agenda, due to its status as an emerging market. 

It also boasts a surprisingly rapid rise to industrial development, despite that it suffered from colonial rule in the early 1900s, followed by a civil war that has left the Korean Peninsula divided. 

Lim Won-hyuk, a director at the Korea Development Institute, speaks at the G20 High-Level Development Conference organized by the Presidential Committee for the G20 Summit in Seoul on Wednesday. (Yonhap News)