UNCTAD launches LDCs report

NAIROBI—The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has today launched ‘The Least Developed Countries Report 2006: Developing Productive Capacities’. Present at the launch were Mr Fortunas Okwiri, UNDP programme advisor and Dr Rashid Aman of the African Centre for Clinical Trials (ACCT).

UNCTAD economists analyse the situation of the world’s 50 poorest countries. They show how the development of the productive capacities of these nations could permit them to carry out strategies for achieving stable, long-term economic growth that could best help their most destitute populations. They propose a redirection of foreign aid towards creating conditions that will allow jobs to be generated for larger and larger populations leaving rural areas for cities, and predict that without such steps these populations will continue to emigrate to the North. The report also reviews progress made towards meeting the goals set at the Third United Nations Conference on Least Developed Countries held in Brussels in 2001.

The report is intended as a resource for policy making in LDCs and for their development partners.