[Asia] faces 'major poverty test'

from The BBC

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has told a conference in London that Asia faces major challenges in tackling poverty in the next decade.

Mr Blair highlighted at the conference on Asian poverty the rising competition for natural resources in Asia and the impact of growth on the environment.

He said more than a billion would still be in "dreadful poverty" in 2015.

Many Asian politicians said the continent was getting a lot right, but much more needs to be done.

Wealth gaps

Mr Blair told the conference, organised by the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the British government, that Asia had remarkable progress to applaud.

However it still faced major challenges, he said.

Although the number of people in Asia living on less than $2 a day would have halved by 2015, he said, one billion people would still be in poverty and by then Asia would have 345 million new entrants to the labour market.

Growth would bring greater competition for limited resources including clean water and greater pressure on the environment.

Mr Blair's message echoed that of many Asian politicians, who wanted to show Asia was getting a lot right.

Chinese officials said they had reduced the number of poor from 250 million to fewer than 26 million in the past 25 years, thanks to rapid economic growth.

But Asia is still home to two-thirds of the world's poor.

No country in the region looks set to meet all the development goals set by the international community for 2015.

Five countries will not meet any at all.

And much more needs to be done to make growth more even.

Many here are emphasising the threat to stability of the growing wealth gaps, both within individual countries and across the region.