Developing countries which invest in better education, healthcare, and job training for their record numbers of young people between the ages of 12 and 24 years of age, could produce surging economic growth and sharply reduced poverty, according to a new World Bank report launched at the Bank's Annual Meetings in Singapore.

With 1.3 billion young people now living in the developing world-the largest-ever youth group in history-the report says there has never been a better time to invest in youth because they are healthier and better educated than previous generations, and they will join the workforce with fewer dependents because of changing demographics.

However, failure to seize this opportunity to train them more effectively for the workplace, and to be active citizens, could lead to widespread disillusionment and social tensions.
The report says that young people make up nearly half of the ranks of the world's unemployed, and, for example, that the Middle East and North Africa region alone must create 100 million jobs by 2020 in order to stabilize its employment situation. Moreover, surveys of young people in East Asia and Eastern Europe and Central Asia-carried out as research for the report-indicate that access to jobs, along with physical security, is their biggest concern.
Far too many young people--some 130 million 15-24 year olds--cannot read or write. Secondary education and skill acquisition make sense only if primary schooling has been successful. This is still far from being the case and efforts have to be reinforced in this area. In addition, more than 20 percent of firms in countries such as Algeria, Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Estonia, and Zambia, rate poor education and work skills among their workforce as 'a major or severe obstacle to their operations.' Overcoming this handicap starts with more and better investments in youth.

"Most developing countries have a short window of opportunity to get this right before their record numbers of youth become middle-aged, and they lose their demographic dividend. This isn't just enlightened social policy. This may be one of the profound decisions a developing country will ever make to banish poverty and galvanize its economy," says Emmanuel Jimenez, lead author of the report, and Director of Human Development in the World Bank's East Asia and the Pacific Department.

The G20 leaders and IMF representatives meeting in Melbourne said the outlook for world growth remains positive, but have called for continuing adjustments to monetary and fiscal policies and appropriate exchange rate flexibility.

After the two-day summit, they said the world economy continued to expand at a solid pace with growth above its long-term average for the fourth consecutive year.

The G20 finance ministers and central bank governors said that although the outlook remained positive, the growth rate "is expected to decline slightly from the rapid pace of the last few years".

"We need to take advantage of the present strength in the global economy to get policy settings right."

In the face of potential inflationary pressures, the normalisation of monetary policy would need to continue, and fiscal policy needs to be adjusted in anticipation of slower revenue growth and higher spending.

"We are determined to implement these policies, which are also required to enable global imbalances between countries to unwind in an orderly manner," the leaders' statement said.

On Saturday, Rodrigo de Rato, the International Monetary Fund managing director, agreed global prospects were good, but that the slump in the US housing market posed a risk.

"What we see right now is certainly not a sharp deceleration of the US economy, although a risk of an abrupt deceleration of the US economy is certainly one of the risks the world economy is facing now," he told a briefing.

Overall, he said the IMF was still forecasting a year of robust and more balanced global growth. The IMF is projecting global growth of five per cent this year.

The G20 includes the G7 nations - the US, Germany, Japan, France, Italy, Britain and Canada - as well as the European Union, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea and Turkey.

IMF and World Bank officials have also been attending the G20 meeting.

The European nations of Spain, France and Italy have presented a Middle East peace initiative aimed at ending years of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Can Europe begin a new peace process?
European nations can help with peace within the Middle East, however they must start at the Security Council. In order to reach real peace in this region those with veto power must be limited. In order that biasness does not override common sense. It is my believe that support for these changes can start with France.. A rotation of sorts can be suggested. However, I am under no disillusionment. Current memebers with veto power will never go for it. Therefor I am pessimistic that any true peace can come.
Europe can begin to play a part in the establishment of real peace in the Middle East but eventually they must negotiate and listen closely to all the countries in the Middle East and let them take the lead in formulating a real Peace Plan. The US and Israel have assisted each other in seeing that no real peace plan is ever implemented in Palestine or any of Israel's other Neighbors. They have talked incessantly, while maintaining their genocidal war tactics. Why should the US have the primary role in " talking and doing nothing" for Peace in the Middle East? Let Those European countries interested in real peace join with their mid-east partners and work for real peace.

The gift of the Nile. Egypt owes its very existence to the waters of the great river, which for thousands of years has made barren land fertile, given life to one of history’s great civilizations, and sustained a population now approaching 80 million people.

Yet those same waters are now threatening some of the world’s most spectacular monuments. The ancient temples of Luxor and Karnak, and several others in southern Egypt, are in real danger from rising ground water in the Nile Valley.

Egypt currently receives eight million tourists a year, most of them attracted to the ancient sites of the pyramids, the valley of the kings, and Luxor.

The Egyptian government recently announced plans to double the number of visitors to the country within the next decade, to 16 million by the year 2016.

Temples of Doom examines the real concern that Egypt's ancient sites simply cannot cope with this volume of traffic.

The antiquities of ancient Egypt have survived for more than four millennia, but if they are to be preserved for future generations, drastic action is required across the region - and time is running out.