Conference : Poverty Alleviation: Challenges for the Islamic

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Poverty Alleviation: Challenges for the Islamic World
2 to 3 August 2007
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Website: http://www.cpds.fep.um.edu.my
Contact name: MS. SHAHNAZ SABRI

The objective of this Conference is to identify ways in which the Islamic world can cooperate in advancing solutions to problems of poverty, illiteracy and backwardness which have been identified as real threats to the Muslim world

Organized by: The Centre for Poverty and Development Studies (CPDS)
Deadline for abstracts/proposals: Not available.

obmar · CONCEPT PAPER

“POVERTY ALLEVIATION: CHALLENGES FOR THE ISLAMIC WORLD”

CONCEPT PAPER

The Islamic world broadly divided into North and Sun Saharan Africa, South and Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Central Asia varies in terms of their levels of socio economic development, poverty incidence, income distribution patterns, literacy, employment and unemployment levels of as well as degrees of backwardness. Wide disparities exist in the Islamic world with some parts enjoying substantially high levels of living while more than half the countries of the OIC are classified as being amongst the least developed nations of the world entrapped in extreme poverty. The existence of these wide disparities within and amongst Islamic nations should not exist if there is strict adherence to the Islamic principles of distributive justice, unity and social responsibility. Thus there is a need for the Islamic world to come together to address these issues and help eradicate extreme poverty and formulate strategies that would enable member countries find sustainable solutions to exit and remain out of poverty.

The objective of this Conference is to identify ways in which the Islamic world can cooperate in advancing solutions to problems of poverty, illiteracy and backwardness which have been identified as real threats to the Muslim world by the Prime Minister of Malaysia, Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi in his recent interview with the CNN.

Some Muslim countries have been more successful than others in tackling the poverty issue. However it does not detract from the fact that the poverty problems loom large in the Muslim world especially in Africa. Poverty, underdevelopment, illiteracy and unemployment characterize more than half the member countries of the OIC. Much of Islamic Sub Saharan Africa and South Asia are entrapped in extreme poverty while poverty related problems continue to be significant in other parts of the Islamic world.

There is a critical need for the global Islamic community to come together to find pragmatic solutions for addressing problems of poverty and identify sustainable strategies that can be used to eradicate poverty.

Poverty in the Islamic world has to be addressed in a holistic manner and the formulation of the 10-Year Plan of Action by the OIC following the Makkah Sumit of December 2005 is a step in the right direction. OIC’s recent efforts through the Islamic Development Bank to set up the $10 billion Poverty Alleviation Fund to be dedicated to alleviating poverty, promoting health and universal education and empowering women in the Bank’s 56 member countries is further reiteration of its commitment .

This two day Conference will provide a forum for initiating discussion on poverty in the Islamic world and will revolve around the following themes
a) Poverty from an Islamic Perspective : A Discourse
b) Eradicating Poverty in the Islamic World : Engaging the Ummah
c) Poverty Alleviation Success Stories from the Islamic World : Deriving Lessons and Avoiding Pitfalls
d) Fostering Strategic Partnerships : The Role of the OIC

The deliberations from this Conference will be tabled by the CPDS at its forthcoming International Conference in August 2007 entitled “Poverty And Distribution Amidst Diversity: Options And Challenges For Development” where Professor Jeffrey Sachs, the First Holder of the Royal Professor Ungku Aziz Chair is the keynote speaker.

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The Lecturer: Professor Jeffrey Sachs

Jeffrey D. Sachs is the Director of The Earth Institute, Quetelet Professor of Sustainable Development, and Professor of Health Policy and Management at Columbia University. From 2002 to 2006 he was also Director of the UN Millennium Project and Special Advisor to United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on the Millennium Development Goals, the internationally agreed goals to reduce extreme poverty, disease, and hunger by the year 2015. Sachs is also President and Co-Founder of Millennium Promise Alliance, a non-profit organization aimed at ending extreme global poverty.

Professor Jeffrey Sachs is widely considered to be the leading international economic advisor of his generation. For more than 20 years he has been at the forefront of the challenges of economic development, poverty alleviation, and enlightened globalization, promoting policies to help all parts of the world to benefit from expanding economic opportunities and wellbeing. He is also one of the leading voices for combining economic development with environmental sustainability and as Director of the Earth Institute leads large-scale efforts to promote the mitigation of human-induced climate change.

He is internationally renowned for his work as economic advisor to governments in Latin America, Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, Asia and Africa and for his work with international agencies on problems of poverty reduction, debt cancellation for the poorest countries and disease control. He has also been an advisor to the IMF, the World Bank, the OECD, the World Health Organization and the United Nations Development Program. During 2000 and 2001, he was Chairman of the Commission on Macroeconomics and Health of the World Health Organization and from September 1999 until March 2000 he served as a member of the International Financial Institutions Advisory Commission established by the U.S. Congress.

Professor Sachs was named as one of the 100 most influential people in the world by Time Magazine in 2004 and 2005, and the World Affairs Council of America identified him as one of the 500 most influential people in the United States in the field of foreign policy. In February 2002 Nature Magazine stated that Sachs "has revitalized public health thinking since he brought his financial mind to it". In 1993 he was cited in The New York Times Magazine as "probably the most important economist in the world" and called in Time Magazine’s 1994 issue on 50 promising young leaders "the world's best-known economist". In 1997, the French magazine Le Nouvel Observateur cited him as one of the world's 50 most important leaders on globalization. His syndicated newspaper column appears in more than 50 countries around the world and he is a frequent contributor to major publications such as the New York Times, the Financial Times and The Economist magazine.

Professor Sachs's research interests include the links of health and development, economic geography, globalization, transition to market economies in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, international financial markets, international macroeconomic policy coordination, emerging markets, economic development and growth, global competitiveness and macroeconomic policies in developing and developed countries. He is author or co-author of more than two hundred scholarly articles and has written and edited many books, including the bestseller The End of Poverty (Penguin, 2005).

He is the recipient of many awards and honors, including membership of the Institute of Medicine, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Harvard Society of Fellows and the Fellows of the World Econometric Society. He is also the 2005 recipient of the Sargent Shriver Award for Equal Justice. He is a member of the Brookings Panel of Economists and the Board of Advisors of the Chinese Economists Society, among other organizations. He has received honorary degrees from many universities across the world. He has given lecture series at several distinguished institutions inlcluding Yale and the London School of Economics and the Universities of Oxford, Tel Aviv and Jakarta.

Prior to his arrival at Columbia University in July 2002, Professor Sachs spent over twenty years at Harvard University, most recently as Director of the Center for International Development and Galen L. Stone Professor of International Trade.

Jeffrey Sachs was born in Detroit in 1954. He received his B.A., summa cum laude, from Harvard College in 1976, and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1978 and 1980 respectively. He joined the Harvard faculty as an Assistant Professor in 1980 and was promoted to Full Professor in 1983.

Source: The Earth Institute at Columbia University