Leaders Urged to focus on Changing Climate

Global leaders have been urged to make progress on resolving climate change and restart the Doha round of global trade negotiations. The call went out at the opening of the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2007 in Davos, Switzerland.

The Annual Meeting co-chairs joined founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum Professor Klaus Schwab in urging participants to confront "The Shifting Power Equation" and use the five-day meeting to shape the 2007 global agenda.

Some 2,400 participants from 90 countries are participating in the Annual Meeting 2007, including 24 heads of state or government, 85 cabinet ministers, religious and media leaders, and heads of non-governmental organisations

Around 50 per cent of the participants are business leaders drawn principally from the Forum's membership - 1,000 of the foremost companies from around the world and across all economic sectors.

"In some ways, we are living in a schizophrenic world. On the one hand, we have an economy that is doing well and the prospects for this year are very promising; on the other hand, we have so many underlying imbalances, inconsistencies, weaknesses and fragilities," said Professor Schwab.(TradeArabia News Service)