United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon intends to ask the G-20 to allocate an additional USD60 billion over five years to improve maternal and child health.
“During the last 10 years, not much attention has been given to these particular two areas,” Ban was quoted by Bloomberg. “When mothers are healthy, families are healthy, the children are healthy. That means we have a very sound and healthy community, and community means country and the world.”
In the U.N.’s Millennium Development Goals Report 2010, maternal health and sanitation are still lagging.
Meanwhile, the World Bank urged the G-20, to foster long-term, broad-based growth, which the bank said is the most effective means of lifting people out of poverty in the developing world.
At the same time, investing in poor nations can help support high-paying jobs in the developed world, as every “dollar spent on investment goods in developing countries can yield 35 cents worth of demand for capital goods produced in high-income countries,” according to the bank’s background paper prepared for this weekend’s G-20 summit.
