The poverty in which millions of the world’s citizens are living is getting worse and catching the attention of many ahead of the G-20 meeting. As the group of 20 nations is preparing to meet in Pittsburgh, US this week to fashion out measures to combat the ravaging global financial crisis, the International Trade Unions Confederation (ITUC) has warned that the increasing global unemployment may frustrate any recovery plan. According to the World Bank president, Robert Zoellick, about 89 million fresh people in 43 poor or low income countries, world-wide, including Ghana, are heading into the extreme poverty net as a direct result of the current global economic crisis. Zoellick’s assertion was contained in a paper titled: “Protecting Progress: The Challenge Facing Low-Income Countries in the Global Recession.” The paper was prepared for the upcoming G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh in the US this week. He said 89 million people will be living in extreme poverty and on less than $1.25 a day, by the end of 2010, pointing out that the global recession has also put at risk $11.6 billion of core spending in areas such as education, health, infrastructure and social protection in the most vulnerable countries. The implication, according to the World Bank, is that Low-Income Countries face long recovery and require better support. “The poor and most vulnerable are at greatest risk from economic shocks - families are pushed into poverty, health conditions deteriorate, school attendance declines, and progress in other critical areas is stalled or reversed,” Zoellick said. He also pointed out that: “The poorest countries may not be well represented on the G-20, but we cannot ignore the long-term costs of the global downturn on their people's health and education.” The global umbrella body of trade unions, in a statement signed by its General Secretary, Guy Ryder and made available to BUSINESS GUIDE last Friday from its Brussels, Belgium headquarters, said the G-20 meeting must prioritise job creation as the bedrock of any plan to make it work. With the global crisis set to cost 59 million jobs by the end of this year, and predictions that unemployment across the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries could reach 10 percent in 2010 and increase into 2011, ITUC and the Global Union Federations are warning in their "Pittsburgh Declaration" that the chances of real economic recovery are under severe threat. “Governments must do much more to arrest the plunge in jobs as tens of millions of people, especially young people and those in precarious jobs, find themselves facing a future without work,” the statement stated. Source: Business Guide/Ghana