The Hindu

India an inspiration for poor nations: Wolfowitz

13 April 2007

"It is time for donors to step up aid in general"

Washington, PTI: Praising India for its success in undertaking development initiatives, World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz has said the country is an inspiration for poor countries in places like Africa.

``India is one of our biggest portfolios. It has been making wonderful progress in the last 15 years or so,'' Mr. Wolfowitz said at a round table for a select group of media persons ahead of the weekend Spring Meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

``The basic point that cannot be stressed enough is that we are seeing around the world development success that is inspiring people that didn't do better in the world before to do better in the future. I think the examples of China and India are beginning to resonate to Africa,'' he said.

Poor countries, the World Bank president argued, will never get to where countries like the United States, England, Germany or Japan are. ``But they look at countries where there is a lot of poor like India and see it can be done. It is inspirational,'' he said.

``We learn a lot from the Indian experience,'' Mr. Wolfowitz said, pointing to his own recent visit to Andhra Pradesh ``where some eight million of the poorest, of the most marginalised, are participating in self-help groups — not just getting micro-credit help, but really getting self-confidence.''

``That's an example that hopefully helps other countries in the world learn from,'' he said, making the point that the major focus of the Bank's programme in India is in rural development.

``We are going to come out with a World Development Report this year on Agriculture and I think it is going to have some very strong reinforcement on investment in rural development as a major way of fighting poverty,'' he added.

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