The Great Debate

By Paul Smalera

Welcome to the new world of volatility, globalization and a host of emerging markets. Merrill Lynch Chief Investment Officer Lisa Shalett and Eurasia Group President Ian Bremmer tell me, Reuters' Deputy Opinion editor Paul Smalera, their views on how best to navigate today's economy. To learn more about the report, including Bremmer's analysis of debtor nations and creditor nations, and the tremendous GDP growth among developing world nations in recent years, watch the video below. To read the entire report, check out ML.com.

The following is a guest post by Angel Gurría, Secretary-General of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation Development. The opinions expressed are his own.

The world’s economic center of gravity is changing. Global GDP growth over the last decade owes more to the developing world than to high-income economies. If these trends continue, by 2030 developing countries will account for nearly 60% of world GDP on a purchasing-power parity basis, according to OECD calculations.

While high-income countries have been languishing in the worst recession since the 1930s, China and India have continued to power ahead. This is not a single stand-alone event, but a sign of an important structural transformation in the global economy, a process we call “shifting wealth.”

–Joe Cerrell is director of Global Health Policy and Advocacy at the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation. He oversees the foundation’s global health communications, public policy, and international finance. The views expressed are his own. –

I recently took my three-year-old twin daughters to their annual doctor visit, where they received their latest round of routine vaccinations.  Thanks to the miracle of vaccines, I know my daughters will be protected for life against measles, tetanus, and other diseases that were once serious threats. But incredibly, millions of children in poor countries still die from diseases that could easily be prevented with the effective, affordable vaccines that Americans take for granted.

Fortunately, that is starting to change.  This week, a landmark report from the World Health Organization, UNICEF, and the World Bank concludes that a renewed global push on childhood immunization has raised the number of children vaccinated to an all-time high.  The authors find that vaccines now save 2.5 million lives worldwide every year.

– Paul Taylor is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own –

The day before he returned to the U.S. Treasury for six weeks to help the understaffed Obama administration, Edwin Truman published a proposal to give the International Monetary Fund more firepower to fight the financial crisis.

Truman’s idea — a one-off $250 billion allocation of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs) to IMF member states — looks like the quickest way to put a safety net under developing countries and avert financial contagion. The Group of 20 world leaders should embrace it at the meeting in London on April 2.