Vienna: The world's poorest nations are
especially hard hit by the global financial crisis and will
feel its impact for years to come, UN officials said today.
These countries already were struggling before the
economic downturn took hold and now risk seeing the progress
they've made in recent years slip, the officials said at a
conference in the Austrian capital.
"The current global financial and economic crisis is
hitting the least developed countries severely," said Cheick
Sidi Diarra, head of the United Nations Office of the High
Representative for the Least Developed Countries, Landlocked
Developing Countries and Small Island Developing States.
"There is no doubt that the effect of the crisis on (least
developed countries) will linger for years."
According to the UN, 49 countries -- 33 in Africa, 15 in
Asia and one in Latin America -- currently qualify as least
developed.
Especially vulnerable to economic shocks, these countries
are now feeling the pinch of the financial crisis through,
among other things, the decline of investment, tourism,
falling exports and trade imbalances, Diarra said.
Kandeh Yumkella, head of the UN Industrial Development
Organization, said the financial crisis has caused impressive
growth rates of African countries to sag significantly this
year. While rich, developed countries are using the financial
crisis to transform themselves and improve their performance
going forward, poor countries now have to struggle even harder
to stay afloat.
PTI
First Published: Thursday, December 03, 2009, 22:26