The Clinton global initiatives

An ocean and a continent away as his wife was officially named Secretary of State of the US, former US President Bill Clinton opened the first – and last – Clinton Global Initiative outside the United States, at the Grand Hyatt in Hong Kong. Against too a backdrop of the US officially in recession, the global economic meltdown, a just-concluded terror attack in India, the world’s climate and natural world under threat and in peril, world leaders – including President Arroyo among 11 former and current heads of state – and leaders in business and industry, education and environment gathered to put concrete action to ideas on global initiatives on education, health, and energy/climate change.

President Clinton opened the two-day forum by again stressing that the CGI seeks to turn “good ideas into action” – the tone set from the first CGI held in September 2005 around the United Nations General Assembly meetings in New York City. This gathering of the most powerful, wealthiest, most innovative and brilliant people in the world seeks concrete commitments from participants for specific projects or action plans that target any of a number of problems facing the world community today – poverty, lack of education, climate change, religious and ethnic conflicts. The commitments can be of money, talent, manpower, ideas, access to resources, or a combination of these. So far, over 1,200 commitments worth about $46 billion have been made, benefiting 200 million people in over 150 countries.

“Our work has never been more important,” Clinton stressed, noting the “persistent inequalities” between the world’s rich and poor – people as well as nations – between rural and urban populations.

Holding the first CGI outside the US in Asia is of particular significance, he noted, because as Asia is home to the world’s leading boom economies, the region is also home to a major portion (641 million) of the world’s poor.

Unfortunately, this is the first and last CGI to be held outside the US. With his wife Hillary taking on the Secretary of State position in the Obama government come January, the former president’s participation in such initiatives will be subject to intense scrutiny and limitations to avoid any possible conflict of interest. The CGI will be established and run as an entity separate from the William J. Clinton Foundation. Likewise, funding for both the foundation and CGI will be subject to strict rules.

But the initiatives of the both entities will continue with the commitments made by thousands of people all over the world.