In late 2007 a dramatic hike in food prices throughout the world had revealed the imperative necessity of revisiting the rules of the global food game. Now, almost two years later, FAO’s 191 member governments had just adopted, by acclamation, a proposed reform of the Committee on World Food Security (CFS).

The WTO has issued an arbitration report in a dispute between the United States and Brazil over US cotton subsidies, giving Brazil the right to use trade countermeasures against the US, and in certain circumstances to suspend intellectual property obligations.

The G20 communiqué agreed at end September in Pittsburgh, despite expressing concern about the impacts of the financial crisis on developing countries, remained vague on some points, and still failed to address the needed radical overhaul of the international financial architecture.

A student journalist threw a shoe at IMF Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Thursday and ran toward the stage shouting "IMF get out!" as the finance official answered questions at a university in Istanbul.

The UN is inviting organizations to take part in a survey on the current situation that local, national and international civil society organizations (CSOs) are facing as a result of the global economic and environmental crises.

The United Nations Millennium Campaign is disappointed that the recently concluded G-20 meetings ended with nothing more than vague commitments to the needs of the world’s poorest represented by the Millennium Development Goals.

Crowded into Monumental Baptist Church, several hundred youth, community folk and activists spent three hours with Nobel Prize winner Joe Stiglitz and others just as the G20 Summit began in the city of Pittsburgh.

Major developing countries are again preparing to stand together on critical issues at the G20 heads of government meeting in Pittsburgh Sep 24-25.

The future of international economic governance and financial reform continues to be debated separately at the United Nations and the G20, but little progress is being made.

The governing Trade and Development Board (TDB) of the UNCTAD began its fifty-sixth session with UNCTAD Secretary-General Dr Supachai Panitchpakdi stressing that the global financial and economic crisis presents an opportunity to find long-term, multilateral solutions to the cycle of financial crisis and unsustainable global imbalances.