A hypothetical bridge providing a direct link to enable the industrialized and emerging nations to examine global growth issues along a single path toward sustainability. This was the guideline for the fourth annual congress of the Fondazione Italcementi Cav. Lav. Carlo Pesenti held at the Bergamo Conference Center, which this year examined the theme “Sustainable Development: a single path for the mature nations and the emerging economies”.

After the welcome and opening address delivered by the foundation’s Chairman, Giovanni Giavazzi, the more than four hundred delegates at the congress heard a paper from Economics Nobel Laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz, whose “Initiative for Policy Dialogue” project offered an analysis of the errors and benefits of globalization to help the emerging nations explore all the possible economic policy alternatives and enable wider, informed civic participation in policy-making. The project, an exhaustive study followed, in subsequent years, by the work that won the Nobel prize — an examination of information imbalances and their impact on the markets —, led Stiglitz to conclude that globalization is an inevitable process that can be harnessed to augment the wealth of the more backward countries and the populations of the developed countries through a mixture of solidarity policies and action by international bodies. According to Stiglitz, economic globalization is a positive force that can drive growth and improve the living standards of the world’s poorest peoples. It requires a review of trade agreements, economic policies imposed on the developing nations, international aid and the global financial system. These and other reforms would enable globalization to develop its full potential, without prejudice to democracy and social justice.

The congress also heard video contributions from Al Gore, the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize winner, TaoTao Chen, a lecturer at the Center for China - Tsinghua University, Beijing, Barack Obama, one of the US senators running for the Democratic Party nomination for the 2008 presidential elections, and Suketu Metha, writer and journalist, short-listed for the 2005 Pulitzer Prize.

In his message, Al Gore stressed that as far as the environment is concerned “We are facing a planetary emergency, one that threatens the future of human civilization. Members of the global business community, governments, and civil society all have a responsibility when it comes to the climate crisis. Some action has been taken: Italy, for example, boasts the 7th highest installed wind power capacity in the world and has doubled its overall renewable energy resources since 1990. This is a trend that must continue to accelerate, but it can only advance through better partnership between government and industry”.

The Fondazione Italcementi Congress ended with a round table, where, in addition to Joseph Stiglitz, the panel members were Tito Boeri, Professor of Economics at Milan’s Bocconi University, and Moushira Khattab, Secretary General of Egypt’s National Council for Childhood and Motherhood and Vice Chairman of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child.