Jubilee 2000 is an international debt forgiveness campaign, aiming to help emerging countries to become economically self-sufficient. Many countries have run up massive debts. Since these debts can only be paid through export earnings, the best way to measure the burden is by comparing export earnings with total debt. Examples (World Bank figures 1998):

• Somalia - total debt $2.6bn - as % of export earnings 3,671
• Sudan - total debt $16.9bn - as % of export earnings 2,131
• Rwanda - total debt $1bn - as % of export earnings 1,374

Debt is spiralling out of control in some countries. A look at the scale of the problem.

What is globalisation? For the first time in history almost the entire world population lives in a global capitalist system with the aim of free movement of goods and services. The drive for globalisation is economic growth and prosperity, especially for poorer nations whose economies have often been the most restrictive in the past.

Keynote speech by Dr Patrick Dixon for Tetrapak in the theatre of a cruise ship for 700 delegates. Client event. Dr Dixon began the three day event with FUTUREWISE and Elton John took the stage in the evening.

Read more for the video presentation.

Qatar is one of the wealthiest nations of the world in terms of income per person, because the Qatar population is small (around 800,000) and the oil / natural gas resources of Qatar are huge. Oil provides around a third of Qatar's GDP and Qatar natural gas reserves are vast - around 5% of the entire world's total. The rest of the Qatar economy is supported by industries such as fertilizers, cement, banking, chemicals, iron and steel, and spin-offs from the petrochemical indust

Read more about Qatar's geography, population, tourism and future.