GENEVA (ILO News) - The International Labour Office (ILO) today welcomed the adoption by the United Nations General Assembly of a Resolution on the report of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization as a means of providing further impetus to the pursuit of a fair globalization.

The General Assembly resolution described the report of the World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization - "A Fair Globalization: Creating Opportunities for All" - as a major contribution "to international dialogue towards a fully inclusive and equitable globalization".

The Resolution was tabled by the governments of Finland and Tanzania, whose presidents - Tarja Halonen and Benjamin William Mkapa respectively - co-chaired the World Commission's two-year review, and had the sponsorship of a very large number of UN member States.

The UN General Assembly decided to consider the report within the framework of next year's comprehensive review of the implementation of the Millennium Declaration, culminating in a three-day General Assembly Summit to be held in September 2005. It also urged international organizations to provide information on their activities aimed at promoting an inclusive and equitable globalization to the Secretary General.

Juan Somavia, Director-General of the ILO, who originally proposed the Commission, has said the report marked the first systematic attempt to deal with the social dimension of globalization.

The report provides essential new elements to current efforts by the UN system to reshape the governance of globalization to work for all the world's people.

The report was the focus of a "presidential" event on 20 September that presented the report to the UN on the eve of the General Assembly. During this special session, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, French President Jacques Chirac, Gabonese Foreign Minister and UNGA President Jean Ping and other Heads of State welcomed the report as a vital contribution to fighting poverty and global economic imbalance. In his comments, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan noted that "the best anti-poverty programme is employment and the best road to economic empowerment and social well-being lies in decent work".

The World Commission's report has received broad political support since its launch in February. Its message of decent work for a fair globalization has received the endorsement of Heads of State and government throughout the world.

"A Fair Globalization: Creating Opportunities for All" calls for an "urgent rethink" of current policies and institutions of global governance. The 168-page report acknowledges that globalization's "potential for good is immense" and that it "has opened the door to many benefits … promoted open societies and open economies and encouraged a freer exchange of goods, ideas and knowledge … (and) a truly global conscience is beginning to emerge sensitive to the inequities of poverty, gender discrimination, child labour and environmental degradation, wherever these may occur".

Nevertheless, it says, "There are deep-seated and persistent imbalances in the current workings of the global economy, which are ethically unacceptable and politically unsustainable… Seen through the eyes of the vast majority of men and women, globalization has not met their simple and legitimate aspirations for decent jobs and a better future for their children".

For more information, please see: www.ilo.org/fairglobalization.