Linking Economic
Growth and Social Development in Lebanon
to create an
efficacious cycle of human progress and growth, was the subject
of deliberations between policy-makers and practitioners in
government, civil society, the private sector, development
agencies and the media. They convened in Beirut on 11-13
January 2000 in a conference hosted by the Ministry of Economy and Trade
and the Ministry of Social Affairs. The conference was
organized by the United Nations Development Programme
(UNDP) in Lebanon and the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies
with substantive support from the United
Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs
(UN-DESA), and financial support from the UNDP
Regional Bureau for Arab States (RBAS)
. The Conference was an
interactive forum that discussed background and situation analysis, the
identification of core issues and problems, the presentation of options and
choices, and alternative policy recommendations.
Ten years after the Taëf agreement and the end of
a protracted and devastating conflict, and on the eve of the
second decade of national rehabilitation and reconstruction
efforts, Lebanon was evaluating and reconsidering its economic
and social priorities and exploring a new development strategy
for the coming decade.
In
June 1999, the Lebanese government adopted a five-year
financial adjustment plan to deal with the heavy burden of the
accumulated public debt, reduce the budget deficit, reform the
fiscal system, increase state revenues, and engage in a
gradual policy of privatization and public sector
reform.
In December of 1999, the Lebanese government planned to adopt a
five-year development scheme, to focus its energies on the country's comparative
advantages, to increase its competitiveness in
the global and regional economy, to continue to
modernize its infrastructure and upgrade its human resources,
and to insure a better social and regional balance in
participation to development, access to resources and economic
rewards.
The National Conference on Economic Growth and
Social Development Policies, organized by the UNDP with substantive support from UN-DESA and in
partnership with the Lebanese Ministry of Economy and Ministry
of Social Affairs and the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies, was a
timely contribution to the current Lebanese debate on public
choices and strategic orientations for the economy and society
into the next decade.
Speakers at the conference included: paper authors,
discussants and participants, some of the major stakeholders
from the policy-making community, the research community, representatives from
civil society, the private sector and the media. The
Conference was conceived as an interactive forum,
where background and situation analysis, identification of main issues
and problems, presentation of options and choices,
and alternative policy recommendations were discussed.
This conference addressed a wide range of topics
relevant to the state of the economy and social conditions in
Lebanon.
During the ten sessions, local and
international experts made about fifty presentations on a
variety of topics such as budgetary analysis, the national
debt, social development, labor markets and
globalization.
Following the
conference, the Lebanese Center for Policy Studies published
together with the partners involved in the meeting a report
entitled, "Linking
Economic Growth to Social Development in Lebanon ".
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