Time to act

Now is the opportunity for Australia, as a wealthy country and chair of the G-20, to show leadership in encouraging concrete policy development and resource allocation for priorities such as primary school education, clean water, and basic health services.

The G-20 must ensure that effective global initiatives such as the Global Fund to combat AIDS, TB and Malaria and the Education for All no longer remain woefully under-funded.

The Millennium Development Goals are the most ambitious commitment the world has ever made to combating poverty. There are promises to be kept.

This G-20 meeting is an excellent opportunity for Australia, a wealthy country, to show leadership and to keep its promise to help end extreme poverty.

And it's worth remembering that failure to act on ending global poverty is measured in millions of lives lost. Over the two-days the G-20 meet, 60,000 children will die from poverty related causes - a sobering thought. The shame of extreme poverty is our collective responsibility. The world's poor will look to the G-20 this weekend in Melbourne to help lift them out of poverty. Now is the time to act.