Meeting to back efforts to tackle poverty

ISTANBUL - Hürriyet Daily News

The Deputy Governor of İzmir Ardahan Toktuk said he believed the İzmir meeting of the 15th Eurasian Economic Summit would energize efforts to tackle basic problems like poverty and unemployment, during the opening speech of the summit, organized by İzmir Chamber of Commerce and the Marmara Group Foundation. Toktuk said he was deeply honored to host the summit.

“İzmir has become a candidate for EXPO 2020 with the theme: ‘New ways for a better world and health for everyone.’ We aim to be the voice of developing countries while looking for a solution to the basic health problems of the developed world. We see health as a universal, economic and a social phenomenon. We need the support of member countries of the Bureau of International Expositions to increase our chances when the EXPO city is elected in December 2013,” Toktuk said, noting that İzmir was a candidate city for the EXPO 2020.

The head of the parliament of the Izmir Chamber of Commerce, Selami Özpoyraz said the whole world lived in a global village, in which 20 percent of the villagers had the wealth of 80 percent of the village, also at the opening of the meeting.

This unfair system causes 16 percent of the world to face hunger, Özpoyraz said, adding that they were searching for solutions to this situation.