Brown calls for poverty fund

Chancellor Gordon Brown will today call for a global campaign against poverty with the creation of a $50 billion (£36 billion) investment fund.

In a speech to the New York Federal Reserve tonight, the Chancellor will effectively ask for a redoubling of the amount already available for Third World development.

The "funding gap" facing poorer countries must also be closed, Mr Brown will tell fellow finance ministers, proposing that extra development aid can be given in exchange for measures to reduce corruption.

The USA, Japan and Canada will also be urged to follow the EU in opening up their markets to all but military products from developing countries, as Mr Brown will argue that an effective subsidy to the arms trade in those countries must be diminished.

"In future no country genuinely committed to economic development, poverty reduction and the transparency and standards I have outlined, should be denied the chance of making progress because of the lack of investment," Mr Brown will say.

He will also defend economic globalisation, stating: "Managed wisely, globalisation can and will lift millions and manage the high road to a just and inclusive global economy."

His proposal for the fund is based on a UN report which calls for world poverty to be halved by 2015.