The World’s Jason Margolis reports on how the changing nature of the G8. The annual summit of the group of eight leading industrialized powers got under way today in L’Aquila, Italy.
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LISA MULLINS: Now technically, China is not part of the G8. The Group of Eight refers to the US, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and Russia. And today, the G8 summit got under way in L’Aquila, Italy. G8 leaders agreed to back new targets to slow global warming. We’re gonna have more on that in just a moment. They also issued a statement that the world economy remains too uncertain to start rolling back stimulus measures. The World’s Jason Margolis begins our coverage.

JASON MARGOLIS: To call the G8 summit the G8 this year is not entirely accurate.  Italy, which holds the G8′s rotating presidency, set the agenda.  Foreign ministry spokesman Fabrizio Petri said Italy has changed the nature of the G8 summit to make it more inclusive.

FABRIZIO PETRI: And so, for three days, there will be 38 countries, head of delegations, some of them are countries, some of them are international organizations, but all with the same equal treatment as far as organization and logistics is concerned, which is quite, quite something.

JASON MARGOLIS: Countries like Brazil and South Africa have been invited to side discussions at G8 summits in years past.  But this year, the list of invitees has grown. This expansion is a positive step, says Richard Rosecrance at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

RICHARD ROSECRANCE: If we’re talking about a relative and relevant economic institution that can really deal with all the problems we confront, G8 can’t do it.

JASON MARGOLIS: Increasingly, decisions about the world economy are being made by what’s called the G20. Rosecrance says the G8 just doesn’t reflect the new world order.

RICHARD ROSECRANCE: After all G8 doesn’t include China, it doesn’t’ include India.

JASON MARGOLIS: This shift towards a more inclusive decision-making body doesn’t mean the G8 is irrelevant.  The G8 countries still represent more than half of the world’s GDP, and they can spur each other to action. For example, with aid to Africa.  Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi put development aid high on this week’s agenda.  Economist Desmond Lachman at the American Enterprise Institute says that’s something.

DESMOND LACHMAN: Well, one would hope that Berlusconi can shame these countries into doing more than they’re doing in order to provide relief to the poorest countries in Africa. But I would imagine, given the state of the global economy, given the state of many of the G8 countries’ budgets, Berlusconi is not going to make much headway.

JASON MARGOLIS: Especially when Berlusconi’s own country has failed to live up to its commitments, says Max Lawson, a policy advisor at Oxfam.

MAX LAWSON: So far the Italian presidency of the G8 has been a big disappointment for Africa and the poorest countries, but it’s not over yet. And these things often change at the last minute. We know that there are emergency plans on the table to get back on track with aid promises. Aid promises that were made in Glenn Eagles in 2005 at the G8 to increase aid by 50 billion. We know they’re way off track at the moment, and the Italians are the worst performers.

JASON MARGOLIS: Development in poorer countries is on tomorrow’s G8 agenda, along with trade, energy and climate change. For the World, I’m Jason Margolis.

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