Massive issue

"It is a massive issue. Poverty is widespread and it is perhaps the most significant global issue of our age."

The coronavirus pandemic could result in many more people being pushed into poverty because many developing countries have weak health systems and nonexistent social safety nets, he said. A World Bank report in June forecast that up to 100 million more people could be pushed into extreme poverty.

"The pandemic is going to greatly exacerbate an already bad situation. It is going to throw hundreds of millions of people back into poverty and many into extreme poverty and starvation."

For Goldin, this does not come as a surprise, given that he forecast a pandemic in his 2014 book The Butterfly Defect: How Globalization Creates Systemic Risks, and What to Do about It.

"This has been a disaster waiting to happen for a long time. It was merely a question of where and when it would start."

Goldin, who is a frequent visitor to China and a regular speaker at the China Development Forum, an event held in Beijing each spring, and which attracts experts and thinkers from around the world, is impressed by President Xi Jinping's ideas on poverty.

Xi, in fact, has made poverty eradication a mission since he was Party chief of Ningde city in Fujian province in the late 1980s. In his book Up and Out of Poverty he sets out four important principles for tackling it: avoiding a poverty mentality (if you believe you are poor, you will be); adopting development measures appropriate to local conditions; strong leadership and coordination; and not wasting money on grandiose projects just because they may be popular.

"These are all very important but he is right to stress avoiding a poverty mentality," Goldin said.

"If you believe you are simply condemned to be poor by virtue of your birth and your circumstances, you will not strive to escape.

"Neither government nor society will feel it is their responsibility to act if they think that some people are just destined to be poor. They will not see it as their absolute responsibility to eliminate that."

Goldin also said Xi is right to emphasize that poverty alleviation strategies need to be aligned to local conditions, which Western policy makers have often disregarded at huge cost.

"There has been this cookie-cutter view of it in the West where a particular development model was dreamed up in Washington or by colonial rulers and it was to be applied everywhere. It proved a disaster.

"Africa is littered with the carcasses of development projects which at some point were regarded as a panacea."

Goldin said good governance and coordination as has been demonstrated by Xi and others in China is vital to alleviating poverty.

"Coordination is certainly vital. There is no point in building a school if you don't have teachers for it, or a hospital if you don't have nurses, doctors or equipment.

"You need coordination across the country too. You can't have provinces which are extremely wealthy because they are easy to access from the capital, and others which are more remote and find they are left behind because no one comes and opens projects there."

Goldin, who studied at the University of Cape Town and also has a degree from the London School of Economics and a doctorate from Oxford University, has had a high-profile career as a professional economist and academic. He has also served on the boards of a number of leading international companies, including Old Mutual, the Pan-African investment and banking institution.