The debate was initiated at the European Development Days 2008 in Strasbourg and the discussion continues. Rendez-vous in Stockholm for the 2009's edition, and until then "To your keyboards"!

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Although the United Nations always has crises to solve, delegates at this year's UN General Assembly (UNGA) in New York seemed to have an exceptional number on their plates. With America's financial turmoil creating a bleak backdrop, the gathering seemed to hum with palpable angst about the future. One world leader after another strode to the podium to tell how high food and fuel prices were devastating the poor in their countries - and threatening to reverse economic growth and the significant gains we have made in fighting poverty. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned that the world is facing a "development crisis", and worried that wealthy nations would fall further behind in their commitments to the poor. Many delegates and leaders I met echoed those fears.

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The failure to reach an agreement in Geneva has severely weakened the Doha round. What could be the consequences of a collapse of the Doha negotiation from the perspective of developing nations?

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Last month, I spoke to a group of British parliamentarians who sit on something called the International Development Committee. Their role is to scrutinise the work of the Department for International Development. "DFID" - as it is known - is the arm of the British government concerned with promoting development, supporting the alleviation of poverty across the globe, and funding multilateral organisations like the UN World Food Programme.Members of the International Development Committee asked me to travel to London to speak to them as part of their inquiry into the work of the World Food Programme (WFP) and the support it receives from DFID. As part of the inquiry, an open invitation was issued to any organisation or individual with an interest in global food security to contribute written evidence.

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These few lines came to my mind after one of our Board of Directors' meetings devoted, among other things, to a new participation in an important microfinance institution in Morocco - a country famous for its involvement in the sector. I have, for a long time, been an avid supporter of microfinance. And I am particularly proud of the important increase in the amount of investments made in this sector by my organization, AFD, over the past 20 years: through 60 projects and nearly 300 million euros invested, we have helped more than 1.5 million people make their way out of poverty. We now want to go further, encouraged in this by GCAP's very positive evaluation of our involvement. I see microfinance as a powerful tool against exclusion; it allows people who have been traditionally excluded from the financial systems to have access to credit. Great tribute must be paid to the pioneers of this revolutionary approach.

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Is it fair to ask developing countries companies to follow the rules of Corporate Social Responsibility considering that our countries have developed themselves without such constraints? Would you consider CSR as a form of protectionism?

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