India has mooted an International Skill Development Fund with active assistance from the developed countries for rooting out poverty in the developing countries.

"We need to give the poor access to training opportunities at affordable costs. I will, therefore, suggest setting up of an International Skill Development Fund," Labour Minister Sahib Singh Verma said at Geneva addressing the 91^st session of the International Labour Organisation.

The fund, under the aegis of ILO, could mobilise finances from the developed world to help the developing countries in their effort to enhance various skills.

He said the skill development fund might also render technical assistance to complement the national efforts of a country to upgrade or train vast labour force.

Asking the developed world to be "more sensitive" to the needs of the developing countries, the minister said, "increased participation in the World Trade Organisation regime was touted as a means for poor countries to reduce poverty.

"Globalisation must bring clear and tangible benefits for the poorer countries, if we are to work out of poverty," Verma said.

He said India had consciously recognised poverty as a major issue and had been carrying out poverty alleviation measures for the last 50 years.

"We have succeeded in bringing down the poverty ratio to 26.1 per cent in 1999-2000 from as high as 54.9 per cent in 1973-74," he said, adding, "we propose to reduce it further to 19 per cent by 2007."

Verma lamented that the benefits from the increased participation in the WTO regime had "so far been less than encouraging".

He said the ILO could play a major role in bringing about free movement of people across national boundaries.