This is a report published for theUnited NationsDevelopment Programme. The report not only draws on many issues andcountry-based studies and papers commissionedby UNDP, it also benefits from thefeedback on the approach and content obtainedfrom a number of regional workshops, stakeholderconsultations and technical meetings. The Asia-Pacific region is at the forefront ofglobalization – with some of the world’s fastestrates of growth in international trade. East Asialed the way, but now South Asia too is makingits presence felt, more strongly. The report examines, from an Asia-Pacificperspective, the changes required in the world’strading system, as envisioned in the GlobalPartnership for Development and the MillenniumDevelopment Goals. It draws on thediverse experience of the region to propose acomprehensive development strategy thateffectively combines trade liberalization with thepromotion of poverty reduction and humandevelopment. This report responds to questionsfrom inside Asia and the Pacific. An extensiveprocess of consultation among policymakers,academics, civil society groups, the privatesector and other stakeholders has examined themost recent developments on trade and economicgrowth and tried to assess the impact onhuman development – more specifically, theeffects on the region’s poorest countries and onits poorest people. This report, therefore, narrows the focus,for although it does consider patterns of tradeand economic growth, it is primarily preoccupiedwith the effects these are having onhuman development in the developing countriesof the region. But it goes further – emphasizing that neither trade nor growth can ever be ends inthemselves; instead, they are simply meanstowards the larger goals of expanded humandevelopment and combating poverty anddeprivation.