Likewise, while democracy and political stability remain at historically high levels across the region, pockets of populist/anti-globalist storm clouds threaten to spread throughout the highly interdependent region. Meanwhile, global climate change presents serious trade-offs for the region – not least between the seizing of opportunities (e.g. aggressive expansion of biofuel production) and the management of life-sustaining resources (e.g. rainforest and freshwater).
Perhaps the region's greatest ongoing concerns are social and economic inequalities – which remain the most significant in the world. Globalization continues to drive both real inequalities, via income stratification within the region, and perceived inequalities, as local populations observe fast growth elsewhere.
Many Latin Americans continue to suspect that global prosperity is leaving them behind, a perception seemingly resistant to decreases in absolute poverty. Political reform, the encouragement of small and medium enterprises and, crucially, education, remain the region's best mitigators of inequality-driven populist backlash.
More than 20 contributors from leading businesses, academic institutions and think tanks in the region contributed to the report, which is published ahead of the World Economic Forum on Latin America, which will take place from 25-26 April 2007 in Santiago de Chile.
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