The sixty-first session of the United Nations commission for Asia and the Pacific opened today in Bangkok, Thailand, with member delegations joining experts for discussions that touched on poverty reduction, the region's rapidly ageing populations and economic recovery after last year's devastating tsunami.

Recognizing that rural women in South Asia are among the poorest people in the world, two United Nations development agencies are teaming up to co-host a conference in New Delhi, India, to promote policies and programmes aimed at reducing gender inequality in that region.

Ministers and senior officials from 52 Asian and Pacific countries meeting under United Nations auspices today pledged to alter current patterns of production, consumption and distribution to promote cleaner, environmentally sustainable growth as they fight to eradicate poverty.

The first high-level major environmental conference since last December's devastating Indian Ocean tsunami opened today in Seoul, Republic of Korea, under United Nations auspices with a warning that high economic growth in the Asia-Pacific region is environmentally unsustainable.