G8 Summit 2008. Frankly, I don't know much about this as well. I heard a lot about this summit last time but I never go and find out what is this summit for. What make me notice about this summit is not because of what they discuss during the meeting but how much did they spend during the summit. G8 permanent members are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, United Kingdom, and United States. To find out more about this summit, refer to HERE.

Let's talk about what attracted to write this post. This year, Japan hosted the 34th G8 Summit and it took place in Toyako, northern island of Hokkaido from July 7-9(take note, 3 days only). What really surprised me was the amount of money spent on this summit. They spent 600 BILLION YEN (18 BILLION RINGGIT / 5.5++ BILLION US$) in 3 DAYS!!! This expenses are 3 times more than the amount of money spent on the summit held on Germany last year! British "Times" reported, Japan government claimed that they spent half of the expenses on the security costs.

In addition, a specialized construction of a 1.8 BILLION RINGGIT media centre, spent more than 3.25 BILLION RINGGIT in the laying of the hotel optical fiber cables and telephone lines Internet and New Chitose airport in Hokkaido acquired a cost of over 3 MILLION RINGGIT of luxury lounges which invited delegates. The lounge will be demolished after the end of the summit. Oxfam senior policy adviser Lawson pointed out that the 600 BILLION YEN can used to buy up to billions of mosquito nets for the world's poorest people to prevent them from the threat of malaria. The expenses also equivalent to the AIDS treatment costs for 4 MILLION PEOPLE a year.

Japanese officials claimed due to the location of the summit which is a bit far, the costs spent would be higher. On the other hand, the British "Times" report, although the G8 summit were discussing the food shortage and the aids to Africa, the leaders were having a RICH, EXPENSIVE and DELICIOUS lunch and dinner (five lunch dishes and eight dinner dishes).

What the hell...