Dubai: The inaugural edition of the World Economic Forum's (WEF) new initiative 'Summit on the Global Agenda' will be held in this Middle Eastern city next month.

Around 700 of the world's most influential thinkers, including leaders from academia, business, government and society, will gather for the summit to be held in association with the Dubai government on November 7-9, according to a WEF statement.

The summit is a new, unique gathering, whose purpose is to advance solutions to the most critical challenges facing humanity.

The summit will see representation of the 68 global agenda councils, which the WEF has created to address the foremost topics on the global agenda.

These councils have been formed to challenge the prevailing assumptions, monitor trends, map interrelationships and address knowledge gaps.

These will also propose solutions, devise strategies and evaluate the effectiveness of actions using measurable benchmarks.

At the Dubai summit, participants will engage in interactive workshops and sessions to set priorities for the most compelling ideas for improving the state of the world, from ground-breaking areas of research to new and exciting developments to address the world's challenges.

Among the major global challenges that will be discussed at the summit are demographic shifts, migration, gender gap, climate change, water security, food security, global trade regime, energy security, terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and AIDS.

Industry-oriented issues will include the future prospects in the areas of media, entertainment, metals and mining, sustainable construction and real estate.

Region-oriented issues that will come up for discussion are the future of Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, China, Russia, Japan, Australia and Korea.

The outcome of the summit will be presented at the WEF annual meeting 2009 in Davos for further discussion and action. IANS