The uneven but strong global recovery that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has predicted for 2011 is cause for optimism.

But sluggish job creation is demanding greater urgency from the international community to press ahead with reforms crucial to sustainable and inclusive growth around the globe.

Buoyed by a speeded global recovery in 2010, the IMF said the global economy would likely expand 4.4 percent this year, a touch higher than the 4.2 percent it forecast about three months ago.

Such an upward revision will surely give the international community a much needed shot in the arm. Three years after the worst global financial crisis in more than seven decades pushed the world economy to the verge of collapse, growth has seemingly returned to most economies, though at different paces.

Advanced economies are expected to expand by more than 2 percent, weak by historical standards but stronger than most of their people will feel.

Meanwhile, growth in emerging and developing economies is expected to have grown by about 6 percent in 2010, following a modest 2 percent in 2009. Now, these economies are projected to grow even faster thanks to stronger economic frameworks and swift policy responses.

This gap between the growth of the advanced economies and the emerging markets has highlighted the unevenness of the current global recovery, giving rise to worries that the global imbalance may not be reduced any time soon.

However, a looming challenge that the world must face squarely, which is far more serious than the difference in growth trends, is the shocking divergence between world growth and job creation.

Against the stronger-than-expected recovery of the world economy, the International Labor Office (ILO) warned that global unemployment has stayed at record highs for the third straight year since the start of the economic crisis, and the weak recovery in jobs is likely to continue in 2011, especially in developed economies.

While global GDP, private consumption, investment, and international trade and equity markets have all recovered in 2010, surpassing pre-crisis levels, the tremendous human costs of the recession have made it more urgent than ever for the international community to carefully rethink and reprioritize policy responses to the global crisis.

The IMF has already pointed out that a 2-percent growth for the advanced economies will not be sufficient to make a dent in their high unemployment rates.

For developing and emerging countries, they are also yet to translate fast economic growth into a steady source of new and decent jobs for their huge populations.

A jobless recovery cannot last long. If the extraordinary amount of policy stimulus adopted to prompt a global rebound cannot deliver inclusive growth to improve the quality of life for more people, the sluggish growth of household consumption will sooner or later stop the expansion of world output.

To achieve a lasting global recovery, policymakers must take immediate actions to ensure job creation be a part, not a price, of economic growth.