The "State of the Future" report, published by the Millennium Project of the World Federation of United Nations Associations, said organized crime entities generated income from money laundering, counterfeiting and piracy, and the trafficking of drugs, people and arms.

One of the countries it singled out was North Korea, which it said makes an estimated $500 million to $1 billion annually from criminal enterprises.

Despite the work of international organizations like the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime and other groups, the report said organized crime "continues to grow and has not surfaced on the world agenda in the way that poverty, water, and sustainable development have."

"This is gigantic and it's not being addressed well," said Jerome Glenn, head of the Millennium Project and one of the authors of the annual report.

The report called organized crime one of the most pressing global issues that needs to be addressed in the next 10 years, along with global warming, terrorism, corruption and unemployment.

Income disparities also remain enormous, with the income of the 225 richest people of the world equaling that of the poorest 2.7 billion, or 40 percent of the world's population.

But the report noted success in tackling other issues, saying the world has made progress on ending poverty, improving access to education and settling conflicts. It also says the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in Africa has begun to level off and could begin to decrease over the next few years.

Glenn said the expansion of organized crime across national borders has made it necessary to find a global solution to the problem, possibly through the creation of a financial prosecution system that would handle cases outside national jurisdictions, similar to the International Criminal Court.

Such a system would have to be funded initially by governments, but could later receive its financial support from the frozen assets of convicted criminals, the report said.

"It's a global issue and it's got to be addressed globally," Glenn said. "South Africa has got the Russian mafia moving in. You've got some Chinese moving into Russia. There are still (organized crime) families, but the interplay of these things is very complex."

More than 2,400 experts from businesses, governments, universities, nonprofit organizations and U.N. agencies have contributed to the research in the Millennium Research report over the past 11 years, with about 350 people taking part in last year's study, the report said.