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Africa: Human Development Report 2003
AFRICA ACTION
Africa Policy E-Journal
July 27, 2003 (030727)
Africa: Human Development Report 2003
(Reposted from sources cited below)
This posting contains brief excerpts from press releases and text
from this year's Human Development Report from the UN Development
Programme, released early this month. The report, which stresses
the reversals in human development in many countries during the
1990s, also cites the possibility of progress, if both poor
countries and rich countries invest necessary resources in priority
measures known to be effective. In particular, the UNDP urges
giving priority to mobilizing resources for 59 countries, many in
Africa, which under current trends will not meet the globally
agreed Millenium Development Goals.
The report was released in Dublin, Ireland and in Maputo,
Mozambique, at the summit of the African Union, but received almost
no news coverage in the United States. At the Maputo launch, UNDP
administrator Mark Malloch Brown congratulated Ireland for
increasing development assistance to the poorest countries, and
Belgium and France for their pledges to join Denmark, Luxembourg,
Norway and Sweden in meeting the target of 0.7 percent of GNP for
development assistance. Among rich countries, the U.S. supplies the
lowest percentage in development assistance, at 0.11 percent of
GNP.
For more information, including the full text of the report, see:
http://www.undp.org/hdr2003 The current Human Development Index
ranking is included at the end of this posting.
Quote from press release: "Subsidies to US cotton growers equal
more than triple the amount of US Government aid to sub-Saharan
Africa. In the European Union, the cash subsidy to every dairy cow
exceeds total per capita EU aid to sub-Saharan Africa."
+++++++++++++++++end summary/introduction+++++++++++++++++++++++
Human Development Report 2003
United Nations Development Programme
One United Nations Plaza, New York, NY 10017
Tel: (212) 906 5295 Fax: (212) 906 5364
http://www.undp.org
Human Development Report 2003 Charts Decade-long Income Drop in 54
Countries
New York, 8 July 2003 While much of the world experienced sustained
economic growth in the 1990s, 54 developing countries suffered
average income declines over the course of the decade, reveals the
United Nations Development Programme's Human Development Report
2003.
Most of the countries that were poorer in 2000 than in 1990 are in
sub-Saharan Africa. The Human Development Report 2003 argues that
to reverse declines, development strategies must focus not only on
economic growth, but also on more equitable distribution of wealth
and services.
"Poverty can be a political problem," said Mark Malloch Brown, UNDP
Administrator. "This Report shows that there are many countries
where income levels are high enough to end absolute poverty, but
where pockets of deep poverty remain, often because of worrying
patterns of discrimination in the provision of basic services."
The Report introduces the new Millennium Development Compact, which
proposes new global and regional policies to kick-start growth and
reduce poverty. The Report argues that investment in industries and
businesses that create jobs, such as manufacturing and textiles,
are more important for human development than industries that
require large amounts of capital, such as oil exploration and
production. The Report also calls for special initiatives to
support small businesses and entrepreneurs in developing countries.
The Report also calls on developing country governments to
prioritize spending on the basic services that poor people need
most: primary schools, not universities; rural clinics, not
technologically advanced hospitals in big cities. "Poor countries
cannot afford to wait until they are wealthy before they invest in
their people," said Jeffrey Sachs, Special Adviser to the UN
Secretary-General on the Millennium Development Goals, and a guest
contributor to this year's Human Development Report. "This is the
wrong way round. They need rural health clinics, schools, roads,
and safe drinking water and sanitation, so that economic growth can
take root in the first place. Investment in meeting basic needs
isn't just desirable in its own right for ending human suffering,
but it is also a key part of an overall strategy of economic
growth."
The Human Development Report 2003 shows that in many countries
women, the rural poor and ethnic minorities do not get their fair
share of increased social spending. Data shows patterns of
discrimination in terms of access to education, healthcare, safe
water and sanitation. In a majority of the countries in the
developing world with reliable statistics charting health standards
in rural as well as urban areas, progress towards the reduction of
child mortality rates has been notably lower in the countryside
than in cities. It is striking that in Cambodia, for instance,
where 85 percent of the people live in the countryside, only 13
percent of government health workers work in rural areas.
The Millennium Development Goals are based on the premise that
economic growth alone will not rescue the world from the poverty
that entraps more than one billion people. Without addressing
issues like malnutrition and illiteracy that are both causes and
symptoms of poverty, the Goals will not be met. The statistics
today are shaming: More than 13 million children have died through
diarrhoeal disease in the past decade. Each year, over half a
million women, one for every minute of the day, die in pregnancy
and childbirth. More than 800 million suffer from malnutrition.
Many of the solutions to the problems of hunger, disease, and
illiteracy are known such as bed nets to prevent malaria; midwives
to assist labouring women; fertilizers to increase agricultural
productivity; hygiene training to safeguard potable water supplies.
These are hardly high-tech strategies. Yet combined they would save
millions of lives.
Rich Countries Called on to Keep Promise to Fight Global Poverty
Fairer trade, more aid and debt relief critical to solving world's
development crisis
New York, 8 July 2003 Despite the promises by wealthy nations to
eradicate extreme poverty, developing nations still need more aid,
fairer terms of trade, and meaningful debt relief, says the United
Nations Development Programme's Human Development Report 2003.
The Report warns that unless rich countries keep their pledges to
deliver financing for development, the Millennium Development Goals
a series of time-bound, quantifiable targets ranging from halving
poverty to halting the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015 will not be met.
The Millennium Development Goals endorsed by all members of the
United Nations and embraced anew by the Group of Eight leaders in
France last month set out eight specific cross-cutting goals that
are essential to the fight against poverty. The first seven goals
outline what poor countries must do to meet the goals. The eighth
goal is aimed at rich countries and their commitment to respond to
developing countries' political and economic reforms with increased
economic assistance, lowered import barriers and the deduction or
elimination of unsustainable debts.
The Human Development Report 2003 warns that these commitments are
not being met. Unless rich countries keep their pledge to deliver
financing for development, the Millennium Development Goals will
not be met, the UNDP Report states.
"The concept behind a fair deal is for both rich and developing
countries to be held accountable to benchmarks and deadlines," said
Eveline Herfkens, Executive Coordinator of the Millennium
Development Goals' Campaign. "Without rich nations doing their
share, the poor countries will not be able to achieve the Goals."
The Report challenges rich countries to set concrete targets and
deadlines and take action by:
* Dismantling unfair trade subsidies and tariffs to create a level
playing field.
OECD countries provide more than US$300 billion in agricultural
subsidies each year. Subsidies to US cotton growers equal more than
triple the amount of US Government aid to sub-Saharan Africa. In
the European Union, the cash subsidy to every dairy cow exceeds
total per capita EU aid to sub-Saharan Africa. The report urges
rich countries to eliminate the discriminatory tariffs, quotas and
subsidies that inhibit agricultural trade and investment in the
developing world.
* Writing off unsustainable debt.
The Human Development Report 2003 argues that rich countries need
to provide more meaningful debt relief and calls on donor countries
to be more cognizant of the particular debt burdens faced by
heavily indebted poor countries. In all of the world's 42 Highly
Indebted Poor Countries, per capita income is less than $1,500 and
between 1990 and 2001 these economies grew on average by only half
a percent per year.
* Stepping-up aid flows.
Last year the long decline in official aid flows was at last
halted, and they rose to $57 billion (from $52.3 billion in 2001).
At the Monterrey Conference on Financing for Development in 2002,
both rich and poor countries pledged support for the policy reforms
and new resources needed to achieve the Millennium Development
Goals, including a promise to increase annual aid flows by $16
billion by 2006. But even if the commitments announced in Monterrey
are fulfilled, the total will still fall far short of the $100
billion minimum needed per year to meet the goals.
* Creating better access to technological progress.
Only 10 percent of research and development focuses on the health
problems of 90 percent of the world's people. Rich countries have
undermined the right of poor countries to make life-saving drugs
available to their people at affordable prices; a right endorsed by
the World Trade Organization's agreement on Trade-Related Aspects
of Intellectual Property Rights. The Human Development Report 2003
also calls on rich countries to make this right a reality.
Much of the debate around the Goals has focused on whether poor
countries will meet the Millennium targets. The HDR 2003 argues
that rich countries should be subject to the same scrutiny, and be
made to report on their progress towards meeting Goal 8. These
progress reports would contribute to a global poverty reduction
strategy.
"It is not a matter of charity," said the report's lead author,
Sakiko Fukuda- Parr. "Diseases don't respect neat geographical
boundaries, nor do hurricanes or droughts or wars. These are the
shared responsibilities of an increasingly inter-dependent world.
2003 Human Development Index Reveals Development Crisis
21 countries suffered socio-economic reversals in the 1990s
New York, 8 July 2003 The world is facing an acute development
crisis, with many poor nations suffering severe and continuing
socio-economic reversals, warns the Human Development Report 2003.
The Report's annual Human Development Index (HDI), measuring the
progress of nations on key social and economic indicators, shows
that 21 countries experienced declines in the 1990s. In the 1980s,
only four countries tracked by UNDP showed similar decade-long
declines.
"Reversals in HDI are highly unusual as these indicators generally
tend to edge up slowly over time," said Mark Malloch Brown, UNDP
Administrator. "The fact that over the course of the 1990's, 21
countries experienced a decline in some cases a drastic drop
signifies an urgent call for action to address health and education
as well as income levels in these countries."
The 2003 Human Development Index ranks 175 countries for 2001, the
most recent year of available data. The top and the bottom of the
Index remain unchanged from last year: Norway is on top and Sierra
Leone is on the bottom. The Index, developed in 1990, takes stock
of fundamental aspects of human development in countries both rich
and poor. The Index is a composite measure of lifeexpectancy,
education and income per-person.
- Almost all of the "low human development" countries at the bottom
of the Index are in sub-Saharan Africa: 30 out of a total of 34.
- Roughly half of the countries in Latin America and the Caribbean
recorded either a decline or stagnation in income during the 1990s.
- Eastern Europe and Central Asia saw an overall decline in the
2003 Human Development Index resulting from falling per capita
income. The decline was particularly steep in Moldova, Tajikistan,
Russian Federation and the Ukraine.
In sub-Saharan Africa, the devastation of the HIV/AIDS pandemic is
responsible for the declines in the 2003 Human Development Index.
Life expectancy has fallen dramatically with HIV/AIDS incidence
rates as high as one in five in some countries. South Africa, for
instance, fell 28 ranks from 1990 primarily because more people
were dying younger from AIDS-related illnesses. Declines in the
Index for Botswana, Swaziland, Zambia and Zimbabwe tell a similar
story. Yet there was also positive news from the developing world
in the 2003 Human Development Index, with countries from all
continents registering major gains since 1990:
- Benin, Ghana, Mauritius, Rwanda, Senegal and Uganda have all
significantly improved their rankings.
- Bangladesh, China, Laos, Malaysia, Nepal and Thailand also moved
up over the last decade.
- Brazil recorded a big jump in the Human Development Index due
mainly to its education efforts. Bolivia and Peru also improved
their positions as a result of social policy reforms over the same
period.
[Countries showing decline 1980-1990 were: Dem. Rep. of Congo,
Guayna, Rwanda, and Zambia. Countries showing decline 1990-2001
were Armenia, Belarus, Botswana, Burundi, Cameroon, Central Africa
Republic, Congo, Dem. Rep. of Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, Kazakhstan,
Kenya, Lesotho, Moldova, Russia, South Africa, Swaziland,
Tajikstan, Tanzania, Ukraine, Zambia, Zimbabwe.] ...
Signs of Progress [The report cites progress in several countries
as examples of what is possible to achieve; this summary is
excerpted from Chapter 2]
Still, during the 1990s:
- Cape Verde, Mauritius, Mozambique and Uganda averaged per capita
income growth of more than 3% a year.
- Countries in Sub-Saharan Africa achieved some of the world's
sharpest reductions in hunger.Ghana reduced its hunger rate from
35% to 12%, and Mozambique from 69% to 55%.
- Benin increased its primary enrolment rate from 49% to 70%. Mali
and Senegal increased primary enrolment rates by 15 percentage
points or more. Primary completion rates also rose in some of the
poorest countries - in Mali by more than 20 percentage points.
- Many of the poorest countries made good progress towards gender
equality in primary and secondary education. Mauritania led the
pack, increasing the ratio of girls to boys from 67% to 93% between
1990 and 1996. Mali and Nepal narrowed their gaps by 10 percentage
points or more in the 1990s.
- Despite HIV/AIDS, there were some remarkable improvements in
child survival in Sub-Saharan Africa. Guinea reduced its child
mortality rate by 7 percentage points, and Malawi and Niger by 5
percentage points or more. There were also dramatic reductions in
some of the poorest countries in Asia. Bhutan and Lao People's
Democratic Republic reduced under-five deaths from around 16% to
10%, and Bangladesh from 14% to 8%.
- Though HIV/AIDS has generally taken a crushing toll on SubSaharan
Africa, there have been some notable exceptions. Uganda
reduced infection rates for eight consecutive years in the 1990s,
and Zambia may become the second country in the region to reverse
the spread of HIV/AIDS from crisis levels. Senegal has also
prevented the spread of the disease.
- Cote d'Ivoire and Mali increased the proportion of people with
access to safe water by 10 percentage points or more. In addition,
Ghana and Senegal increased the proportion of people with access to
improved sanitation by 10 percentage points or more.
HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX 2003
The HDI measures achievements in terms of life expectancy,
educational attainment and adjusted real income
Note: African countries in italic and marked with *
High human development
1 Norway
2 Iceland
3 Sweden
4 Australia
5 Netherlands
6 Belgium
7 United States
8 Canada
9 Japan
10 Switzerland
11 Denmark
12 Ireland
13 United Kingdom
14 Finland
15 Luxembourg
16 Austria
17 France
18 Germany
19 Spain
20 New Zealand
21 Italy
22 Israel
23 Portugal
24 Greece
25 Cyprus
26 Hong Kong,China (SAR)
27 Barbados
28 Singapore
29 Slovenia
30 Korea,Rep. of
31 Brunei Darussalam
32 Czech Republic
33 Malta
34 Argentina
35 Poland
36 Seychelles*
37 Bahrain
38 Hungary
39 Slovakia
40 Uruguay
41 Estonia
42 Costa Rica
43 Chile
44 Qatar
45 Lithuania
46 Kuwait
47 Croatia
48 United Arab Emirates
49 Bahamas
50 Latvia
51 Saint Kitts and Nevis
52 Cuba
53 Belarus
54 Trinidad and Tobago
55 Mexico
Medium Human Development
56 Antigua and Barbuda
57 Bulgaria
58 Malaysia
59 Panama
60 Macedonia,TFYR
61 Libyan Arab Jamahiriya*
62 Mauritius*
63 Russian Federation
64 Colombia
65 Brazil
66 Bosnia and Herzegovina
67 Belize
68 Dominica
69 Venezuela
70 Samoa (Western)
71 Saint Lucia
72 Romania
73 Saudi Arabia
74 Thailand
75 Ukraine
76 Kazakhstan
77 Suriname
78 Jamaica
79 Oman
80 St.Vincent and the Grenadines
81 Fiji
82 Peru
83 Lebanon
84 Paraguay
85 Philippines
86 Maldives
87 Turkmenistan
88 Georgia
89 Azerbaijan
90 Jordan
91 Tunisia*
92 Guyana
93 Grenada
94 Dominican Republic
95 Albania
96 Turkey
97 Ecuador
98 Occupied Palestinian Territories
99 Sri Lanka
100 Armenia
101 Uzbekistan
102 Kyrgyzstan
103 Cape Verde*
104 China
105 El Salvador
106 Iran, Islamic Rep. of
107 Algeria*
108 Moldova,Rep.of
109 Viet Nam
110 Syrian Arab Republic
111 South Africa*
112 Indonesia
113 Tajikistan
114 Bolivia
115 Honduras
116 Equatorial Guinea*
117 Mongolia
118 Gabon*
119 Guatemala
120 Egypt*
121 Nicaragua
122 Sao Tome and Principe*
123 Solomon Islands
124 Namibia*
125 Botswana*
126 Morocco*
127 India
128 Vanuatu
129 Ghana*
130 Cambodia
131 Myanmar
132 Papua New Guinea
133 Swaziland*
134 Comoros*
135 Lao People's Dem.Rep.
136 Bhutan
137 Lesotho*
138 Sudan*
139 Bangladesh
140 Congo*
141 Togo*
Low human development
142 Cameroon*
143 Nepal
144 Pakistan
145 Zimbabwe*
146 Kenya*
147 Uganda*
148 Yemen
149 Madagascar*
150 Haiti
151 Gambia*
152 Nigeria*
153 Djibouti*
154 Mauritania*
155 Eritrea*
156 Senegal*
157 Guinea*
158 Rwanda*
159 Benin*
160 Tanzania, U.Rep. of*
161 Cote d'Ivoire*
162 Malawi*
163 Zambia*
164 Angola*
165 Chad*
166 Guinea-Bissau*
167 Congo,Dem.Rep. of the*
168 Central African Republic*
169 Ethiopia*
170 Mozambique*
171 Burundi*
172 Mali*
173 Burkina Faso*
174 Niger*
175 Sierra Leone*
+++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
Date distributed (ymd): 030727
Region: Continent-Wide
Issue Areas: +economy/development+
The Africa Action E-Journal is a free information service
provided by Africa Action, including both original
commentary and reposted documents. Africa Action provides this
information and analysis in order to promote U.S. and
international policies toward Africa that advance economic,
political and social justice and the full spectrum of
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