Global Issues. Kristen A. Hite
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Название: Global Issues
Автор: Kristen A. Hite
Издательство: John Wiley & Sons Limited
Жанр: Социология
isbn: 9781119538486
isbn:
How did the world do in achieving the first Millennium Development Goal – a goal, by the way, unprecedented in the world’s history? As we have seen from the information presented above, China and India are doing quite well, but the same cannot be said for many other countries. Take the time to read the following paragraph from the Millennium Development Goals Report 2015 by the United Nations, as it presents a good summary of the world’s progress up to that date in achieving this goal:
The world economy continues to grow at a modest pace. Growth of world gross product is projected to accelerate slightly from 2.6 per cent in 2014 to 2.8 per cent in 2015—a downward revision by 0.3 percentage points from the forecast presented in the World Economic Situation and Prospects 2015 in January. In 2016, global growth is forecast to improve to 3.1 per cent. There are still considerable downside risks to the baseline forecast, related to the upcoming move towards monetary policy normalization in the United States, ongoing uncertainties in the euro area, potential spillovers from geopolitical conflicts and persistent vulnerabilities in emerging economies. The overall subdued performance of the world economy since the global financial crisis has raised concerns of a “new normal” of lower growth, especially in view of a broad‐based weakness in investment.
Plate 2.1 Poverty in Indonesia
Source: World Bank.
The downward revision in global growth for 2015 reflects mainly a deteriorating outlook in the economies in transition and several large developing countries, especially in South America. Gross domestic product (GDP) in the economies in transition is projected to contract by 2 per cent this year, while average growth in developing countries is expected to remain at 4.4 per cent, about 3 percentage points below the pre‐crisis pace. The growth divergence between the various regions is widening in 2015. This can be partly attributed to the differing impacts from the recent drop in the prices of oil and other commodities.24
By 2014, the Millennium Development Goal of halving the extreme poverty rate had been met: by 2010, 700 million fewer people lived on $1.25 per day than in 1990.25 While much of the world still lives in extreme poverty and hunger, this successful reduction can point to a glass‐half‐full outlook.
Then in 2015, nations adopted a new and more ambitious 15‐year target under the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals: ending poverty by 2030. Optimists cite the information above as reasons to believe this is achievable; however, pessimists question whether this goal is genuinely achievable.
A Pessimistic View: The Persistence of Poverty
Now, here’s some information for the pessimist. The United Nations claimed in 2014 that about 1 in 8 people in the world, or 827 million people, endured chronic hunger between 2011 and 2013, and 1 in 4 children, or about 160 million, suffered from chronic undernutrition in 2012.26 In 2018, the United Nations reported that chronic hunger rose to approximately 1 in 9 people in the world.27 We review this in more detail in Chapter 4.
As illustrated in Figure 2.5, over 700 million people still live in extreme poverty.28 From 2012 to 2014, 11 percent of the global population, or about 770 million, still lacked clean drinking water and 2.5 billion lacked adequate sanitation (Goal 6 of the Sustainable Development Goals).29 About 1.2 billion had no electricity.30 (We return to discussions on clean drinking water, electricity, and sanitation in subsequent chapters of the book.) In 2015, about 47.18 million people living in East Asia and the Pacific lived in extreme poverty, as did about 7.15 million in Europe and Central Asia, 25.90 million in Latin America and the Caribbean, 18.64 million in the Middle East and North Africa, and 413.25 million in sub‐Saharan Africa. In 2013, about 274.49 million in South Asia lived in extreme poverty.31
Plate 2.2 The weight of poverty falls heavily on children in poorer nations
Source: United Nations.
A depressing number of countries (46) actually became poorer in the 1990s.32 Many of these were in Africa and a few were in Latin America and in Europe and Central Asia. In Africa many of the countries growing poorer are in sub‐Saharan Africa and are being hit by an HIV/AIDS epidemic, among other problems, while in Europe and Central Asia parts of the former Soviet Union found the transition to becoming an independent country difficult. For many the path from a planned, state‐managed economy to a freer economy was filled with obstacles.
Figure 2.5 Number of extremely poor individuals by region
Source: The World Bank. “http://iresearch.worldbank.org/PovcalNet/povDuplicateWB.aspx
Where are the world’s poor? Figure 2.5 shows that the world’s poor are concentrated in Africa, East Asia, and South Asia, with a particularly high concentration in sub‐Saharan Africa. Within regions and countries, the poor tend to be concentrated in rural areas with a high density of population, such as on the Ganges plain in India and on the island of Java in Indonesia. Although urban poverty is a growing problem due to demographic migration toward cities, 76 percent of extreme poverty occurred in the rural areas of the poorer countries as of 2013.33 Part of this is due to how poverty is defined, part is due to differences between rural and urban livelihoods, and part is due to disparities in economic opportunities.
Figures 2.6 and 2.7 show an interesting contrast in the poverty situation. From 1990 to 2015, the proportion of those in two of the poorest regions in the world – sub‐Saharan Africa and South Asia – who were living in extreme poverty actually decreased, while at the same time the number of people in both regions living in extreme poverty increased. Do you know why it was this way? As we will see in СКАЧАТЬ