Rural poverty in North Africa is similar to rural poverty in South Africa, though the national poverty line varies dramatically. According to Rural Poverty Portal, this includes the differences between 6% in Tunisia and 90% in Somalia. North-African economies are in dire straits.
Poverty-ridden people, they said, “constitute about one third of Tunisia’s poor population, and about three fourths of Somalia’s poor.” However, poverty in Northern Africa is still concentrated in rural areas.
This has deep causes such as the limited availability of “good arable land and water,” and “the impact of droughts and floods.” Conflict has similarly disrupted agriculture and thus intensified poverty, especially in Somalia and Sudan.
Algeria is a country in Northern Africa whose economy is dominated by the state, according to the CIA World Factbook.
“Hydrocarbons have long been the backbone of the economy,” the Factbook explains, “Accounting for roughly 60 percent of budget revenues, 30 percent of GDP (gross domestic product) and over 95 percent of export earnings.”
This hydrocarbon exportation has brought relative “macroeconomic stability, with foreign currency reserves approaching $200 billion.”
Despite Algeria’s relative stability, things such as transportation and a stable social infrastructure remain obstacles for Northern Africa. High rates of illiteracy, especially among women, also negatively affect the economy.
Rural Poverty Portal furthermore illustrated that the northern region of the continent has “weak local institutions, poor integration with the national economy, and the migration of rural youth to urban areas.”
However, the urban areas in Northern Africa hold the most political influence. “Government policies and investments in the region tend to favor urban areas over rural areas,” they said.
Just south of Algeria lies Niger, a land-locked, Sub-Saharan nation. Though it shares a border with Algeria, a relatively stable African country, it has a very low income – less than $250 USD gross national income per capita, according to the World Bank Development Indicators as of 2005.
Moreover, CIA World Factbook states that Niger qualified for “enhanced debt relief under the International Monetary Fund program for Highly Indebted Poor Countries.” This significantly reduced Niger’s debt and annual obligations, and freed up funds for “basic healthcare, primary education, HIV/AIDS prevention, rural infrastructure and other programs geared at poverty reduction.”
The Factbook said that food security remains a problem in Niger, and is enhanced by refugees from Mali.
Sixty-three percent of the population lives below the poverty line, according to the most recent data which was gathered in 1993.
Northern Africa has a wide disparity between the very poor and the middle-class. Though some countries are more stable than others, education, food stability, access to clean water and social stability remain significant obstacles for the reduction of African poverty as a whole.
– Alycia Rock
Sources: Encyclopedia Britannica, BBC, Rural Poverty Portal, Central Intelligence Agency
Photo: Reuters
UN Economic and Social Council
On January 23, 1946, the first session of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) was held. Almost 68 years later, ECOSOC is still grappling with the world’s economic, social and environmental challenges. The broad categorization is daunting, especially since the Council and its subsidiary bodies are responsible for about 70 percent of the entire U.N. human and financial resources. The span of ECOSOC encompasses economic, social, cultural, educational and health concerns, according to the U.N. Charter. The Council’s subsidiary bodies demonstrate the diversity under ECOSOC’s umbrella of responsibility: U.N. Forum on Forests, Commission on Narcotic Drugs, Commission for Social Development, and the various regional commissions.
The U.N. General Assembly elects the 54 member-governments, with each region allocated a certain number of seats. The U.S.’ three year term began in 2012 and will end in 2015. The Colombian representative is currently President, with four Vice-Presidents from Albania, Austria, Pakistan and Sudan. The year 2013 has seen major reform efforts from the Council, aiming to make ECOSOC more effective, more issues-oriented, and more responsive. For example, the Commission on Sustainable Development held its final session in September after it was slated to be dismantled due to lack of progress in its sector. The chairperson acknowledged that though the Commission greatly influenced the 21st century environmental goals, it did not create the change sought out by the larger Council.
As a result of its extensive areas of focus, ECOSOC is one of the most important humanitarian bodies in the United Nations. One of the early acts by ECOSOC was to adopt the Commission on Human Rights’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, an early stepping-stone in the path to equality. The current reforms mark an important return to an issue-centered approach that many hope will lead to greater progress in the subsidiary bodies’ foci.
– Katey Baker-Smith
Sources: UN News Centre, UNISDR
Malaria: The Enemy
What is Malaria?
Malaria is a life-threatening blood disease caused by a parasite known as plasmodium. This parasite is transmitted to human by the anopheles mosquito. An infected person of this disease shows signs of dizziness, loss of appetite, anemic, high fevers, dehydration and loss of body weight.
The History of Malaria: The word malaria comes from the 18th century Italian “mala” meaning “bad” and “aria” meaning “air”. Most likely the term was first used by Dr. Francisco Torti in Italy, where people thought the disease was caused by foul air in marshy areas. It was not until the 1880’s that scientists discovered that malaria was a parasitic disease.
The Socioeconomic Effect of Malaria: Malaria kills a child somewhere in the world every minute; it infects approximately 219 million people each year with an estimated 660,000 deaths mostly being children in Africa. Ninety percent of malaria death occurs in Africa. It is one of the most dreadful diseases reducing the populace on the large scale. The sickness also contributed greatly to anemia among children-a major cause of poor growth and development.
Malaria also has some serious economic impact in Africa, slowing economic growth and development and perpetuating the vicious cycle of poverty. Malaria is truly a disease of poverty afflicting primarily the poor who tend to live in malaria-prone rural areas. Nevertheless, the rich cannot be left out with the infection of this sickness.
Prevention and Control: Malaria, many say, is no respecter of person. Irrespective of one’s social status, malaria can indeed infect many people. It is in this light that people must take precautionary measures to protect themselves, family and friends from this dreadful sickness. Those living in malaria prone regions like Ghana should make sure they follow certain precautions, some of which are as follows:
Get Involved in the Fight Against Malaria: It is high time all stakeholders globally, be it governments agencies, health institutions, policy makers, developmental agencies and individuals, get involved in the fight against Malaria. Government and other developmental agencies should formulate realistic policies, carry them out, monitor the progress of these implementations and evaluate their final outcomes.
These programs, in effect, when implemented, will help the fight against malaria and help improve the living conditions of the rural poor. Just as the adage goes, “brighten the corner where you are” the individual cannot be left out in the fight as well. Gutters or drains and the environment need to be free from the breeding of mosquitoes and as such, the onus also lies on us as individuals to practice personal and community hygiene. People should not wait for government agencies and other non-governmental organizations to help clean their environments; they must take responsibility of their actions and outcomes and ensure they genuinely support the fight against poverty through the prevention and control of malaria.
– William Annang
Sources: UNICEF, Medical News Today
Photo: The Guardian
Poverty, Poor Health and Access to Healthcare
It is an obvious fact that living in poverty makes one more vulnerable, less secure and more likely to need assistance. When combating poverty issues of health and accessibility to health care providers in a crucial factor in creating the stability that helps people leave poverty and with appropriate polices to prevent future poverty crisis.
In the United States, it is clear that many have fallen into poverty. The U.S. Census Bureau’s annual report on poverty provides clear evidence that more Americans are struggling financially. Nearly 46 million people, which would be 14.6 percent of the population, are living in poverty. Of that, hundreds of thousands of these people were once counted among the middle class. Something beyond employment and GDP has effected security in the U.S. and made it difficult to not be impoverished.
When comparing the U.S. with other wealthy countries, the U.S. has one of the highest reported numbers of people living in poverty. Additionally, Americans also face a high risk of becoming poor. The disparity begs for answers.
When countries do not protect rights and basic securities it often leads to a poorly functioning economy and a poor standard of living. States that do not have affordable health care have high rates of poverty. High rates of economic growth or their level of wealth cannot circumvent the absence of human rights protections and the statistics reflect that.
With such high costs of coverage and access, it is not surprising that the new census report also shows that 16.7 percent of Americans are without health insurance. The passage of the Affordable Care Act has brought this discussion of the value of human health to the forefront, and is the first major piece of anti-poverty legislation in decades.
The ACA mandates that quality healthcare must be provided to all Americans no matter what their income level is. In addition to accessible healthcare for those in need, the bill also reaffirms the belief that health care is a human right.
The health insecurity of the poor puts everyone at risk and the lack of care is trapping people in systemic poverty and risking lives that could otherwise be saved. When people live in extreme poverty they a more frequently and severely ill and face greater complications with more demands on an already over-burdened healthcare system.
Unless we can contain this spiral out of the cycle of poverty it will only continue. Job creation offers security through employment; however it cannot make a sick individual a healthy worker, and cannot always cover the high costs of health treatments and coverage.
The causes of poverty are varied and not always identified. Unless poverty is fought simultaneously from multiple points of vulnerability, it is not a winnable fight. With affordable accessible healthcare is provided along with increased social services, benefits and job creation, there are enough steps for individuals to finally leave poverty and find the security to participate economically and thrive.
– Nina Verfaillie
Feature Writer
Sources: Huffington Post, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, CNN
Photo: The Economist
Cambodian Garment Worker Clash Turns Deadly
One bystander was killed and 20 people were injured when police clashed with protesting garment workers in Phnom Penh, Cambodia on November 12, 2013.
Workers at the SL Garment Processing Ltd. Factory, one of the largest in Cambodia and a supplier to many western brands including Gap and H&M, marched from the factory towards Prime Minister Hun Sen’s Phnom Pehn home to protest unfair wages and poor factory conditions. They were, however, blocked by police at Stung Meanchey bridge. Reports differ on which side started the violence, which escalated to more than 100 police officers firing tear gas, rubber bullets and live ammunition into the crowd, who were armed mainly with rocks and sticks. Police arrested 37 people, including seven monks, who were later released.
The march marked the three-month anniversary of 4,000 workers walking out of the SL factory to protest the presence of armed military police, which they viewed as an intimidation tactic meant to expel unions. Company shareholder Meas Sotha incited rage among workers with his claim that police were only there to protect the factory. SL 2 joined the strike, demanding raised salaries as well as a $3 per day lunch stipend and Sotha’s ousting.
Conditions in Cambodia’s more than 500 garment factories, though better than in some areas of the nation, are dismal. Wages are low—workers at SL, for example, make just $75 monthly—and factories are unsafe, with poor ventilation, recent collapses and regular fainting masses of malnourished workers. About 500,000 Cambodians work in garment and shoe factories, supporting the industry that accounts for 80% of the country’s exports. In 2012 alone, Cambodia exported $4.45 billion in products to the United States and Europe.
The protests erupted at a time of international attention on the garment industry following several deadly incidents at factories in Bangladesh, including a factory collapse at Rana Plaza that killed over 1,100 people in April. According to the New York Times, many multinational organizations are now looking to Cambodia as an alternative to factory locations in Bangladesh. Unfortunately, in Cambodia, strikes are frequent, though factory concessions are small and rare.
Workers at Alim Cambodia Co. Ltd. blocked a road in Phnom Phen on November 13, 2013 also protesting for higher wages. The demonstration was short-lived, breaking up due to rain when protestors became concerned they would get sick. The Alim protestors were demanding a $1 lunch stipend, and were angry that the factory was paying new workers $93 monthly to their $89.
The Cambodian government has made few efforts to back garment workers, and seems largely indifferent to workers’ rights. In fact, government-official-mediated talks about wages between unions and SL ended in a deadlock. Although the Cambodian People’s Party raised the monthly minimum wage from $61 to $75 earlier this year, reports by the local Community Legal Education Center and United Kingdom-based organization Labour Behind the Label found that a single garment worker needs at least $150 monthly to cover basic needs.
The United Nation’s International Labor Organization (ILO) released a report calling for the compliance of the Cambodian government and garment companies in improving workplace conditions in the garment industry, specifically concerning fire safety, child labor as well as worker safety and health. The ILO also announced in September it plans to continue the practice of “naming and shaming” factories that violate the law.
– Sarah Morrison
Sources: The New York Times, NPR, The Cambodia Daily: Garment Worker Clash, The Cambodia Daily: Protest, AlJazeera, AlJazeera America
North-African Economies
Rural poverty in North Africa is similar to rural poverty in South Africa, though the national poverty line varies dramatically. According to Rural Poverty Portal, this includes the differences between 6% in Tunisia and 90% in Somalia. North-African economies are in dire straits.
Poverty-ridden people, they said, “constitute about one third of Tunisia’s poor population, and about three fourths of Somalia’s poor.” However, poverty in Northern Africa is still concentrated in rural areas.
This has deep causes such as the limited availability of “good arable land and water,” and “the impact of droughts and floods.” Conflict has similarly disrupted agriculture and thus intensified poverty, especially in Somalia and Sudan.
Algeria is a country in Northern Africa whose economy is dominated by the state, according to the CIA World Factbook.
“Hydrocarbons have long been the backbone of the economy,” the Factbook explains, “Accounting for roughly 60 percent of budget revenues, 30 percent of GDP (gross domestic product) and over 95 percent of export earnings.”
This hydrocarbon exportation has brought relative “macroeconomic stability, with foreign currency reserves approaching $200 billion.”
Despite Algeria’s relative stability, things such as transportation and a stable social infrastructure remain obstacles for Northern Africa. High rates of illiteracy, especially among women, also negatively affect the economy.
Rural Poverty Portal furthermore illustrated that the northern region of the continent has “weak local institutions, poor integration with the national economy, and the migration of rural youth to urban areas.”
However, the urban areas in Northern Africa hold the most political influence. “Government policies and investments in the region tend to favor urban areas over rural areas,” they said.
Just south of Algeria lies Niger, a land-locked, Sub-Saharan nation. Though it shares a border with Algeria, a relatively stable African country, it has a very low income – less than $250 USD gross national income per capita, according to the World Bank Development Indicators as of 2005.
Moreover, CIA World Factbook states that Niger qualified for “enhanced debt relief under the International Monetary Fund program for Highly Indebted Poor Countries.” This significantly reduced Niger’s debt and annual obligations, and freed up funds for “basic healthcare, primary education, HIV/AIDS prevention, rural infrastructure and other programs geared at poverty reduction.”
The Factbook said that food security remains a problem in Niger, and is enhanced by refugees from Mali.
Sixty-three percent of the population lives below the poverty line, according to the most recent data which was gathered in 1993.
Northern Africa has a wide disparity between the very poor and the middle-class. Though some countries are more stable than others, education, food stability, access to clean water and social stability remain significant obstacles for the reduction of African poverty as a whole.
– Alycia Rock
Sources: Encyclopedia Britannica, BBC, Rural Poverty Portal, Central Intelligence Agency
Photo: Reuters
Cancer Cases at All Time High
According to the World Health Organization, Cancer cases are soaring each year. Data indicates an upward trend from 12.7 million cases in 2008 to 14 million in 2012. Cancer related deaths have also increased from 7.6 million to 8.3 million since 2008. With these growing rates, there is a desperate need for advances in diagnosis and detection of cancer.
An IARC report has shown a connection between increased smoking, obesity and cancer rates. This report also predicts a rise in cancer cases to 19.3 million by 2025. Several types of cancer kill every year but the most common cancer affecting thousands of women worldwide and is a leading cause of deaths in developing countries is attributed to breast cancer.
Developed countries do not have the clinical advances required to stop the disease at an early stage. Several people living below the poverty level don’t even know they have breast cancer since clinics are scarce. The Word Health Organization has also claimed this urgency for treatment of breast cancer in developing countries as thousands die from late detection. In 2012, around 522,000 women from around the globe died of this disease. Lung cancer is also among the top most common cancers worldwide, about 13% of total cancer cases. The large amount of lung cancer rates has been linked to both increased smoking from adults and young adults alike. Longer lifespans also contributes to these spiking rates according to the BBC.
Several health leaders from IARC believe that these growing cancer rates can be changed through preemptive action seen before with cervical cancer and access to the HPV vaccination. They hope that national programs for screening can produce similar excellent results and by giving easy access to treatment or detection centers, several will be able to beat other forms of cancer.
– Maybelline Martez
Sources: BBC, NY Daily News, Global Post
Photo: Giphy.com
American Sentiment Toward Global Poverty
Though the United States is one of the wealthiest nations in the world, the country ranks poorly when it comes to aid and contributions to global poverty. In a ranked global list of 27 developed countries, the United States tied for 19. This gap in aid can be explained by the belief that Americans care more about helping people geographically near them than helping people who live further away.
A study conducted by the Center for Global Development established a “Commitment to Development” Index which measures the contributions of developed countries to less-developed nations around the world. The study also splits aid into 6 different sectors in order to account for every kind of assistance given by countries.
The security sector of the study, for example, deducts points from countries that give weapons to unstable or tyrannical governments. The study concluded that the United States does less than the average developed country to help underdeveloped nations, resulting from the lack of attention given to people residing in further countries.
Furthermore, a study conducted by a PhD student at Stanford found a clear correlation between citizens’ support for foreign aid and the amount of aid given by their country. In the United States, many people are very generous and give public and private donations at high levels; however, these donations are directed to fellow Americans. As it stands, a majority of Americans support donating to their fellow citizens and cutting aid in the form of food and money to foreigners.
Both studies go far in explaining the low levels of aid given by the United States of America to foreign nations. In order to increase the amount of aid given to foreign nations, the United States will have to change its attitude, thus allowing for a positive affect on the amount of aid donated overseas.
– Lienna Feleke-Eshete
Sources: Think Progress, Center for Global Development
Federal Poverty Level: Its Affects on the Economy
The federal poverty level is a measure that is often cited yet seldom is it fully understood. Currently, the federal poverty level is considered to be at about a $15,000 yearly income per two-person families and, of which, the extreme poverty threshold is set to households that are living on less than $2 per day. This definition is fairly controversial, and has been subject to change over the years based on a number of factors. However, it is a key concept to understand, and not just for domestic policy but foreign affairs as well.
The federal poverty level, or threshold, has been in effect in its current state since the Kennedy Administration. According to a paper by economist, Gordon M. Fisher, the level was initiated in order to understand the risks of living in poverty and the affects of poverty on different groups of people. During the Johnson Administration, the level was used as a target; particularly, during the administration’s War on Poverty.
The level was developed based on the cost of food for families at the time and what kind of nutritional diet a family would be able to have at different levels. Under the first calculation of this threshold, done by an economist working for the Social Security Administration, the threshold was determined at $1,988 yearly income per two-person households.
Since its creation, while a number of revisions have occurred since the first set of calculations, the formula to determine the level has been an important factor in U.S. policy decisions. When looking at global poverty, the extreme poverty measure is particularly important for the threshold has been used to set goals for anti-poverty measures.
The Millennium Project is one such measure that uses the federal poverty level calculations to influence foreign policy. The project has a number of goals to keep the global economy move forward, but listed first on these goals is the effort to “eradicate extreme hunger and poverty.” These goals were set in 1990 with initial targets set to hit these goals.
The initial target for the extreme poverty goal was to halve extreme poverty by 2015. Reminiscent of Johnson’s War on Poverty, this goal looked to drive the force for a greater world society. The goal actually was estimated to have been reached by 2008, an achievement that was praised as a major success for the Millennium Project.
Despite the fact that poverty levels are used by programs like the War on Poverty and the Millennium Project, the poverty threshold has a number of critics. Popular criticisms are that the threshold is too low, as it still uses calculations from the 1960s, and are applied indiscriminately to very different regions. Alternative poverty measures have been proposed by state governments and by groups such as the National Academy of Sciences. Unfortunately, none have yet been adopted.
Federal poverty levels are important to understand considering they are most often used in discussions surrounding poverty. The measures influence policy decisions and are used to track the path of the U.S. economy. The indications are that extreme poverty is going down across the world, but what this says about actual poverty and what it says about the way it is measured could be debated in some corners.
– Eric Gustafsson
Sources: The New Yorker, Huffington Post, UN Millennium Project, Social Security Administration, Center for American Progress
The Business Solution to Global Poverty
Almost three billion people live on less than $2 dollars per day. Paul Polak, one of the co-authors of the Business Solution to Poverty: Designing Products and Services for Three Billion New Customers (Berrett-Koehler Publishers 2013), believes that social entrepreneurship is the solution to ending global poverty.
From a marketing standpoint, those 2.8 billion people represent an enormous international market that is not being utilized in the economy. Innovation and technological advancements in the world of supply and demand could put products on the market that are affordable to those nearly three billion people. With a market of that size, anyone is bound to enjoy capital gain as well as improve the lives of countless people in need.
Author Paul Polak founded a business to sell cheap irrigation pumps to farmers in Bangladesh to increase their access to clean, healthy drinking water. The market for the water pumps raised the average income of the farmers by $150 million dollars a year. Contaminated water systems spread disease quickly to a massive amount of people, contributing to the ‘water crisis’ that plagues societies around the world.
What is the water crisis? Countries with no access to clean water are more heavily riddled with disease, rendering them unable to work and contribute to the economy. Medical treatment is expensive even for people who are working, so the inability to work combined with the need for disease treatment puts a heavy financial strain on a massive number of people- all because their drinking water is basically poisoning them. Unclean water spreads disease and consequently causes the economy to get stuck in a downward spiral deeper into poverty and distress. Of the 3.4 million water, sanitation, and hygiene-related deaths that occur annually, 99% in the developing world.
Polak believes that selling affordable products that improve the lives of people in developing countries could benefit both the entrepreneurs marketing these products and the customers who are buying them. The Business Solution to Poverty outlines how companies focusing on the market in developing countries could bring an end to global poverty in approximately 30 years.
Another book called, “Thirty Years to Peace,” that more extensively details the business solution to global poverty timeline, is reported to be released in the next year. America has the wealth and manpower to launch these initiatives and the fact that it is a hugely profitable market should make it attractive to executives across the nation. There is no downside to ending global poverty through business ventures.
– Kaitlin Sutherby
Sources: Philstar, Project Humanity, Forbes
Photo: Giphy.com
Overpopulation and Public Health
There is much debate whether overpopulation poses public health risks. Some believe it is the cause of hunger and poverty throughout the world while others feel that it has never been a problem. It is important to shed light on this fear of overpopulation as its consequences are said to be evident in all developing countries.
Several reports about Africa’s growing population has been connected to the starvation of millions of people. Every year 32.5 percent of children in developing countries suffer from malnutrition. Sustainable population advocates have pointed to the approximate 200 million hunger-related deaths in the past twenty years. Deterioration in global biodiversity has also been linked to overpopulation. Substantial data of species loss has been presented by countries such as China, Brazil and Mexico. Human settlements that are gradually increasing according to the rate of population is said to ruin the benefits of nature and destroy habitats. The consequences of overpopulation is also suggested in access to education, primarily in Africa. In African classrooms, children are unable to learn due to overcrowding. Access to water, medical care and housing are all diminished when there are more people that require aid. Data from the United Nations further suggests that by 2050, 10 percent to 15 percent of land that is farmed today will not be available. This could potentially lead to a food crisis as the current population increases at a faster rate.
Those supporting a sustainable population see hope in public policies being employed in countries such as Bangladesh, Iran and Thailand. Results from securing social services to women and families indicate a large decrease in undernourished people in Asia, from 23.7 percent to 13.9 percent. This downward trend from simply giving access to birth control and adopting policies that give aid to small families suggests that overpopulation is an issue that can be solved. Policies that provide family planning to those in remote, rural areas in Asia has led to stability in undernourishment over time. By merely shifting the focus on public policy these countries quickly witnessed better health standards, quality of education and housing availability, all of which offer hope to the remaining developing nations.
– Maybelline Martez
Sources: Scientific American, Huffington Post, World Hunger