The Comoros consists of four islands located in the Indian Ocean near Madagascar and Mozambique. Affectionately calling their country Masiwa, or “the islands”, the population totals to 1,080,000 citizens. The country, among several other small island states, is considered underdeveloped. Although the country gained independence in 1975, political and institutional crises created sustained instability.
In 2012, the Union of the Comoros, under the leadership of the newest president, Dr. Ikililou Dhoinine, drafted an official Poverty Reduction Strategy, highlighting six distinct goals to reducing their nation’s poverty.
1. Stabilize the economy by building a foundation for strong equity.
Although the external debt of the Comoros is said to remain unsustainable, the country’s external trade has increased from 47.8% in 2010 to 52% in 2011, increasing imports from 8.9% in 2010 to 9.1% in 2011.
2. Strengthen profitable sectors, including institution building and participation of private economic operators.
The Comorian government has set a priority to repair highly damaged roads including 17 km on Ngazidja, 17 km on Ndzouani, and 6.5 km on Mwali, among other main highway repairs.
3. Strengthen governance and social cohesion.
Studies on citizenship, prejudice, discrimination, the roles of women and youth in society, the establishment of 16 peace committees, introducing biometrics into the electoral process, and the institutionalization of a national commission to fight corruption.
4. Improve the health of citizens.
According to the recently drafted strategy, 300 households are currently benefiting from implemented sanitation programs, far surpassing the target set in 2011. A sanitary water network has reached 23 km, active in Djando on Mohéli, Domoni, and Sima on Anjouan.
Fighting against avoidable illnesses has also made significant progress. Through obtaining instruments and equipment, support for training programs, and the installation and management of vaccine distribution. Comorians were able to see high percentages of vaccination effectiveness per antigen.
5. Promote education and vocational training.
The main objective in education was to improve access to educational institutions per capita. Enrollment in professional and vocational roles reported an increase from 3% in 2010 to 8% in 2011. Although this rate is lower than the projected improvement of 15%, there has been a significant increase in admissions at the University of the Comoros.
6. Promote environmental sustainability and civil society.
Priority zones for biodiversity conservation resulted in the completion of five inventories of flora and fauna, exceeding the 2011 forecast. 1,531 citizens were educated in several areas of agricultural management, complying with government-instated goals for sustainable use of renewable resources.
Although one out of two people in the Comoros is considered poor, the Comorian government is taking active steps to reduce their poverty and improve the lives of their citizens.
– Kali Faulwetter
Sources: IMF, Every Culture, Maps of World
Zambian Government Praises USAID Health Programs
A Zambian Government official, Bert Mushala, praised the American government for its foreign aid initiatives at the launch of two new USAID health programs in Zambia in June. According to USAID Mission director for Zambia, Susan Brems, the two projects, Thrive and Mawa, are aimed at strengthening nutrition within small farming households and with those living with HIV. The initiatives would also focus on enhancing economic opportunities for poor households, encouraging crop diversification.
The Thrive and Mawa programs, funded by USAID and the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), would benefit 21,500 people in the Eastern Province of Zambia. This runs parallel to USAID’s Feed the Future program which is aimed at assisting 200,000 smallholder farming households rise out of poverty, decreasing the percentage of malnourished children, and augmenting the production and consumption of nutritious crops. Zambia was selected as a Feed the Future country because of its vast capability for agricultural growth, along with its large food insecurity.
The Feed the Future program and the Thrive and Mawa programs are all focused around the Eastern Province due to the high prevalence of poverty there. As the Eastern Province Permanent Secretary Bert Mushala has witnessed USAID health programs in this poor region of Zambia and commended USAID’s support of Zambia.
USAID’s programs in Zambia, working under the US Global Health Initiative, have several other focuses besides nutrition and empowering small farmers. Under PEPFAR, USAID works with the Ministry of Health to prevent mother-to -child transmission of HIV. The amount of infants born with HIV has dropped from 39 percent in 2005 to 5 percent in 2010, and over 400,000 Zambians are now on regular antiretroviral treatments for HIV. USAID has also addressed gender-based violence and supported over 500,000 orphans and vulnerable children.
These USAID health programs in Zambia are all part of a larger network of the USAID initiatives in Zambia. USAID also focuses on economic growth, education, and creating a just and democratic government in the country. These initiatives have led to a longer life expectancy for Zambians along with 12 straight years of notable economic growth. As a country that has such potential for growth, particularly in agriculture, a prosperous Zambia is crucial to stability in a region which includes the war torn Democratic Republic of the Congo.
– Martin Drake
Source: USAID
Photo: USAID
Food Aid Reform Act: The Facts
On Wednesday, June 12 discussions continued on Capitol Hill in an attempt to push forward a modernization of US international food aid policy according to the Guardian’s Cydney Hargis. HR 1983, the Food Aid Reform Act, would remove laws requiring US food aid to be grown in the United States and then shipped to the receiving countries. Instead, it would allow food aid to be purchased in areas local to the countries receiving it. The impact of the Food Aid Reform Act would be twofold: it would eliminate the time and costs required to ship the food, and it would further stimulate the economies of countries or regions that are receiving US food aid.
Under the Food Aid Reform Act, aid could reach the receiving country up to 14 weeks sooner, giving up to 4 million people better access to food. It would also significantly decrease transportation costs of US food aid, which make up 50 percent of the US food aid budget. Right now US food aid has to travel 7,000 miles to reach its destination and that food chain is vulnerable, especially in conflict zones such as what we are seeing right now in Syria.
The other aspect of the Food Aid Reform Act is the stimulation of the local economy where the food is being produced. When the US ships food to developing countries as aid, the US food can crowd out locally produced food. This is especially important considering that most of the world’s poorest and those without food security are small farmers. In shipping food to aid the poorest in the developing world, the US can prevent these farmers from being able to sell their crops at a profitable price, thereby harming the very people which USAID is supposed to be helping.
Purchasing food aid locally will raise the demand for local food, thereby driving up the price and enabling farmers to gain more profit out of the crops they sell. This profit can then be put towards things like better fertilizers, water pumps, and other things which increase the productivity of these farmers. When these farmers increase their productivity their communities will develop their food security, fixing the very reason that food aid would have to be provided to these developing nations in the first place.
The Food Aid Reform Act is a piece of bipartisan legislation that will go a long way to modernize US foreign aid. It will help stimulate developing economies to bring them further towards contributing significantly to the global economy, which will ultimately lead to a more prosperous international community as a whole.
– Martin Drake
Source: The Guardian, House Committee on Foreign Affairs
Photo: ONE
Australian Students Live Below the Line
Recently, students at the University of Melbourne in Australia spent five days on less than two Australian dollars a day in order to raise awareness for those living in extreme poverty.
Students participated in this as part of the Live Below the Line challenge, a program of the Global Poverty Project. The Global Poverty Project is in organization designed to advocate for the world’s poor and get citizens effectively engaged in the fight to end extreme poverty. Their Live Below the Line Challenge, which spans three continents, asks participants to spend five days living below the poverty line in an effort to show solidarity with the world’s poor and to raise money and awareness for their cause.
The challenge of the Live Below the Line campaign is effectively budgeting resources so that participants have the food to last themselves 5 days. Participants are not allowed to take snacks from their pantries or consume anything that had been bought before the challenge unless it was factored into their five day budget. Their diet consisted mainly of pasta, lentils, fruit, and rice for the duration of the challenge, and they were only allowed to drink tap water.
The students at the University of Melbourne raised over $24,000, which is more than any other Australian university. The closest American university to raising this amount was the University of Notre Dame, raising only $3,239. Some celebrities are also involved in the Live Below the Line challenge, ranging from Ben Affleck to Hugh Jackman.
This was an impressive achievement for these Australian students. However, as hard as it seems to buy food on such a low budget, participants still had it better off than the world’s poor. They had access to shelter, sanitation, and healthcare—things that most of those living below the poverty line do not have. It is hard for us in the developed world to imagine the amount of hardship faced by the world’s poor, but the Live Below the Line challenge gives a small peek into the lives of the least fortunate.
Citizens interested in the program should go to www.livebelowtheline.com
– Martin Drake
Source: Live Below the Line, The Age
Photo: VSO
What The Hunger Games Tells Us About Global Poverty
For a young adult series, Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games offers a surprisingly biting criticism of the status quo in the West. Her story is one of a privileged district in society that is altogether indifferent to the suffering going on outside its boundaries. Although Collin disguises it with different names, she has not ventured far from our present reality of global poverty.
The Hunger Games is set in a dystopic future world, where citizens live in an area divided by districts. District One & Two are the wealthiest, and control the majority of the resources. As they spread further and further out, the regions become more impoverished. The heroine of the novel, Katniss Everdeen, is from the last, District 13, and relies on her wits, her will and a crude bow and arrow to support her family. Through its fantastical descriptions, outlandish characters and futuristic technology, Collins’ world manages to appear quite distinct from our own. Yet, in a thinly veiled criticism Collins has painted an unsettling portrait of ourselves and the world we live in.
The Hunger Games: A Lesson on Global Poverty
The parallel escapes many of the fans of the books, but those who live in District One are akin to the top percent in the world: they have enough to eat, access to clean water, safe homes and opportunities for betterment. For this percentage of the world, daily life is not a struggle: it is a thing to be enjoyed, to find happiness and meaning, to indulge in fads and fancies and fashion. Much like the District One in the books, the humans in District One seem bizarre and alien in comparison to those struggling on the fringes. They have none of the same concerns and seem largely unaware of the brutal reality that exists just beyond their borders.
The Hunger Games offers an uncomfortable mirror to our own world. In our daily lives, we often obsess about trivialities: we track celebrities, dedicate time to watching who wore what dress, aim to buy smartphones and cars while the vast majority of the world struggles to scrape a living out of the most dire circumstances.
As audiences, we automatically condemn District One; without even meeting them, we judge everyone in it and see the plot’s revolution as inevitable and cheer for Katniss. In reality, however, we are not quite as benevolent. We are quick to make excuses to preserve self-interest. Poverty and the state of the world do not often rank among our daily concerns, as much as what to wear and what people think of us. On the national scale, US foreign aid consists of less than 1% of the budget; this covers everything from healthcare to military aid to food assistance.
The Hunger Games has captivated a number of readers in the United States; and yet, for some, Collins has posed a very uncomfortable and very important question – what makes us so different from District One?
– Farahnaz Mohammed
Photo: Film.com
Ultimate Value of Millennium Development Goals
Not all of them will be met, but that does not mean that they have not been effective. The deadline for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) will expire at the end of this year, and certain goals, like universal primary education and reducing maternal mortality by 75%, won’t be achieved. But the progress towards these goals is undeniable, and, while it may be hard to quantify, these gains likely would not have occurred without the MDGs.
The goals have effectively highlighted certain issues. The U.N.’s developmental outline was embraced by a multitude of countries upon its release in September of 2011. As such, it has been a focus of the international policy and development strategies of many countries, as well as providing a yardstick against which to measure progress.
While progress can be attributed to many diverse factors, including individual countries’ economic growth or political stability, one area where the impact of the MDGs is clearly perceptible is in foreign aid. Global aid reached $128 billion in 2009, twice that of a decade earlier. The majority of that aid is going to the world’s poorest countries, particularly for organizations including the Global Health Initiative, the Global Climate Initiative, and Feed the Future.
These initiatives, as well as all other aid and funding aimed at reaching the Millennium Goals, have already reached millions of people globally. And already in the works is a framework for a new set of development goals, to supplant the current MDG’s. For the long term, the impact of the Millennium Development Goals has only just begun.
– David Wilson
Sources: Christian Science Monitor
Photo: Oxfam
Global Poverty by the Numbers
Global poverty is not just about numbers. Statistics in income, wealth distribution, disease, and education never tell the whole story of individual lives in harsh conditions. Poverty affects health, life expectancy, maternal mortality, educational opportunity, environmental risk, and many other factors that contribute to individual and collective well-being. Nevertheless, numbers show a lot about the challenges of global poverty, and better data can inform better solutions to the problem of global poverty.
Reports on global poverty commonly use GDP to determine the relative wealth of countries. Such numbers allow researchers, governments, and relief organizations to determine areas of the world where poverty is most severe. Using 2012 figures from the IMF World Economic Outlook Database, the magazine Global Finance states that Sub-Saharan Africa is home to many of the poorest countries in the world. Indeed, according to those estimates, 19 of the 20 poorest countries in the world can be found in that region. Measured by per capita GDP, the five poorest countries in the world are:
Life expectancy at birth in the poorest countries in the world is 2/3 that of some of the world’s wealthiest nations:
Child mortality rates in these countries where poverty is the worst are also expectedly high. The probability of infant death per 1,000 births is as follows:
In comparison, the average life expectancy in the U.S. and the U.K. is 79 and 80 respectively. The infant mortality rate is 5 per 1,000 in U.K. and 8 per 1,000 in the US. Using the GDP metric, the U.S. ranks 7th on the list of wealthiest nations, with an estimated GDP of over $49,000; and the U.K. ranks 23rd, with an estimated GDP of almost $37,000. The richest nation in the world is the oil-rich microstate of Qatar, with a per capita GDP of over 100,000 dollars. Life expectancy in that country is 82 years. The probability of infant death is also 8 per 1,000 live births.
– Délice Williams
Source: Global Finance,WHO
Photo: Melange
Poverty Reduction in the Comoros
The Comoros consists of four islands located in the Indian Ocean near Madagascar and Mozambique. Affectionately calling their country Masiwa, or “the islands”, the population totals to 1,080,000 citizens. The country, among several other small island states, is considered underdeveloped. Although the country gained independence in 1975, political and institutional crises created sustained instability.
In 2012, the Union of the Comoros, under the leadership of the newest president, Dr. Ikililou Dhoinine, drafted an official Poverty Reduction Strategy, highlighting six distinct goals to reducing their nation’s poverty.
1. Stabilize the economy by building a foundation for strong equity.
Although the external debt of the Comoros is said to remain unsustainable, the country’s external trade has increased from 47.8% in 2010 to 52% in 2011, increasing imports from 8.9% in 2010 to 9.1% in 2011.
2. Strengthen profitable sectors, including institution building and participation of private economic operators.
The Comorian government has set a priority to repair highly damaged roads including 17 km on Ngazidja, 17 km on Ndzouani, and 6.5 km on Mwali, among other main highway repairs.
3. Strengthen governance and social cohesion.
Studies on citizenship, prejudice, discrimination, the roles of women and youth in society, the establishment of 16 peace committees, introducing biometrics into the electoral process, and the institutionalization of a national commission to fight corruption.
4. Improve the health of citizens.
According to the recently drafted strategy, 300 households are currently benefiting from implemented sanitation programs, far surpassing the target set in 2011. A sanitary water network has reached 23 km, active in Djando on Mohéli, Domoni, and Sima on Anjouan.
Fighting against avoidable illnesses has also made significant progress. Through obtaining instruments and equipment, support for training programs, and the installation and management of vaccine distribution. Comorians were able to see high percentages of vaccination effectiveness per antigen.
5. Promote education and vocational training.
The main objective in education was to improve access to educational institutions per capita. Enrollment in professional and vocational roles reported an increase from 3% in 2010 to 8% in 2011. Although this rate is lower than the projected improvement of 15%, there has been a significant increase in admissions at the University of the Comoros.
6. Promote environmental sustainability and civil society.
Priority zones for biodiversity conservation resulted in the completion of five inventories of flora and fauna, exceeding the 2011 forecast. 1,531 citizens were educated in several areas of agricultural management, complying with government-instated goals for sustainable use of renewable resources.
Although one out of two people in the Comoros is considered poor, the Comorian government is taking active steps to reduce their poverty and improve the lives of their citizens.
– Kali Faulwetter
Sources: IMF, Every Culture, Maps of World
Post-2015: A New Millennium for Women
For U.N. members looking to affect real change in reforming the millennium development goals post-2015, one thing is clear: gender equality goals must be at the top of the agenda.
Many argue that a lack of attention to the pervasive inequalities that plague the developing world was the key limitation of the last round of millennium development goals (MDGs) that are set to expire in 2015. While the new set of MDGs now makes achieving greater equality a priority, some wonder if the goals will focus too much on income inequality while overshadowing issues of gender and other social inequalities.
Specifically, human rights advocates worry about the proposal to replace the current, specified gender equality goal with a less defined, overarching goal covering all “inequalities.” Female empowerment advocates disagree with the MDGs’ tendency to treat gender as merely one of the many inequalities that generate poverty. Rather, they say, gender is both the most pervasive form of inequality as well as the root problem that instigates other forms of inequality.
Despite its limitations, however, having the MDGs has proven useful both as a tool to hold governments accountable for their responsibilities to women, and as a line of defense against conservative forces in developing nations that threaten to reverse equality gains. U.N. leaders and stakeholders around the world should use this solid foundation to achieve further, more progressive reforms, like ensuring fairer access to employment opportunities and greater representation in decision-making positions in the public sector.
As it turns out, as rates of gender equality improve, so does a country’s overall well-being. Recent reviews have shown that countries with greater gender equality in employment and education were more likely to experience greater economic growth and human development rates. Thus, fixing the gender inequality problem can consequently help improve the socio-economic inequality problems without necessitating separate initiatives.
The same principle does not apply in the reverse, however. Economic growth does not necessarily contribute to gender inequality if the social structures needed to empower women are not put in place. Gender, then, seems to be the only standalone factor that intertwines itself with every other aspect of the complex issue of global poverty, and thus the issue that must be addressed and corrected before any other reforms can occur.
– Ally Bruschi
Source: The Guardian,Institute of Development Studies
Photo: The Business Finance Store
Rethinking Hunger in Africa
Philanthropists may be tempted to rejoice that recent trends have shown that the total number of people who face chronic hunger has dropped. New surveys, however, caution those working to eradicate global poverty.
The Afrobarometer is an independent, nonpartisan research project that measures the social, political and economic environment in Africa through a series of regularly-repeated surveys. By consistently asking the same, standard set of questions in more than a dozen African countries each year, the Afrobarometer can track trends in public attitudes that can be shared with various public actors in order to create better dialogue between the public and the government.
When asked in a recent Afrobarometer survey how many times in the past year they had gone without food, 16% of survey participants responded either “always” or “many times.” Even as global instances of chronic hunger drop as a whole, Africa remains the exception to the trend. The U.N. suggests that 239 million African citizens, or nearly 23% of the total African population, meet the U.N.’s criteria for being chronically undernourished.
The situation is even more alarming when one considers that chronic hunger mainly affects African children, who may experience stunting (low height), wasting (low weight) or micronutrient deficiency if exposed to chronic hunger conditions between the ages of 2 and 3. Chronic hunger not only puts children at risk for future health complications but can also impair future economic concerns as well. Studies have also shown that undernourished children eventually earn an average of 20% less than their healthy peers.
The current hunger problems in African can be traced back to a reliance on maize. Though maize is highly caloric, it offers mediocre nutritional qualities and thus can exacerbate malnutrition even as it satisfies daily caloric needs. Both Zambians and Malawians report receiving more than 50% of their calories from maize.
Over-reliance on maize is not just stunting the growth of African children, but also the potential of the African economy and agricultural development. By only producing maize, African farmers limit their access to global markets, thus making them too reliant on foreign aid and capital.
Instead of maize, the U.N. and its associated nutritionists suggest a food fortification program that supplies rural grain mills with a range of foods that include added iodine, zinc and vitamin A to provide an extra nutritional boost. Additionally, initiatives like ReSCOPE are using schools and colleges in Africa to teach a technique called permaculture, which uses a version of organic farming to keep nutrients in the soil to promote sustainable, year-round crops that will help local farming cultures flourish like never before.
These initiatives follow the concept of the “teach a man to fish” proverb. By promoting a culture of food self-sufficiency that allows African farmers to create both the quantity and quality of the food needed to meet their local nutritional needs, global aid communities and governments may be giving Africa the long-overdue ability to stand on its own two feet.
– Alexandria Bruschi
Source: Afrobarometer.org,Think Africa Press
Photo: WPHR
Nelson Mandela’s Childhood
Nelson Mandela’s life has been exemplary in many ways. Through his patience, his perseverance, his strength and his courage, he managed to lead South Africa through troubled social and economic times to become one of the world’s largest emerging economies and bring an end to apartheid to establish a new “Rainbow Nation” in honor of its racial diversity.
Nelson Mandela’s childhood is no less remarkable than his career. From a family that was traditionally powerful – his father was in line to be chief until a dispute robbed him of the title – Mandela came from humble beginnings. After his father was dispossessed of his status, his family was forced to move to a small village, where he was raised in a hut and lived a very simple life, eating what they could grow and playing with the other village boys. His first name was Rohlilahla, meaning “troublemaker” (an apt name for the man who would later become the leader of the African National Congress). He adopted Nelson when he began formal schooling and was given an English name.
After his father died, he was sent to live with Jongintaba Dalindyebo, a regent of the Thembu people, who began raising Mandela to assume a position of leadership when he grew older.
Mandela’s interest in African history is said to have started during his lessons next to the palace, where he studied English, Xhosa, geography, and history. He became interested in the effect of the arrival of the Europeans on the nation and the people. Later, in a coming-of-age ritual in the village, Chief Meligqili, a speaker, uttered words that would greatly influence Mandela.
“He went on to lament that the promise of the young men would be squandered as they struggled to make a living and perform mindless chores for white men. Mandela would later say that while the chief’s words didn’t make total sense to him at the time, they would eventually formulate his resolve for an independent South Africa.”
From the village, Mandela would go to boarding school and later university, which would feed the fire of his emerging interest in the rights of South Africans.
Mandela disproves the common conception that one needs to come from an established background in order to be successful; what made the difference in Mandela’s case was the education afforded to him by Dalindyebo, and later through boarding school and university. Mandela’s understanding of his own country’s history and his exposure to multiple facets of life gave him insight into the lives of many of the different citizens of the country.
Much of Mandela’s strength stemmed from a humble background and the early lessons of hardship and the value of each opportunity.
– Farahnaz Mohammed
Sources: Biography.com, History.com
Photo: The Guardian