NGO "ANOTHER WAY" (STICHTING BAKENS VERZET), NETHERLANDS, SUSTAINABLE INTEGRATED SELF-FINANCING DEVELOPMENT PROJECTS AND ADVANCED DEVELOPMENT TECHNOLOGIES

The Millennium Project, commissioned by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, has produced a report called A practical plan to achieve the Millennium Development Goals – 2002-2006. With effect from 1 January 2007 reporting on the Millennium Development Goals was taken over by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) which brings out annual reports on progress made in achieving the Development Goals. The most recent report at the time this course was written was the Millennium Development Goals Report 2008. The most recent report published is The Millennium Development Goals Report 2010. Analysis of these documents is included in parts Goals 1-4 and Goals 5-8 in Section 8 of Block 5.

These reports are intended to sway public opinion. Tucked away at the end of the reports under the heading “The basis for this analysis” is a sort of “disclaimer” explaining that where information provided is inadequate of absent (which is often the case), the editors make an educated guess. For the 2010 report this is at p. 76 and reads :

“Data are typically drawn from official statistics provided by governments. This is accomplished through periodic data collection by ministries and national statistical offices around the world. To fill data gaps, which occur frequently, many of the indicators are supplemented by or derived exclusively from data collected through surveys sponsored and carried out by international agencies.”

For an analysis of the perils of data reporting from Africa, as an example, see Sandefur, F and Glassman, A. : The Political Economy of Bad Data : Evidence from African Survey & Administrative Statistics, Center for Global Development (CGDev), CGD Working Paper 373, Washington, July 2014. From the introduction (p. 1) :

“…. misrepresentation of national statistics does not occur merely by accident or due to a lack of analytical capacity { at least not always ) but rather that systematic biases in administrative data systems stem from the incentives of data producers to overstate development progress.” Information is often based on self-reports by the local agents (nurses and teachers etc) involved resulting in “systematic mis-reporting undermining the state’s ability to manage public services, particularly in remote rural areas.”(p.3).

“…perverse incentives and lack of functional independence mean that public and private investment decisions based on poor data can be deeply flawed, with major implications for well-being and public expenditure efficiency.” (p. 24)

The production of the statistics themselves often depend on foreign aid. (p.7)

Paragraphs 7-13 of the Plan of Implementation of the Millennium Goals cover change in consumption patterns and unsustainable production.

“II. Poverty eradication

7. Eradicating poverty is the greatest global challenge facing the world today and an indispensable requirement for sustainable development, particularly for developing countries. Although each country has the primary responsibility for its own sustainable development and poverty eradication and the role of national policies and development strategies cannot be overemphasized, concerted and concrete measures are required at all levels to enable developing countries to achieve their sustainable development goals as related to the internationally agreed poverty-related targets and goals, including those contained in Agenda 21, the relevant outcomes of other United Nations conferences and the United Nations Millennium Declaration. This would include actions at all levels to:

(a) Halve, by the year 2015, the proportion of the world's people whose income is less than 1 dollar a day and the proportion of people who suffer from hunger and, by the same date, to halve the proportion of people without access to safe drinking water;

(b) Establish a world solidarity fund to eradicate poverty and to promote social and human development in the developing countries pursuant to modalities to be determined by the General Assembly, while stressing the voluntary nature of the contributions and the need to avoid duplication of existing United Nations funds, and encouraging the role of the private sector and individual citizens relative to Governments in funding the endeavours;

(c) Develop national programmes for sustainable development and local and community development, where appropriate within country-owned poverty reduction strategies, to promote the empowerment of people living in poverty and their organizations. These programmes should reflect their priorities and enable them to increase access to productive resources, public services and institutions, in particular land, water, employment opportunities, credit, education and health;

(d) Promote women's equal access to and full participation in, on the basis of equality with men, decision-making at all levels, mainstreaming gender perspectives in all policies and strategies, eliminating all forms of violence and discrimination against women and improving the status, health and economic welfare of women and girls through full and equal access to economic opportunity, land, credit, education and health-care services;

(e) Develop policies and ways and means to improve access by indigenous people and their communities to economic activities and increase their employment through, where appropriate, measures such as training, technical assistance and credit facilities. Recognize that traditional and direct dependence on renewable resources and ecosystems, including sustainable harvesting, continues to be essential to the cultural, economic and physical well-being of indigenous people and their communities;

(f) Deliver basic health services for all and reduce environmental health threats, taking into account the special needs of children and the linkages between poverty, health and environment, with provision of financial resources, technical assistance and knowledge transfer to developing countries and countries with economies in transition;

(g) Ensure that children everywhere, boys and girls alike, will be able to complete a full course of primary schooling and will have equal access to all levels of education;

(h) Provide access to agricultural resources for people living in poverty, especially women and indigenous communities, and promote, as appropriate, land tenure arrangements that recognize and protect indigenous and common property resource management systems;

(i) Build basic rural infrastructure, diversify the economy and improve transportation and access to markets, market information and credit for the rural poor to support sustainable agriculture and rural development;

(j) Transfer basic sustainable agricultural techniques and knowledge, including natural resource management, to small and medium-scale farmers, fishers and the rural poor, especially in developing countries, including through multi-stakeholder approaches and public-private partnerships aimed at increasing agriculture production and food security;

(k) Increase food availability and affordability, including through harvest and food technology and management, as well as equitable and efficient distribution systems, by promoting, for example, community-based partnerships linking urban and rural people and enterprises;

(l) Combat desertification and mitigate the effects of drought and floods through measures such as improved use of climate and weather information and forecasts, early warning systems, land and natural resource management, agricultural practices and ecosystem conservation in order to reverse current trends and minimize degradation of land and water resources, including through the provision of adequate and predictable financial resources to implement the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification in Those Countries Experiencing Serious Drought and/or Desertification, particularly in Africa,

(m) Increase access to sanitation to improve human health and reduce infant and child mortality, prioritizing water and sanitation in national sustainable development strategies and poverty reduction strategies where they exist

8. The provision of clean drinking water and adequate sanitation is necessary to protect human health and the environment. In this respect, we agree to halve, by the year 2015, the proportion of people who are unable to reach or to afford safe drinking water (as outlined in the Millennium Declaration) and the proportion of people who do not have access to basic sanitation, which would include actions at all levels to:

(a) Develop and implement efficient household sanitation systems;

(b) Improve sanitation in public institutions, especially schools;

(d) Promote education and outreach focused on children, as agents of behavioural change;

(e) Promote affordable and socially and culturally acceptable technologies and practices;

(f) Develop innovative financing and partnership mechanisms;

(g) Integrate sanitation into water resources management strategies.

9. Take joint actions and improve efforts to work together at all levels to improve access to reliable and affordable energy services for sustainable development sufficient to facilitate the achievement of the Millennium development goals, including the goal of halving the proportion of people in poverty by 2015, and as a means to generate other important services that mitigate poverty, bearing in mind that access to energy facilitates the eradication of poverty. This would include actions at all levels to:

(a) Improve access to reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy services and resources, taking into account national specificities and circumstances, through various means, such as enhanced rural electrification and decentralized energy systems, increased use of renewables, cleaner liquid and gaseous fuels and enhanced energy efficiency, by intensifying regional and international cooperation in support of national efforts, including through capacity-building, financial and technological assistance and innovative financing mechanisms, including at the micro- and meso- levels, recognizing the specific factors for providing access to the poor;

(b) Improve access to modern biomass technologies and fuel wood sources and supplies and commercialize biomass operations, including the use of agricultural residues, in rural areas and where such practices are sustainable;

(c) Promote a sustainable use of biomass and, as appropriate, other renewable energies through improvement of current patterns of use, such as management of resources, more efficient use of fuel wood and new or improved products and technologies;

(d) Support the transition to the cleaner use of liquid and gaseous fossil fuels, where considered more environmentally sound, socially acceptable and cost-effective;

(e) Develop national energy policies and regulatory frameworks that will help to create the necessary economic, social and institutional conditions in the energy sector to improve access to reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy services for sustainable development and poverty eradication in rural, peri-urban and urban areas;

(f) Enhance international and regional cooperation to improve access to reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy services, as an integral part of poverty reduction programmes, by facilitating the creation of enabling environments and addressing capacity-building needs, with special attention to rural and isolated areas, as appropriate;

(g) Assist and facilitate on an accelerated basis, with the financial and technical assistance of developed countries, including through public-private partnerships, the access of the poor to reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy services, taking into account the instrumental role of developing national policies on energy for sustainable development, bearing in mind that in developing countries sharp increases in energy services are required to improve the standards of living of their populations and that energy services have positive impacts on poverty eradication and improve standards of living.

10. Strengthen the contribution of industrial development to poverty eradication and sustainable natural resource management. This would include actions at all levels to:

(a) Provide assistance and mobilize resources to enhance industrial productivity and competitiveness as well as industrial development in developing countries, including the transfer of environmentally sound technologies on preferential terms, as mutually agreed;

(b) Provide assistance to increase income-generating employment opportunities, taking into account the Declaration on Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work of the International Labour Organization;

(c) Promote the development of micro, small and medium-sized enterprises, including by means of training, education and skill enhancement, with a special focus on agro-industry as a provider of livelihoods for rural communities;

(d) Provide financial and technological support, as appropriate, to rural communities of developing countries to enable them to benefit from safe and sustainable livelihood opportunities in small-scale mining ventures;

(e) Provide support to developing countries for the development of safe low-cost technologies that provide or conserve fuel for cooking and water heating;

(f) Provide support for natural resource management for creating sustainable livelihoods for the poor.

11. By 2020, achieve a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers, as proposed in the “Cities without slums" initiative. This would include actions at all levels to:

(a) Improve access to land and property, to adequate shelter and to basic services for the urban and rural poor, with special attention to female heads of household;

(b) Use low-cost and sustainable materials and appropriate technologies for the construction of adequate and secure housing for the poor, with financial and technological assistance to developing countries, taking into account their culture, climate, specific social conditions and vulnerability to natural disasters;

(c) Increase decent employment, credit and income for the urban poor, through appropriate national policies, promoting equal opportunities for women and men;

(d) Remove unnecessary regulatory and other obstacles for microenterprises and the informal sector;

(e) Support local authorities in elaborating slum upgrading programmes within the framework of urban development plans and facilitate access, particularly for the poor, to information on housing legislation.

12. Take immediate and effective measures to eliminate the worst forms of child labour as defined in International Labour Organization Convention No. 182, and elaborate and implement strategies for the elimination of child labour that is contrary to accepted international standards.

13. Promote international cooperation to assist developing countries, upon request, in addressing child labour and its root causes, inter alia, through social and economic policies aimed at poverty conditions, while stressing that labour standards should not be used for protectionist trade purposes.’’

Read the report Making the MDGs Work for All, Corner L. , United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) , New York, 2008.

Pages 15-44 of the report refer to Millennium Goal 1.

“Poverty and hunger not only have a greater impact on women, they are also among the principal—though not the only—causes of inequality, including gender inequality, and lack of empowerment, including lack of empowerment for women and girls.”(p.15)

“If poverty and hunger are to be eradicated, a range of gender and rights issues need to be addressed, both in relation to poverty and hunger in general, and in relation to Goal 1 in particular.” (p. 16)

1. Research.

Make a three-page summary of the 11 factors cited by Mrs Corner for this purpose. (pp 16-27 of the report).

Take another look at pages 16-19 of the report.

2. Opinion.

What are the features of a pro-poor policy ? Make two columns on one page. In the first column write the necessary pro-poor actions. In the second column write the equivalent traditional development strategies.

Read pages 19-21.

«Most of women’s contribution to the economy, especially in developing countries, takes place through the unpaid care economy. » (Page 19)

Poverty is multi-dimensional.

“From a rights perspective, poverty consists of failure to achieve and/or utilize a range of basic capabilities. In addition to adequate nutrition, these include the capability to avoid preventable and premature mortality; have adequate shelter; have a basic education; have personal security and equitable access to justice; and be able to appear in public without shame, earn a livelihood and take part in community life.” (Page 21)

3. Opinion.

On one page describe why this list is different from the one in Section Some factors related to poverty in Section 1 of Block 1 of the course.

Paragraph 7 a) of the Plan of Implementation of the Millennium Goals foresees the need to :

“Halve, by the year 2015, the proportion of the world’s population whose income is less the US $1 a day and the proportion of people who suffer from hunger and. By the same date, to halve the proportion of people without safe access to safe drinking water. ” The benchmark income was subsequently increased to US$ 1.25 per day.

As even the OECD recently admitted : “Many people who have escaped poverty as defined by Millennium Development Goal 1a are still poor according to different thresholds of income poverty, or when measuring poverty according to its many other dimensions. The MDGs’ focus on global progress also masks uneven progress across and within countries, localities and population groups…….Leaving China aside, only 5% of people have passed this USD 1.25 per day income threshold over the past 20 years….….Ending USD 1.25 per day poverty is unlikely to mean the end of the many overlapping deprivations faced by poor people, including malnutrition, poor sanitation, a lack of electricity or ramshackle schools (Alkire and Sumner, 2013). ). This is why economic growth is not sufficient to end poverty or to benefit all people” (OECD and Post-2015 Reflections, Element 1, Paper 1, pp. 1 and 2, OECD Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, Paris, 2014.)

“There is no clear evidence suggesting a causal relationship between the setting of MDG-1 and the (uneven) country poverty reduction results …. The MDG more broadly, need to be embedded within a broader narrative on the causes of poverty.” (Gentilini U., Sumner A., Setting and Income Poverty Goal after 2015, Harvard University FXB Center for Health and Human Rights, Cambridge (Mass.) May 2013.)

“Measuring extreme poverty by the $1.25 per-day threshold is simplistic and misleading. The indicator has rendered extreme poverty in developed countries invisible. It has not been eradicated and has worsened after the 2009 economic and financial crisis. ….One of the weaknesses of the MDG framework has been its blindness to the issue of inequality and to the most marginalized members of societies. Its focus on aggregate figures and overall progress failed to account for growing social and economic disparities and incentivized States to prioritize aggregate progress and the ‘low-hanging fruit’ rather than giving special attention to the most vulnerable groups.” (Coyne, B. et al (ed.), Towards Sustainable Development that Leaves No-one Behind : The Challenge of the Post-2015 Agenda, Working Paper, International ATD Fourth World Movement, New York, Pierrelaye and Geneva, June 2013, p. 10.)

“GDP per capita growth [in Zambia] averaged three percent every year between 2004 and 2013, pushing Zambia into the World Bank’s lower-middle income category. Despite this growth, the number of people living below the $1.25 poverty line grew from 65 percent in 2003 to 74 percent in 2010. [Data based on World Bank, ‘World Development Indicators’’] (Seery E., Arendar, A, Even It Up : Time to end extreme inequality, Campaign Report, Oxfam International, 29 October 2014, (Executive summary p. 10.)

Some students may be interested in reading D. Woodward’s report How poor is “poor” ? (New Economics Foundation, London, May 2010). The report provides a critical and detailed analysis of the US $1 [now US$ 1.25] a day criterion. On pages 30-35 the author proposes a “Snowflakes” Rights Based Poverty Line method for more accurate measurement of poverty levels. The report is not part of this course. Integrated development is about eliminating poverty on a case by case basis, not trying to standardise ways of measuring it.

For an opinion on the achievement of the poverty reduction goal see King, R., What’s up (or down) with global hunger, ? Guest post, From Power to Poverty, Duncan Green’s blog, Oxfam GB, 16 October, 2012.) Even without taking the effects of food price increases in recent years and the accuracy of the official figures used into account, both numbers and the prevalence of undernourished are too high in all regions with respect to the goals. In sub-Saharan Africa the situation has worsened.

For a critical analysis of target 2 on the reduction of the proportion of people suffering from hunger see Fukuda-Parr S and Orr.A, The MDG Hunger Target and the Contested Vision of Food Security, Harvard University FXB Center for Health and Human Rights, Cambridge (Mass.) May 2013. The view consistently expressed by everyone interviewed by the authors (p.21)was that:

“the MDGs did not succeed in mobilizing attention to hunger. Food security, including issues of small-scale farmer productivity, vulnerability and nutritional adequacy, was a neglected issue during much of the 2000s, continuing the trends of the preceding decades that experienced a precipitous decline in support to agricultural production and neglect of nutrition. Significant new initiatives were launched by national governments and multilateral actors during this period including Brazil’s Zero Hunger [ praised !] campaign and Africa’s CAADP and [ the heavily criticised !] AGRA initiatives. However, it is doubtful if the MDGs were instrumental in motivating them. Although the MDGs were used as part of the language to justify action, they were never a critical factor in the initiation of such programs.”

“Between 2004 and 2013 food prices [in India] in general rose by 157%. But when you get into the nuts and bolts the real pain becomes starkly clear. India is the second largest producer of vegetables in the world. Yet chronic supply shortages coupled with serial hoarding has led vegetable prices to shoot up by a deadly 350% in that period.” (Varma S., Food prices rose 157% between 2005 and 2013, The Times of India, Gurgaon, 20 September, 2013.) This article shows the following food price statistics from the Office of the Economic Adviser, Government of India :

All food items together : 157%

All vegetables together : 350%

All fruits together : 95%

Rice : 137%

Wheat : 117%

Potato : 185%

Onion : 521%

Tomato : 139%

Cabbage : 714%

Milk : 119%

Eggs : 124%

Sugar : 106%

Salt : 85%.

In any case, “It is clear that the persistence of higher and more volatile food prices has increased the number of households that are not eating enough nor able to meet other basic needs such as education, shelter and healthcare. But the FAO's State of Food Insecurity report for 2011 did not include statistics on the number of malnourished people in the world that would have allowed analysts to make more accurate calculations. This was because FAO committed to rework its methodology to improve the quality of the hunger numbers it produces.” ( S. Murphy, Cobwebbed : International Food Price Crisis and National Food Prices – Some Experiences from Africa, Actionaid, Johannesburg, October 2012. ISBN-978-984-33-5571-3, p.24 .)

In paragraph 20 of his report A/68/183 dated 24 July 2013 to the General Assembly of the United Nations the Secretary-General stated :

“20. Income inequality has increased in the majority of countries over the past 30 years. About two thirds of the countries for which data were available experienced an increase in income inequality between 1990 and 2005, despite globally robust economic growth. Similarly, the income gap between the wealthiest and the poorest 10 per cent of income earners increased in 70 per cent of the countries. There were large differences in mean income across countries, which accounted for two thirds of global income inequality. Global wealth was highly concentrated, as the richest 1 per cent of the world’s population owned 40 per cent of global assets, while the bottom half held just 1 per cent.” (United Nations, New York, 2013).

As the Secretary-General had just pointed out in the preceding paragraph 19 : “growing inequality jeopardizes progress towards poverty eradication and social stability. Situations where the poor are excluded from economic growth, or trapped in low-productivity jobs, result in the gains from growth going disproportionately to those already better off. ”

Paragraph 20 of the Secretary General’s report refers to the period to 2005. The above-referenced works indicate the situation of the world’s poor has worsened since then.

It is doubtful whether claimed progress to halving the share of the world’s population living off an income of less the US$ 1,25 per day has much to do with the MDG’s anyway. As even the conservative weekly The Economist puts it : “It is not clear how much the pledge itself caused the fall in poverty—arguably not much, since China, where the biggest decline took place, took no notice of the goal.” (Poverty : Growth or safety net?, The Economist, London, 23 September, 2013.)

“Poor numbers give room to both politicians and donors that want to negotiate numbers upwards or downwards…..there are serious gaps in the data that should make us far more cautious in asserting that the current episode of growth is ‘inclusive’. As indicated, some of this very high growth [in Africa] is driven by upward revisions, at the same time, a lack of data on poverty in many of the big countries (Nigeria, Sudan, Angola, DRC), as well as missing data from the poorer countries on the continent means that better data would probably paint a more sobering picture than the current very optimistic narratives.” (M. Jerven, Poor Numbers: How We Are Misled by African Development Statistics, Independent Science News, Ithaca (New York), 20 October, 2013. Book published by Cornell University Press, Ithaca (New York), 2013.)

As Olivier de Schutter, the Special Reporteur to the General Assembly of the United Nations on the Right to Food, puts it at par. 24 of his final report (The Transformative Potential of the Right to Food, United Nations Human Rights Council, 25^th Session, Agenda item 3, A/HRC/25/57, New York, 24 January, 2014) puts it :

“the promotion in the past of export-led agriculture, often based on the exploitation of a largely disempowered workforce, operated at the expense of family farms producing food crops for local consumption [. This] resulted in a paradoxical situation in which many low-income countries, though they are typically agriculture-based, raw commodity-exporting economies, are highly dependent on food imports, sometimes supplemented by food aid, because they have neglected to invest in local production and, food processing to feed their own communities (A/HRC/9/23, annex I, para.5). It also led to increased rural poverty and the growth of urban slums.”

4. Opinion.

Make a two-page analysis. On the first page, on one side give reasons justifying the choice of 50% ; on the other explain why that choice could be considered absurd. On the second page, bearing your studies on monetisation in mind, on one side give reasons justifying the choice of US $1 a day; on the other explain why that choice could be considered absurd.

Paragraph 7 f) of the Plan of Implementation of the Millennium Goals foresees the need to :

“(f) Deliver basic health services for all and reduce environmental health threats, taking into account the special needs of children and the linkages between poverty, health and environment, with provision of financial resources, technical assistance and knowledge transfer to developing countries and countries with economies in transition;”

5. Opinion.

Make a two-page analysis explaining who should supply the services, the financial resources, the technical assistance and the technology transfer referred to. On the first page you are an operator in an industrialised country. On the second page you are the inhabitant of a rural area in a developing country.

Paragraph 9 e) of Plan of Implementation of the Millennium Goals relates to energy. It provides:

“(e) Develop national energy policies and regulatory frameworks that will help to create the necessary economic, social and institutional conditions in the energy sector to improve access to reliable, affordable, economically viable, socially acceptable and environmentally sound energy services for sustainable development and poverty eradication in rural, peri-urban and urban areas;”

See also the references in section 9 g) to public-private sector partnerships.

6. Opinion.

Make a two-page analysis explaining who should supply the energy services. On the first page you are an operator in an industrialised country. On the second page you are the inhabitant of a rural area in a developing country.

◄ ►

◄ Second block : Problems to be solved.

◄ Index : Diploma in Integrated Development (Dip. Int. Dev)

◄ List of key words.

◄ List of references.

◄ Course chart.

◄ Technical aspects.

◄ Courses available.

◄ Homepage Bakens Verzet.