Angola, as well as recovering from the affects of a prolonged civil war, is having to come to terms with a rising rate of HIV/AIDS. Nearly 4% of the adult population is affected and more than 100,000 children were orphaned as a result of HIV/AIDS in 2003 (source UNICEF). Malaria is a bigger problem.
The country's three decades of civil war ended two years ago.
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which include halving poverty and hunger by 2015. A recent UNDP report states that Botswana is showing potential for long term growth that will raise standards of living. The UNDP believes that it is ‘‘likely’’ that Botswana will reach the target of halving the proportion of people suffering from hunger by 2015. The proportion of children under five who are underweight was reduced from 17 percent to 13 percent between 1996 and 2000, according to Botswana’s Central Statistics Office. Over the same period the proportion of children under five who are too thin for their age was reduced from 11 to five percent, while the proportion of under-fives who are too short for their age dropped from 29 to 23 percent. But ordinary Batswana are less optimistic about developmental progress in their country.
This view is shared by the European Union (EU) in its report ‘‘EU Strategy For Africa’’ released in February 2006. The document identifies Botswana as one of the countries in which the rural poor are particularly marginalised. Changing this picture will require sustained action over the next decade, argues Modireemang Klass, chairperson of Molepolole Village Development Community in the south-eastern part of the country. Klass argues that political commitment is vital to change levels of inequality in Botswana. These levels are striking given Botswana’s status as an upper middle-income country. According to the UNDP, the poorest 20 percent of the population get a measly four percent of the total national income. The richest 20 percent of Batswana earn almost 60 percent of the total national income. The unemployment rate is also high, at almost 16 percent. It seems economic development has mostly benefited the politicians, professional people and civil servants. This also explains the high level of inequality, writes Ian Taylor, an academic who has studied development in Botswana, in the 2003 book ‘Limits to Liberation in Southern Africa’. The urban-rural divide exacerbates inequality. Four out of five households in rural areas are still dependent on income from a family member in the urban areas. About one-fifth of rural households do not have any income source that statisticians could discern, writes Taylor.
The difference in the level of access to resources means that development outcomes still vary considerably between rural and urban centres. That is why people like Morwang and Klass doubt that Botswana will achieve the MDG on eradicating poverty and hunger. They feel that it would be a major achievement for Botswana to reach a poverty level by 2015 which is lower than that of 1990. In contrast, Pedzani Malikongwa, a vendor in Gaborone, argues that most Batswana are lazy and over-reliant on government. ‘‘We should work hard and stop complaining. Government is doing its part. Who else can afford to give you money for free just because you have aged?’’ she asks with reference to the government pension of about 154 pula (about 20 dollars) for people over the age of 65. (END/2007)
The civil war that flared up in 1997 and again in 1999 left a wake of destruction and loss of life in the southern regions of the Congo, where most of the people live and where most of the country’s food crops are produced.
The vital national rail line and adjacent rural roads forming the Congo’s economic lifeline were ruined. At the height of the conflict, about one third of the country’s people were displaced. The chronic financial crisis became acute and the financial sector came close to collapse. Poverty became deeper in the rural areas of the Congo. Throughout the country, the income gap continues to widen. Most of the productive capacity of rural poor people, especially in the south, was destroyed by warfare. People lost savings, assets and tools and their capacity to withstand shocks and respond to changing circumstances. Poor people in rural areas in the Congo are powerless, vulnerable and isolated. Disease and malnutrition have sapped the strength they need to produce food and income for their households.
The spread of HIV/AIDS is a major concern and an obstacle to reducing poverty in the Congo, where an estimated 90,000 adults and children were living with HIV/AIDS at the end of 2003. About 5.5 per cent of people in the Congo between the ages of 14 and 49 were affected by HIV/AIDS. In 2003 some 97,000 children under the age of 17 had lost one or both of their parents to AIDS. The government supports a multi-agency initiative implementing a ten-year programme to assist people living with HIV/AIDS.
Now the Congo has a new constitution, and there is hope that the ongoing pacification process will foster a return to normalcy. Progress since early 2000 has exceeded expectations, and almost all displaced people have returned to their homes.
Who are the Congo’s rural poor people?
The poorest people in rural areas are small-scale farmers and fishers and their households, and some people in certain areas, such as poor people living in peri-urban areas who have no access to land. Because of the low population density in rural areas, access to land is not a major problem for most rural people. But in peri-urban areas, where small plots can yield profitable garden produce, land has become a scarce resource, and people without access to land or off-farm employment are the poorest of the poor. The most vulnerable of all poor people are youth and particularly women, who are the primary agricultural producers and processors.
Poverty is most severe in the Congo’s rural areas, where per capita GDP is one to two thirds lower than in urban areas.
Why are they poor?
The main causes of poverty in the Congo are:
low agricultural productivity as a result of traditional cultivation methods, insufficient use of agricultural inputs such as improved seeds and planting materials and fertilizers high transaction costs that are mainly the result of inefficient rural transport infrastructure, including poor rural roads and vehicles marketing inefficiencies such as weak collection and distribution organizations, rudimentary processing equipment, scarce financial services and a frail communication system connecting producers, traders and consumers Despite liberalization of agricultural marketing and the prices of agricultural products, few private operators have stepped in to provide the services once furnished by the public sector.
Source: IFAD
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Somalia-
Rural poverty in Somalia
Somalia faces a number of major obstacles to development: civil conflict, the lack of a fully functioning central government, and natural calamities such as drought and floods. In addition, the ongoing armed struggle has often prevented much-needed humanitarian assistance from reaching the population. Poverty has inevitably increased since the early 1990s and the collapse of the government and onset of civil war. About 43 per cent of the population lives in extreme poverty, or on less than US$1 per day. This figure rises to 53 per cent in rural areas, where extreme poverty is more prevalent.
Health indicators for the population have shown a decline since 1991, an inevitable consequence of the collapse of public services and destruction of infrastructure. Child survival improved after the famine of the early 1990s, but is still low and has deteriorated since the end of the 1990s. Malnutrition continues to be prevalent throughout the country.
Who and where are Somalia’s rural poor people?
The regions that have established autonomy and experienced relatively peaceful conditions — Somaliland in the north-west and Puntland in the north-east — have achieved a greater degree of stability than the rest of the country. The southern part of the country, where conflict has raged for more than 15 years, is inevitably poorer and in a more critical situation regarding food security, infrastructure and services.
Social groups that were already vulnerable prior to the 1990s have been further marginalized by the conflict and general instability. In particular indigenous groups and ethnic minorities have fallen into greater poverty, and many have been expelled from their traditional lands.Women have particularly low status in Somalia. Many are illiterate or poorly educated, and they have inadequate access to health and family planning services. Female genital mutilation is widespread. The country has one of the highest rates of maternal mortality in the world. Every day about 45 women die as a result of pregnancy and childbirth.
Why are they poor?
Somalia does not abound in resources and depends heavily on agriculture to sustain its economy. Agricultural productivity is often at the mercy of climatic extremes, including periodic droughts and flooding. In 2006 floods in parts of southern and central Somalia caused widespread devastation, destroying food stores, cutting off access to food supplies and contaminating water supplies and sanitation facilities.
Livestock is essential to the economy. Over 60 per cent of the population depends directly on livestock for food and income. Outbreaks of disease frequently go unchecked and untreated as a result of the lack of an effective disease control strategy. Over the last decade Saudi Arabia has imposed several livestock bans because of disease concerns, and these have severely hampered the sector and generated serious problems for the pastoralists whose livelihoods depend upon the sale of livestock.
Large stocks of animals put considerable pressure on grazing land, causing land degradation and generating disputes over land rights. In the absence of regulatory measures, competition over resources, especially land and water, is a major component of the current conflict. Qat addiction among the population has become a real problem. Excessive chewing of qat leaves leads to listlessness and disinterest in family and work: It reduces productivity and leads farmers to abandon animal husbandry.
Conflict and instability aggravate poverty More than 15 years without an effective central government and a chaotic state of ongoing civil conflict and lawlessness have had a devastating effect on the country's population and the resources they depend upon for their survival. Extreme poverty has become widespread and large numbers of people are unable to meet basic food requirements. Many Somalis have been internally displaced, often from rural to urban areas. The strongest clans have taken over valuable agricultural land, expelling weaker clans and indigenous peoples from their traditional lands. Vulnerable people have lost their assets and livelihoods. Famine and disease have raged unchecked, causing the death of about one million people. Extensive damage to roads and other infrastructure makes it extremely difficult to deliver humanitarian assistance to those who need it.
Extended civil conflict has had a direct or indirect impact on many resources, but competition for access to some resources has also been and continues to be a source of conflict itself. In the absence of a central government and regulation, many traditional forms of natural resource management have been abandoned, leading to unsustainable exploitation. For example, overgrazing and uncontrolled harvesting of trees to make charcoal in parts of the north-west and the Kismayo area have led to environmental degradation that may be difficult to reverse. Un-regulated off-shore fishing threatens marine resources.
Poverty, in Somalia , is a way of life. People have been adjusting themselves to a situation of depriviation. Living with severe shortages in terms of basic services has become an accepted norm of life. I think a change must come from within ourselves rather than waiting it to come from outside. We should work hard to make a change in our life and not rely on mere textbook information which says Somalia has potential mineral endowments but not actually coming up with strategies to tap these resources. Leadership failure in Somalia has caused our people to sit on a golden rock while starving to death. That has to change, no matter how long takes. And change does not come out of the blue. It has to start from somewhere, some point.
The political contest between the Islamic courts and the TFG must come to an end otherwsise we shall always be moving along the viscious cycle of war. The traditional systems of government must be replaced with new modalities of administration in which people are allowed to participate the leadership of their country. Previously a group of politicians or military junta hyjacked the political authority of the country thereby marginalizing the people and pushing them to corners of destitution.
The TFG is built upon the basis of tribe which is no different than what we used to see in the last fourty years. And they did not do much to rebuild the nation as it was a seatless government over the two or so years of its existence. It had spent most of its time unwisely in unnecessary travels to attend flag-showing conferences. On the other hand the Islamic courts are giving more emphasis to the political side of their struggle instead of thinking of a way to devise strategies to rebuild the nation and to make peace with the TFG.
Somalis warn the UIC not to throw us in yet another war with the TFG or get absorbed in this expensive war on terror raging on between Bush and Bin Laden. They should know that while away in the war there are international mafia who suck all our natural heritage and resources while letting our people die from lack of food and medical attention. So in that case they should not go to war.
I call the UIC to end this stalemate with the TFG and, together with the TFG, to put in place some sort of an administration and begin to reconstruct the nation. If not then the UIC are another interest group who emerged to milk chaos just like the warlords they had chased out. UIC, please be always on the positive side, if things get out of hand let it not be your fault. Look at the Somali children who are everyday dying from hunger and disease, the poor mother who is bleeding in the camps of displaced populations etc. and don't look for the personal advantage you will gain if you insist on wearing a straight political jacket. Stretching your influence in new areas is nothing more than a power show if you are not actually coming up with viable strategies of security and development .
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AIDS/HIV Pandemic – In 2003, the population of South Africans infected with HIV reached 53 million. This epidemic affects most of Africa as a continent, it is estimated that by 2015, 3/4 of young adults (ages 18-35) living in South-Saharan Africa will be dead to AIDS. One of the main reasons it is such a problem is lack of education. Schools and churches are hesitant to speak about AIDS or sex and so the young population does not have many reliable resources to learn on how to prevent being infected.
Racism/Discrimination – Even though Apartheid is over, there are still major problems with racism and discrimination in South Africa. It will take a long time for many of these issues to be resolved.
If you stop to think about it, you may realize that even after the end of slavery in the U.S. and the Civil Rights Movement throughout the 1960’s, the United States also has a long way to go concerning racism and discrimination. These issues take a lot of time.
