The ‘global economic crisis’ was the top buzz phrase for most of last year and only began to be overtaken somewhat by ‘climate change’ towards the end of the year, when some economies began to turn around and it was clear that despite the global predicament of a warming planet there would be no clear consensus at the United Nations Climate Change Conference held in Copenhagen in December – if ever there is total agreement; but that’s another story.
The economic crisis is all but over. What’s left now is the picking up of the pieces cast asunder in its wake; pieces like joblessness and poverty that will adversely affect the poorest of the poor – the human factor.
The World Bank, in this year’s Global Monitoring Report says the impact of the global economic crisis will be lasting and immeasurable, particularly on human development in developing countries. It is predicting that by 2015 – the year set for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), one of which is to halve extreme poverty – 53 million more people in the world will be living in extreme poverty. Regardless of what individual countries would have achieved by then, if that will be the world’s status then this pivotal goal would not have been met.
When in 2000 members of the international community sat down at the UN and agreed on the MDGs, they reckoned without the heartlessness of a powerful minority; a few already rich folks with plans to become extremely wealthy, cost it what it will. Their gambling and shenanigans brought most of the world to its knees financially, and although so far the international financial institutions have responded positively and strongly to the crisis, circumstances have prevailed against there being the kind of recovery needed to propel the momentum towards achieving all of the MDGs. These came in the form of spectacular natural disasters, wrought by that other global crisis – climate change. The immediate and tremendous responses these disasters needed wreaked havoc with developmental plans and in some cases threw countries back five years or more – a case in point being Haiti.
There is growing consensus that the world will be unable to achieve the majority of the MDGs in the next five years and a major part of this failure will be because of the poverty factor on which practically every other goal hinges.
Five years ago when he published The End of Poverty, economist Dr Jeffrey Sachs argued that if all wealthy countries of the world were to increase their combined foreign aid budgets to between $135 billion and $195 billion for the next decade, and properly allocate that money, extreme global poverty – defined by the World Bank as an income of less than a dollar a day – could be eliminated by 2025. But back then, there was no global economic crisis in sight. Sachs also had a blueprint – some time in the 1980s, he provided the technical expertise that tamed Bolivia’s hyperinflation. He then turned his eyes towards Russia where he was less successful, though he did not fail and has subsequently set his sights on Africa among the worst places in the world where extreme poverty is concerned. Perhaps today Dr Sachs is contemplating a new edition of The End of Poverty as it would be even more difficult now than it was then to raise $195 billion.
