Strategies for National and International Development
(i) International strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the
LDCs to develop & (ii) National development policies have limited success in
improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens. What are your
views?
20 Comments:
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I do not agree that International strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop but I do agree that national development projects have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens. Examples of these international agreements are the United Nations Millennium Development Goals(UNMDG) and the United Nations Covention on the Law of the SEA(UNCLOS)
Firstly, the UNMDG have reduced the number of cases of extreme poverty and hunger in Vietnam. The proportion of people living in extreme poverty decreased from 58.1% in 1993 to 24.1% in 2004. the second goal of the UNMDG plans to achieve primary education for everyone in the world. Much progress has been made as the percentage of enrolment in the primary schools arounf the world has increased. The highest increase is in the Southeast Asia where it rose from 72% in 1992 to 86% in 2004 which is largely due to the progress made in India.
Since the adoption of the UNMDG,people living in LDCs such as Vietnam and India now have better education and higher quality of life. These factor would ultimately support development in the countries. Hence, these internatinal stratergies are not a waste of resources and time.
Secondly, National Development policies such as the Hill Tribe education project in Thailand and the 'linking arms against poverty' prject in Philippines.
In thailand, after obtaining education, the people in the hill tribes were able to find employment in the cities. This helped to increase the incomes of the people. However, The effectiveness of the project was limited as the people live in small communities and due to the geogrphical isolation, it is difficult to reach out to large numbers of the hill tribe people.
In Philippine, three million people have been helped, 600 000 agricultural jobs were created in the rural areas and the government provided jobs through job placement schemes. Poverty rates have decreased and people can afford basic necessities such as food and water. However, more still needs to be done as there is aneed to diversify the products and the skills of the poor. There is also a need for greater market access in order to get more consumers to purchase thier goods and services. Finally, there is also a need for more volunteers to give loans, provide training for the poor and to reach out to more enterprising poor.
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International strategies are not a waste of time in helping the LDCs to develop. The world Bank provides aid to reduce poverty in the world and has successfully improve many countries living in poverty all around the world. For example, the World Banks'Kecamatan Development Programme (KDP), started in 1998, provided aids to 25 villages in Indonesia that year. Over US$890 million in funds were supplied to the KDP for Reconstruction and Development. Presently, it has banefited over 34000 villages across Indonesia.
Also, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) reduces poverty and improve quality of life of people in the Asia Pacific Region. The ADB lends millions of dollars to LDCs such as Bangladesh to support its economic growth. Example, the ADB provided financial and technical help to Bangladesh in the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge project. Therefore, the International Strategies are not a waste of resources and time in helping the LDC to develop as it has successfully helped many countries and many villages to over come poverty.
To me, National development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of the citizen. Example, the China's 'one child policy' did helped in greatly reducing the number of birth rates and overcoming the problem in China of overpopulation. However, the policy is too successful that the government has to made some adjustments to it in order to ensure that there will be sufficient people to support the elderly in the future. Also, this policy is not effective in the rural areas as people living in rural ared tendto have more children for reasons such as having additional farm hands to help in agricultural activities.
Therefore, i agree that National development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens as no policy is flawless in the world.
-Jun Kai
Firstly, I think that International stretegies is not a waste of resources and time. It is actually beneficial for all the LDCs and it help these LDCs in their development greatly like the World Bank helped the villagers from Sleepy Tirtoyomo, Indonesia to gain access to clean reliable water source. Also, We have the UN who came out with the United Nations Millennium Development Goals to give aid to the 1.1 billion people living in extreme poverty. It actually help to narrow the gap betweeen the rich and the poor. They can't live in poverty while other country are prospering, it will make the gap between the rich and the poor even bigger. Therefore, it is not a waste of time and resources. It is a need!
National development has achieved much success and this success is not limited. Although there are some limitations like the hill tribes in Thailand being geographically isolated, It still succeeded. It helped the poor in that country to achieve a higher standard of living by having proper education in the Hill Tribe Education Project, clean water in the Parivartan Slum Networking Programme,jobs From the KALAHI,etc. People in these countries can to ive out of poverty and have a better life. Example, in Philippines, The KALAHI(Linking Arms Against Poverty) through job placement schemes have decreased the poverty rates and people living in poverty previously now are able to afford basic necessities. It also provided a greater market access for them to sell their products. Therefore, it has limited success but it helped to a greater extent.
With all these efforts put in, I do believe that the uneven development will be alleviated but this process will take some time. Miracles can't happen without all these efforts, therefore, all these efforts are necessary and it is a success although there are some limitations.
In my opinion, international strategies are not a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop. Many international organizations such as the UN and the World Bank have put in lots of effort to end poverty and helping the LDCs to develop.
For example, the UNCLOS have benefited many coastal LDCs such as Peru and Tunisia. They have exclusive rights to fish within 200 nautical miles of their coast (Exclusive Economic Zones), thus, they do not need to compete with fishermen from other countries, especially the DCs as they have advanced technology and are able to fish for more fishes. By being able to fish for more fishes, those fishermen from the LDCs have more profits as their catch would be larger than in the past. These can in turn lead to higher demand of goods and this can attract TNCs to set up factories there as the people are affluent enough to buy goods. This will lead to higher income of the people and their standard of living will improve. Moreover, fishes will not be over fished and this can lead to the conservation of fishes.
However, I agree that international strategies are a waste of time to a certain extent. This is because those agreements took a long time for all the countries to agree to the agreement. Moreover, the agreements will take time for it to take place and it would result in further waste of time. Furthermore, some agreements would not benefit some countries. For example, the UNCLOS will not benefit landlocked countries such as Laos.
In my opinion, I agree that national development have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life. This can be supported by the fact that the Thais are not benefiting much from the government’s policy – Education for All. Although students are taught subjects such as Math and Thai and increase literacy rate, not many students benefit from it. Firstly, there are communication barriers as the volunteers speak in English and the students speak in Thai. This would lead to misunderstanding among them and students cannot learn efficiently. Secondly, there is geographical isolation as villages tend to be spread out and is remote. Thus, it is difficult for government to organize development programmes for education. Thus, the policy has limited success.
Also, people from China did not gain much from the One Child Policy by the Chinese Communist government. This is due to the fact that China is a very big country and the government will have trouble ensuring that every couple has only 1 child. Although its effect in urban areas is quire good, the rural area is not benefiting much. People would tend to have more than 1 child as they need more help in the farms. Also, they would not stop bearing children until they have a son as they would want to carry on the family name. Moreover, the birth rates have dropped so much that the government need to be careful in population control so that there will be enough people to support the elderly in the future. Thus, it have limited success in trying to control the population of China so as to not waste too much resources.
To help alleviate uneven development, strategies are implemented to improve the situation.
I disagree that the international stratagies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop. As it is shared internationally, they will be more helping hands to help the LDCs. There is also more funds provided which will help and benefit the LDCs more. Those international organisations have helped the LDCs to improve their standard of living relatively well compared to their situations in the past. For example, the World Bank's Kecamatan Development Programme have helped over 34000 villagers across Indonesia. The villagers now have good water system which improved their access to clean water and also irrigation. With the aid of the World Bank, their health and economic conditions have improved. Overall, the international organisations have improved the standard living of LDCs. Most of them are successful in providing financial or technological aids to the countries. Though it requires more time and funds, but I think it still do allow the LDCs to get out of poverty and alleviate the countries' development.
I disagree that national development policies have limited success on the lives of the citizens. As it is done in the country, it can reach out to the citizens more efficiently. The government will be able to know what the citizens want and have a more benifitting strategy. For example is China's 'One Child' policy. It is implemented due to the country's situation of overpopulation. The government wants to control the population thus allowing couples in China to have only one child. This was effective as it was against the overpopulation situation in the country. Birth rates in China have dropped significantly since the implementation. The government have also made adjustments to suit the country's population especially the ageing population. The country will also have enough resources for survival. As seen from the success, I can see that national development do help the country to overcome the problems and improve the SOL and QOL. I do not think that the success is limited as the countries do benefit alot from these national development policies like increase in employment, more resources, better basic infrastructure and increase in country's wealth.
In my opinion, I think both national development policies and international strategies have helped the LDCs. However, there is still a need to narrow the gap between the rich and poor in the world.
International strategies are may well be a waste of time and resources to helping the LDCs to develop in a certain point of view.
But I do have to reject the fact that it does not do any help or alleviate the situation at all. Most strategies often do have its usefulness and limitations to certain problems.
Therefore, in a international scale, most organisations are unlikely to cover all of the problems in the world to help the people in LDCs. Refering to an example, the World Bank, an international organisation which made of up of different countries commited to provide aid, reducing poverty around the developing countries in the world.
Established in 1944, the World Bank, provides aid in forms of money or technology. Loans that are low or no interest rates are given to LDCs to improve their level of development. Projects such as improving sanitaion and water supply, or financing vaccination programmes are implemented to the country.
One of its international projects are the Kecamatan Development Bank. It provided aid to 25 villages in rural areas of Indonesia for reconstruction adn development.
Presently, it is the largest community-driven progamme in the world and have benefited over 34000 villages across Indonesia, making it a plus factor for inernationl strategies in helping LDCs to develop.
Not only international organisations, in a national scale, some governments have implemented and adopted various development policies to help its own country's wealth and standard of living.
Some strategies can be seen in China. Population control are introduced in China as its resources cannot support its large, overgrowing population of people. Problems arises as there maybe shortage of jobs, housing and limited access to education.
Governments realised that they need to implement a policy called the 'One Child Policy'. It has allowed each couple in China to have only one child, reducing the population numbers.
Althrough there is side consquences such as gender inequality, this policy worked well in China and ensure there will not be any indications of overpopulation.
(i) I do not agree that international strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop. Although the strategies are successful to a certain extent, i believe that international strategies such as the United Nations Millennium Development Goals(UNMDG), has benefitted the LCDs more. Through the UNMDG, LDCs are able to achieve greater development by getting rid of extreme poverty and hunger. For example, Vietnam, the proportion of people living in extreme poverty has decreased from 58.1% in 1993 to 24.1% on 2004. People living in Vietnam are able to receive basic items such as food, water and clothing for survial. Another strategy is the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea(UNCLOS). Under the UNCLOS, Exclusive Economic Zone(EEZ) was developed to prevent fishermen of a country from fishing in the waters of foreign countries. This benefitted poor fishermen in Peru. Before the UNCLOS was implemented, poor fishermen has to compete with larger fishing boats from DCs, which decreased the number of harvest they made from the sea. Therefore, decreased their income.
On the whole, although international strategies requires resources and time, they benefitted many LDCs to a large extent.
(ii) I agree that national development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens. Take for example the Hill Tribe Education Policy developed by the Thailand government. Although education had led to an improvement in the living conditions of the hill tribe communities in Thailand, the effectiveness of this programme was limited. This is because hill tribes live in a small communities, which made it difficult for the government to reach out to large numbers of the community. Communication barriers between the hill tribes and the volunteers and government organisations have made it a challenge to this project.
Hence, i agree that there are limited success in these policies.
In my opinion, International strategies are not a waste of resources and time in helping LDCs to develop. This is because many LDCs benefited from these strategies.
For example, the World Bank provided monetary grants of over US$890 million to villages in Indonesia for their own development plans and this benefited over 34000 villages. Sleepy Tirtomoyo is one of the villages that benefited greatly from this. Not only did it have access to clean water, its health and economic conditions also improved.
Besides that, the Asian Development Bank helped Bangladesh develop its transportation which eased traffic congestion, encourage economic growth and improved its living conditions. The bridge built also connects argricultural areas to commercial centre. This makes farmers sell their produce more easily.
Having benefited the LDCs so much, how is it that these strategies are a waste of time and resources?
I also do not agree that National development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of live of citizens. It is true that these policies have limitations, however, the success is greater than its limitations.
For example, the One Child Policy implemented in China to solve the problem of the fast growing population. Though it faced challenges and limitations, the policy is still very succesful as the birth rate dropped after the policy is implemented. In fact, it is too successful that the government had to make adjustments to ensure there are enough people to support the elderly in future.
The other 3 National development Policies also benefited various countries alot. Therefore I do not agree that these policies have limited access in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens.
Jeffery Fern
(i) I do not agree that international strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop.
The first international strategy is United nations Convention on the Law of the Sea(UNCLOS). this strategy is adopted by more than 160 countries. It helps to control the usage of the resources in the seas and oceans of the world. It ensure that resources are used in a sustainable manner and that they would not be overused and depleted. Peru, a coastal LDC is being protected by the Exclusive economic Zones(EEZ) set up. It ensures that DCs with better technology cannot use their improved fishing boats and other advanced fishing equipment to fish in Peru's seas without permission. This ensure that the livelihood of the fishermen will not be affected. Although landlocked countries such as Laos and Bolivia do not benefit from this strategy, many countries have received help.
The other international strategy is United Nations Millennium Development Goals(UNMDG).It help LDCs to alleviate uneven development and achieve greater development. Countries such as Vietnam have successfully improved their standard of living. Enrolment in primary school in Southeast Asia have increased from 72% in 1999 to 89% in 2004. s the UNMDG have plan eight goals which includes issues such as getting rid of extreme global poverty and hunger, and achieving primary education for everyone in the world, the time taken to achieve all goals is long as they have to ensure cooperation among nations and more contribution of funds. However, it have benefited many people around the world.
(ii) I agree that national development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens.
For example, the Hill Tribe Education Project which provides "Education For All". Many have received help in terms of obtaining employment and increasing income. However,it is only successful to a certain extent as their geographical isolation have made it difficult for the government to reach out to large numbers of the community. In addition, communication barriers between the hill tribes and the volunteers who have been brought in from the developed regions to teach them have posed another challenge to the government.
Although the standard of living and quality of life of the hill tribes have improved, more can be done to improve their lifestyle.
The international agreements such as the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (UNMDG) and the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) help to alleviate uneven development throughout the world, to shorten the development gap between the Developed Countries (DCs) and Less Developed Countries (LDCs). Though these actions would not benefit or affect the DCs in anyway, there is a need for such development. Reason being with countries having too much a income gap, LDCs could possibly face economic crisis and eventually face extreme poverty for the entire country. In a way, with LDCs prospering, the DCs could benefit from it. For example, LDCs like Indonesia have well climate for growing of crops, and with help of United Nations (UN) to help them, supply of crops worldwide can be replenished and maintained at a faster rate, with farmers having more education on improving agricultural productivity. Also, with LDCs developing, people living in LDCs will get out of poverty and given education, just like any other children from the DCs. Also, the UNCLOS helps to maintain and control resources of the seas and oceans, so as to prevent overfishing, and resources would be sustainable.
National development policies implemented in LDCs, help to raise the education standards, standard of living and life of citizens. Though it is true that such policies like the Parivartan Slum Networking Programme in Ahmedabad, India has limited success, its achievements are rather still commenable, considering over 40 slums have been benefited and death rates have declined. However, areas such as education, as in this case in India, education have not been focused, with citizens remaining uneducated, Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita remains low with citizens only able to be involved in low-paying primary industry jobs. This would cause the quality of life of citizens in LDCs to remain low, thus it is true to say that national development policies have limited success.
No international strategies are not a waste of resources and time in helping LDCs. Internantional organisations come up with international strategies such as the United Nation Millennium Development Goals ( UNMDG ) and the United Nation On The Convention Of The Law Of The Seas. (UNCLOS). The aim of the UNMDG is to reduce problems such as poverty, hunger , disease and lack of shelter. The main goal of the UNMDG is to reduce the number of people living in extreme poverty. Extreme poverty is define as people who are living on less than 1 USD a day. They are also unable to afford trhe most basic items such as food, water and clothing. An estimate of 1.1 billion out of 6.5 billion of the world population is living in extreme poverty hunger. By getting rid of extreme hunger in countries such as Vietnam where 58.1 percent of the countrys population were living in extreme poverty in 1993 to 24.1 percent in 2004. By reducing the number of people living in extreme poverty and providing them with food, water and clothings. Their standard of living will improve and their HDI (Human Development index) Will increase. The UMCLOS enable coastal states to have the exclusive right to use resources such as oil and fishes 200 nautical miles from their shoreline. This EEZ( Exclusive Economic Zone ) prevent fishermans from other countries to fish in the area around LDCs. This help increase the standard of living of the people in LDCs as less competition means more profit for them. Income per capita and having food, clothing and shelther increase the standard of living of peoples living in LDCs. Therefore international strategies are not a waste of resources and time.
National development polices have both its pros and cons in improving the standard of living and quality of life and citizens. An example is Parivartan Slum Networking Programme in india where slum dwellers were provided with basic infrastructures so they will have access to clean water supply and sanitation facilities. The project also ensure the people are educated on how to use the facilities provided. Within five year since the start of the project, it has benefitted 56000 peoples in over 40 slums and is currently expanding to include 59 other slums. This project result in the death rate declination from 6.9 people per 1000 to 3.7 per 1000 people. Fewer people also suffer from general illnesses. While this has improve the standard of living of the people however not all the people of slums in India are involve as there are too many areas that need help and there aren't enough man power. Another example of a national development policy that has help improve the standard of living of its citizens is the hill tribe education policy in Thailand. By being over volunteer teachers from developed region of the country to the areas where people from the hill tribes live. This is to provide basic education such as thai language and mathematics to the people whom are living in the hill tribes. By having basic educations, the people living in hill tribes are able to find employment in cities. This help increase the income of the people living in hill tribes and help improve the standard of living. However due to the geological location of this people, there exist communication barrier and its hard to help all of the hill tribes.Therefore i feel that national development policies have limited success in improving the life of the citizens.
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I disagree that international strategies really helped the LDCs. One of it is United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. ALthough it protects the coast os the LDC within (200 nautical miles), it is not very effective. Due to global warming, the plankton are dying because of the unsuitable temperature for survial. Thus, the fishes are depleting as their food which are planktons depletes. In additon, the inflation rate of food resulted from the recent series of disasters destroying live stocks. Even if their earning have increase, their standard of living will not impove much due to the high inflation rate. Moreover, only coastal LDCs will be benefiting form it.
I agree that national development policies are a waste of resources. One of it is Hill Tribe Educaton. It is not pragmatic as there are many hinderance to it. First of all, there are lack of manpower. Who would leave their comformtable home to help those unfortunate one? I will expect that there are not many people willing to volunteer in such programmes. Secondly, the hill tribes speaks a different languages other than Thai. How would education be conducted when there is communication barriers? Furthermore, there are too many children in a classroom for a teacher to take care of. This means that education will be inefficient as the teacher will be having diffculty to point out how the students can improve. Lastly, these hill tribes are geograhically isolated. This hindered large vehicles from sending aids and volunteers. Thus, it would take a long time to send resoures there if not unale to reach there at all! Overall, it is a waste of resources as the hill tribes do not benefit much.
I disagree that the International strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop.
Firstly, the UNMDG came up with eight international development goals that all 192 United Nations member statesv and at least 23 international organisation have agreed to achieve by the year 2015. They include eradicating extreme poverty, reducing child nmortality rates, fighting disease epidemics such as AIDS, and developing a global partnership for development. The Declaration asserts that every individual has the right to dignity, freedom, equality, a basic standard of living that includes freedom from hunger and violence, and encourages tolerance and solidarity
Secondly, the UNCLOS is an international agreement which is an attempt to control the usage of the resources of the sea and oceans of the world. this is to ensure that these resources are being used in a suitable manner and are not overused and depleted. By putting together this international strategy, we can ensure that our future generation will have ample resources to rely on. However, landlocked countries will not benefit from this policy.
There are other policies like for example the ones implemented in China, Philippines, Thailand and India. In China, the 'one child policy' did help in greatly reducing the number of birth rates and overcoming the problem in China of overpopulation. However, it was too successful that the government had to make some adjustments to it in order to ensure that there would be sufficient people to support the elderly in the future. In addition, this policy is not effective in the rural areas as people living in rural area tend to have more children for reasons such as having additional farm hands to help in agricultural activities. Each of these policies implemented have reach a certain level of success. However, i believe, with all these advantages or benefits, it has also its limitations.
Thus, we cannot say that International strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop as no policy is able to eradicate poverty entirely or to improve the people's life indefinitely without the possibility of failure resulting in wasting of resources.
I disagree that International strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the less developed countries (LDCs) to develop. For example, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) has helped fishermen in the LDCs to have a sufficient amount of resources for living as they are competing with developed countries (DCs) which have better equipments and are able to spot fish easier. Under the UNCLOS, coastal states have the exclusive rights to use the resources in the waters 200 nautical miles, hence, the LDCs does not have to compete with the DCs for resources. Furthermore, the United Nations have also came up with another strategy, United Nations Millennium Development Goals (UNMDGs), which aims to get rid of poverty and hunger and provide primary school education. This strategy has help to decrease poverty rate in Vietnam from 58.1 percent to 24.1 percent.
As for the National development policies, it has help countries such as India, Thailand, China and Philippines. In India, Parivartan Slum Networking programme has helps Ahmedabad, India, to have access to clean water supply and underground sewerage, individual toilets and solid waste collection. This helps Ahmedabad to decrease the death and illness rate. As for Thailand, the government came out with the ‘education for all’ policy which has benefited the hill tribe people as they are able to find jobs in the urban areas and generate income.
Thus, I disagree that the international and national strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping LDCs develop.
(i) I do not agree with the statement that international strategies are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop. Allow me to discuss why below.
United Nations Millennium Development Goals (UNMDG) , it had achieved two goals while helping Vietnam. UNMDG aims to help LDCs to achieve greater development and gets out of poverty. It can be proven by taking Vietnam as an example. By statistics, the porportion of people living in extreme poverty in Vietnam decreased from 58.1% in 1993 to 24.1% in 2004. The people were trained to equip the necessary skills to look for a job. To at least provide themselves with basic needs and earn a little income to support their family. Next, they achieved their second goal, evidence from the percentage of enrolment into primary schools from 72% in 1999 to 89% in 2004.
With education encouraged and effort made to improve the problem of poverty, Vietnam is developing. With successes of the above mentioned, I do not think that the effort put in was a waste.
(ii) Yes, I agree that there are limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens. Now, taking Thailand as an example, the government had been improving the education standards in their country. So as to boost the literacy rate and also to upgrade the people through training and development programmes. With education, the people will be able to find a job easily and therefore helping the economy to grow. A community learning centre was also built to facilitate the people and teach them about sustainable development. However, the effectiveness of this programme is really limited. As there is a break down in the communication and also, the country's geographical isolation made it difficult to reach out to them. Therefore, the successes are really limited.
I agree that the strategies are a waste of time and money. This is because even though the strategies have improve the lives and standard of living of the Less Developed Countries(LDCs) , it has minimum effect on the entire economy in the world as the Developed Countries(DCs) help them out of extreme poverty, they still have little monetary contribution in the help of the economy of the world. Furthermore, the United Nations uses and expects each DCs member of the UN to contribute or commit 0.7% of their Gross Domestic Product (GDP) to help finance projects for example, United Nations Millennium Developments Goals. The goal is to be expected to be done by 2015 however, up till this date which is 4 years away, not one goal has been achieved fully. This proves that this is the waste of time and resources of the international bodies that facilitate the strategies. So why should the DCs help the LDC when they have nothing to gain? Though there are some successes of development in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, these are only useful to states that are coastal like Peru. Other than that, landlocked countries such as Bolivia gains nothing from it thus UNCLOS has only prove some of its worth of the resources used.
I agree as even though there are successes in the national development projects such as Parivartan Slum Networking Programme, China one child policy, Thailand Hill Tribe Education project and KALAHI plans, all have some success but those are still not enough to allow their economy to be less reliant on DCs. The Parivartan Slum Networking Programme, they provided basic infrastructure, training, decrease death rates but these can only go on if the government cares. Furthermore, there successes will be further limited because of problems such as communication barriers and geographical isolations. Some might just want to stick to their traditional way of life or find it too much of a hassle. The successes also vary with the contributions from organizations and number of volunteers as this in non-pay and well, money makes the world go round.
(i) I disagree that international strategies such as the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (UMNDG) and United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) are a waste of resources and time in helping the LDCs to develop.
The UNMDG helps LDCs get out of poverty and helping them achieve greater development. This is done so by promoting gender equality, education and environmental sustainability. An example of a LDC which benefited from the works of the UNMDG is the Vietnamese living in poor communities. Such works include educating them with knowledge and skills, helping them to achieve a primary education so that they would be able to afford basic necessities and improve their standard of living. Thus UNMDG helps get rid of extreme global poverty and hunger in LDCs. This is evident in the statistics given which supports the fact that UNMDG has helped reduced extreme poverty, decreasing the percentage of 58.1 per cent in 1993 to 24.1 per cent in 2004.
Moving on, the UNCLOS benefits coastal countries’ fishermen by adopting the Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs). Peru in South America is an example of coastal countries which benefited greatly from the UNCLOS. With the EEZs, the rights of fishermen are protected by ensuring that there will be sufficient supply of fish in the waters around the country, so that they can maintain their livelihood. Moreover, it is to prevention the extinction of underwater life, especially the endangered ones such as the Club shells. However, a minority of the countries in the world do not benefit from the UNCLOS. This includes Bolivia in South America and Laos in Southeast Asia.
To sum up, I feel that the impacts of the UNMDG and UNCLOS have benefited the LDCs and that they are worth the resources and time invested in these international strategies.
(ii)I agree with the statement that “National development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens”.
The Parivatan Slum Networking Programme is implemented by the Indian government in Ahmedabad, a major commercial, industrial and financial centre in the state of Gurjarat, India. This programme provided basic infrastructure to increase the accessibility to clean water, reducing the spread of diseases caused by bacteria found in waste and contaminated water. To help the villagers adapt to changes in their environment, monthly monitoring meetings are held and trainings are provided to educate the villagers on how to operate the infrastructures. These improved the Indians’ living conditions, providing them with a better quality of life and reduce the spread of widespread diseases such as cholera and polio. The statistics have proven the above mentioned to be true as death rates have decreased from 6.9 per 1000 people to 3.7 per 1000 people.
Unfortunately, literacy rates in these villages seem to be ignored, and the villagers do not have the proper knowledge and skills to contribute to the economic development of the country. As much as this programme can help improve their standard of living, they would not be able to clinch a stable income, unable to afford basic necessities, let alone goods and services. As a result, the unemployment rate in these LDCs would increase, forcing the villagers to work in primary industries such as agriculture or extraction of raw materials. With a large population of its workforce in primary industries, the country would be stagnant, only capable of maintaining the poor standards of the villagers lives.
Therefore, the national development policies have limited success in improving the standard of living and quality of life of citizens. And this is clearly evident in the impact of the Parivatan Slum Networking Programme.
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