Download 4.1 How and why do countries develop in different ways? Definitions

4.1 How and why do countries develop in different ways?
Definitions of development vary as do attempts to measure it.
People use different ways to measure development, shown in the range of
indicators below. There are different opinions on how development should be
measured:

Economic development is thought to be most important by most people,
this includes industries and trade. Countries want this as the taxes from
it pay for social development (schools, roads and hospitals).

Charities consider socio-political development is equally important- this
includes education , health care, safety and freedom of speech.

Some people believe development causes pollution and inequality between
people and therefore think the happy planet index and gender inequality
index are two of many more important ways to measure development in
relation to GDP and HDI.
How good are different ways of measuring development?
*In your exam you could be given any one of these with the numbers for
different countries. You need to know what the indicators mean, but the
numbers will be provided.
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita- the total value of goods and
services in a country in a year divided by the number of people. Britain’s figure
is $35,494, Tanzania’s is $11,719. This shows how wealthy a country is in
comparison to its population, it does not show how this wealth is spread out (e.g.
in Tanzania there are a few very rich people and many are very poor).
Gross Domestic Product (GDP)- the total value of goods and services in a
country in a year.
The Human Development Index (HDI)- Includes income, education and life
expectancy, and combines them into one number. The UK is 28th, Tanzania is
152nd.
Happy Planet Index-This indicator measures how well resources use benefit
the people in a country without causing long term damage to the environment.
The UK was 41st, Tanzania was 133rd (out of 151).
Gender Inequality Index- How many females are involved in politics, women’s
education levels, how many women work and whether they have access to birth
control and abortion contributes to this measure. The lower the scote, the
fairer women are treated. The score is between 0 and 1. TUK’s socre is 0.243,
Tanzania’s score is 0.590. Women’s rights are not usually measured in the other
indicators; the only issue with this indicator as it does not account for women’s
role in that country; for example in many rural African areas women stay at
home with their children.
Political Freedom RatingCorruption Perception Index-This is a rating relating to how much development
projects benefit the people within the country and not just businesses. A
“perception is used”- research is done on development projects, as this is hard
to measure. Tanzania was ranked 100, The UK was 16th.
Environmental Performance Index-Uses 22 indicators to work out how healthy
people and the environment are in a country. The UK is 9th, Tanzania is 64th.
Progress against the millennium development goals- Targets set in 200 to
achieve by 2015. Goals include “halve the number of people who earn less than
$1 a day”. The progress towards attaining these goals can be used to measure
development.
b There remains a large gap between the level of development of the most
developed and least developed countries.
Examine the extent of the global development gap and how this has changed
over time, using a range of indicators.
You need to be able to use development indicators to give details about how the
development gap has changed. GDP (Gross Domestic Product= total value goods
and services in the country in a year) will show that China and India are
becoming more developed than the rest of the world, whereas indicators such as
literacy rate, environmental performance index and political freedom rating will
still show the quality of life in these countries is still low for a large quantity of
the population (while there are many people who are extremely wealthy.
The development gap is the gap between rich and poor countries. Since 1800’s
Europe has been the richest area due to industrialisation, USA and Japan
followed. This gap opened up because of:

Locational advantages- countires with coast access can trade better.
Equatorial countries often have desserts and droughts, or dense
rainforest that was hard to clear without machinery; Europe has an
excellent climate for farming and most countires have coast access for
trade.

Resources- Britain had excellent coastal access, this led to exploration
and resources such as potato plants were brought back from across the
world. Countries with forests built ships to trade. Today resources such
as oil, gold and agricultural land impact development.

Historical Factors- colonialism meant countries including Britain and
Portugul became rich using other countries labour and products.
There is a global divide between the “have’s” (USA, Britain) and “have not’s”
(many African Nations e.g. Tanzania and Sudan). In 1980’s a divide between
developed and developing countries was clear, it isn’t as clear now because of:

NIC’s- Newly Industrialised Countires including South Korea and Taiwan
have become wealthier due to manufacturing.

“BRICs” economies- Brazil, Russia, India and China are developing and
these countries are now receiving more GDP than many areas of Europe.
China will soon have the highest global GDP.

For one developing country in Sub- Saharan Africa (Tanzania),
consider recent social, political and economic development and possible
barriers to further progress.
A Sub- Saharan country: Tanzania.
Social Development:

Before 1885 the area now known as Tanzania was mainly a primitive
society- it had little technology, transport or trade.

The government set up “rural communes”- rural groups who farmed and
had their services (water, healthcare and education) paid for by the
government. As the government were not getting many taxes (they owned
the companies so couldn’t tax themselves) they had to stop doing this.

Help is available from organisations such as the United Nations
Development Program (UNDP)- the Millennium Villages project (2006-11)
for example, which focused on people (social), (e.g. primary education for
all, women’s health, eliminating hunger). An example of a local scheme is
the Bumbuli Development Corporation, which promotes local business
ideas and farming, as well as encouraging people to report, by mobile
phone, incidents of corrupt government officials demanding or
accepting bribes.
Economic Development:

After independence in 1961 Tanzania kept exporting materials, however
foreign companies were making much more profit than Tanzania.

In 1981 Tanzania and the World Bank disagreed and Tazania’s government
had to change the way it farmed as it had no money.

The most recent phase (2005-25), known as Tanzania’s “Development
Vision” involves changing the way the government and Tanzania’s economy
works, to try to get the country into the middle- income category. The
government want more investment in infrastructure (e.g. 2, 200km of
surfaced roads and new bridges). Tanzania is currently working on
reducing the extreme poverty within the country.

From 1986 the International Monetary Fund (IMF) tried to help Tanzania
to receive steady money flows and boost export growth, mainly from
selling farm products; exports did increase but there was also rising
inflation and falling GDP (meaning Tanzania was making less money, and
the price of things were going up), which meant in more rural poverty,
inequality, malnutrition, and deforestation, and made Tanzania dependent
on foreign aid.

Between 1985 and 2005 reforms took place to move Tanzania back
towards a market economy (selling farming goods to other countries) with
foreign direct investment (FDI), but this time with the decisions made by
the Tanzanian government and its people rather than by people outside
the country. However, during this time the government did not invest in
services leaving people without basic needs.
Political Development:

A brief war with Uganda from 1978- 1979 did not help development in
Tanzania.

Between 1885 and 1961 it was a German and then a British colony, it made
money by selling raw materials to other countries (primary industry).

Between 1967 and 1985 Tanzania’s government took over all of the
industries to try to make more money.
Barriers to further progress:

Poverty for a large percentage of the country.

Lack of infrastructure (roads, train lines, airports, ports, water pipes,
broadband, electricity lines, power plants etc.)

Widespread corruption (people will keep money for themselves within
government and the people do not get what they need).

Gap between rural and urban.

Global recession.

High prices globally for food and oil.

Climate change.

HIV and aids (1.4 million people in Tanzania suffering with this condition).

World Bank loan control meaning Tanzania is struggling to get finance.
4.2 How might the development gap be closed?
Development strategies vary in theory.
Use theories of development to help explain why societies develop over
time, including Rostow’s modernisation theory and dependency theory.
Rostow’s modernisation theory
Rostow, and American money expert (economist) suggested in the 1960’s that all
countries would go through the 5 stages above as they developed. The stages go
from farming to a society where people consume a large quantity of goods and
services. A “stimulus” is needed to get to the next level; for example building a
port to reach stage 2 so surpluses can be sold to other countries. This is based
on UK and USA development, and many people do not think it is accurate for
other countries, as it assumes all countries have the same conditions (such as
weather and population.
Dependency Theory
This theory is also from the 1960’s, and is a reaction to the American Rostow
model. This model blames developed countries (The USA and UK) for developing
countries lack of development. There are a range of reasons it says developed
countries have made developing countries poor:

Rich countries interfere with poorer countries politics, for example The
UK and USA in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Unbalanced trade- poor countries sell materials cheaply to rich countries,
rich countries charge poor countries a large amount for finished
products.

Selling poor countries things they don’t need (coca cola).

Third world debt; rich countries charge huge interest rates on loans to
poor countries, poor countries have to use aid money to repay them.

Big companies do not pay people in poor countries good wages, and do not
pay poor countries well for their materials and products. The companies
get rich by ripping off the poor countries. Fair trade is a reaction to this,
where some companies are trying to do the right thing when they trade
with poor countries.
Levels of development may vary within a country with regional differences
evident, especially between an urban core and a rural periphery.
Case study example: India (Bihar and Maharashtra)
The Core area studied in India is Maharashtra; this is where Mumbai is located.
Features of this area are:

Richest region of India.

Service industries; banking, insurance, IT centres and call centres.

Excellent education including Universities.

Large quantity of graduates who are fluent in English; this has led to
outsourcing with many jobs from UK companies being based in Mumbai e.g.
insurance and bank call centres.

Entertainment; the Bollywood industry is based here.

Leisure and businesses; hotels and restaurants.

Manufacturing; half of factory work in Mumbai is in the cotton industry.

Wide spread construction work.

Opportunity to make money.
The Periphery area studied in India is Bihar, this is in the North East and
borders onto Nepal. Features of this area are:

Very low income (the average is £75 a year).

Only half of people have electricity and only 12% have a flushing toilet.

Lung disease common due to burning wood and dung in the house for fuel.

Most people farm; they don’t own their own land and eat what they grown.
They often get into debt paying rent for their farms.

“Caste system”- low castes don’t get education.

Very low school attendance and access.

Women become pregnant at a young age and the can’t work.
Main differences in development between Maharashtra and Bihar:

Access to entertainment.

Access to services e.g. health care, education, transport and
entertainment (cinemas and shopping).

Wealth- income differences.

Health and life expectancy
b Types of development vary between top-down and bottom-up strategies.
Compare the characteristics of top-down and bottom-up strategies in terms
of their scale, aims, funding and technology.
Bottom up- Microhydro power, The Kingdom of Kasephuan, Indonesia
Scale- Small scale; power for one village.
Aims-The first aim is to provide electricity for the village, this means:

Longer hours can be worked in fields (as they can see with electric
lighting).

They can access trade (electricity for phones and computers).

Education improves due to computer access.

Less wood being burned in house for light and fuel (this means less lung
disease and higher life expectancy).

Jobs created maintaining the scheme.
The second aim is to sell extra electricity back to the government, this
means:

Income for the village (they have used this to fund education,
healthcare and libraries).

Greener energy (less carbon dioxide emissions).

The area has an outside income which will lead to this money being
spent in the community and more businesses developing.
Funding- IBEKA (a charity) loan the money to the community. A percentage of
the profits from selling the elextricity to the government pays back IBEKA,
IBEKA makes a small profit to reinvest somewhere else.
Technology- Intermediate technology (cheap technology locals can maintain and
repair themselves with little equipment).
Top Down- The Madeira River Project, Brazil (The Santo Antonio Dam)
Scale-The Santo Antonio Dam is a large scale development project. The Madeira
River Project impacts a large area of Brazil including the Amazon Rainforest.
The Madeira River then flows into Bolivia where the projects in Brazil are
having further impacts.
Aims:

Create electricity without a large amount of carbon dioxide emissions,
ensuring Brazil has a power supply as gas and oil become more expensive
and harder to access.

Create jobs to aid development in the region.

Build new infrastructure as part of the project improving people’s
facilities (including the construction of new roads, schools, health clinics
and a transport channel for river barges).

Improve river navigation therefore boosting trade and incomes in the
area.
Funding- $5.3 billion; it is being funded by a range of banks and electricity
companies.
Technology- Very large scale, complex technology which is expensive to
construct and maintain.
Evaluate the impact of one large top- down project, e.g. a dam, on
different groups of people in a developing country.
Top Down- The Madeira River Project, Brazil
Impacts on different groups of people:
Local Residents:

Improved sewage disposal.

Mercury poisoning monitoring (as the dam will cause mercury to be
present in the river by disrupting the soil).

Expansion of farming meaning more jobs and incomes.

Immigrants will be attracted and mean there is more competition for jobs
and services.

More malaria due to increased water attracting mosquitos.
Farmers and fishermen:

Health, education and sanitation improved.

“Fish channels” in dam to allow the fish to migrate.

300 forced out of their homes, 5000 forced to move away from river
banks.

Farms in front of the dam will have insufficient water.

Commercial fishing will reduce fish stocks and lead to fisherman job
losses.
Indigenous tribes:

Two reservations created to home them.

Their lands will be flooded and eroded, they will have to stay in one area
of the forest.

They will be exposed to unwanted outside contact leading to diseases
(such as flu) and a loss in culture (they are in voluntary isolation, they do
not want outside contact).
Poorer people in the region:

20,000 new jobs, 100,000 expected to move to the area.

Education and training centre constructed to help them to get jobs.
Brazilian government:

Possible war with Bolivia as the dams are flooding Bolivia including nature
reserves.

Improved transport for barges will lead to increased trade.

Less pressure to buy oil as dam supplies electricity.

Debt from dam has to be paid off.
Conservation groups:

“Run of the river” technology means water does flow leading to less
flooded rainforest area.

Hydroelectric power means less carbon emissions.

Forest reserves created for conservation.

Environmental Impact Assessment flawed- fish will not be able to adapt
to their habitat chance (including piranhas) and will die, meaning the food
chains will collapse.

Under the “Equator Principles” this dam should not be built as it will
totally destroy the food web of the ecosystem.

Soya farming will expand meaning more deforestation.
Businesses:

Cheapest electricity in Brazil.

76% of Brazil’s electricity is from HEP; if the rivers receive less flow
Brazil may run out of power.