Countries throughout the world differ in their level of development; they are classified within a range of the two extremes as either LEDC (Least Economically Developed Countries) or MEDC (More Economically Developed Countries). The Variety of economies, cultures and people make it impossible to use a single indicator of development. Geographers use diverse Development Indicators to compare regions against each other, such indicators include:
LEDCs exhibit the lowest socioeconomic indicators and meet the criteria of poverty, human resource weakness (nutrition, health, literacy and education) and economic vulnerability.
On the other hand, MEDCs, also known as Developed or Industrialized countries, have high economic levels and advanced technological infrastructure. MEDCs are usually advanced industrial countries where they but raw material from other LEDCs to produce high-tech products. Moreover, MEDCs general have good health care for their citizens.
The CIA fact book was referred to for obtaining general statistics describing two LEDCs (Togo and Madagascar) and two MEDCs (Canada and United States of America) in terms of Population growth, health and education.
A comparison was made between one MEDC (Canada) and one LEDC (Madagascar) to show the difference between the different indicators that are used to compare countries’ development, the comparison was made as a graphical representation.
From the above graphs it can be concluded that MEDCs have lower Birth rates; due to families tend to be smaller as individuals invest more in few children in order to give them a better chance in life and families in MEDCs have less time to spend on raising children because women also contribute in the societies’ work.
Moreover, Literacy...
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...ng the development gap between countries. Unfair trade between developed and undeveloped countries has decreased the undeveloped countries share in the world trade and has increased the effect of globalization on such countries. Other economic factors include over reliance on farming, Lack of technological resources and debts to other countries which will prevent any money that a country under debt makes to go towards developing the country as it will be used to pay back the debt.
In many countries the Socio-Economic factors have a greatly impeded development, this is when the country spend too much money on things that the society doesn’t really need.
Cultural factors also has an effect on development, some native tribes refuse the idea of development and choose the traditional way of life and other societies (e.g. Tibet) do not see value in material goods.
Assess the causes of absolute poverty in a developing country of your choice (20 marks)
World Bank. (2012). World Development Indicators and Global Development Finance, annual data for multiple years, 242 countries. Retrieved from http://databank.worldbank.org
When looking at these countries a couple of things stuck out to me. The first thing that stuck out to me was that Canada and Australia are very similar regarding numbers in all three categories. The second thing I picked up on was that China, Algeria, and Spain all have scary low numbers in the biocapacity per capita measurement. Another key thing I noticed is that Canada from the North performed very well and Austrailia from the South performed very well. Altogether these numbers are very concerning in particular for the countries in the red because they are so highly populated.
The socio economic inequality is often cited as the main fundamental cause of differential health outcomes among men and women. Gender, as structural determinant of health operates through different intermediary determinants that influence the maternal and reproductive health of women and their access to care. This also causes to influence attitudes towards the use of contraceptives and women’s ability to make decision on family planning. Early marriage and early pregnancy leads to high fertility and puts women in danger of anaemia and pregnancy complication, infant mortality also high in children among young mothers. Weak health system, weak information system, discontinuity of care, unsupported health workers and limited referred and accountability, etc. has the implication for the ability to prevent maternal mortality among women seeking care during
The IMR “reflects the economic and social conditions of the community, as well as the effectiveness of health systems. It also indicates health disparities between different populations, both within and between countries. Furthermore, IMR is strongly correlated to economic development, general living conditions, social wellbeing, and the quality of the environment, that affect the health of entire populations.” (Infant Mortality, 2012)
Geographically in less developed countries (LEDCs) in comparison to more developed countries (MEDCs) have distinct dissimilarities with one another.
Every year there is a ‘league table‘ published showing the level of economic growth achieved by each country. The comparison is made using each countries Gross Domestic Product, or GDP. An important factor to look at is the difference between actual and potential economic growth. Actual economic growth increases in real GDP. This increase can occur as result of using previously unemployed resources, or reallocating resources into more productive areas or improving existing resources. Whereas potential economic growth is the productive capacity of the economy. For example, it can be shown by the predicted ability of the country to produce goods and services. This changes when there is an increase in the quantity or quality of the resources. All countries have different ways of achieving this with the resources they have available to them. For this reason it party answers the question of why some countries are richer than others. It is widely thought that the productive capacity of an economy will increase each year largely due to improvements in education and technology. This will obviously differ from country to country. For example, in the UK the quality of fertilizer could be improved, hence forth increase the years fruit and vegetable output.
Two internal barriers to economic growth and development are International trade and Political barriers. Barriers prevent and restrict development in some countries. While some things are barriers to economic growth some are barriers to economic development. In this case being international and having a political sense is a barrier to both thoughts. Change and the process of development is a multi-generational process.
There are countless causes of poverty in under developed countries such as overpopulation, disease, and how the government distributes its wealth. When you have people in developing countries have far too many children than they should and don’t have the means to take care of them you get overpopulation, when you get overpopulation you get less job opportunities, and when that happens you people who can’t take care of themselves or their children. Two factors have been shown that correlate with overpopulation which is poverty and education. When you have higher education in a community you will tend to have a decrease in birth because when people get education especially in women you will have a decline in birthrates because when they get their education they usually want to get a good job. (Poverty and overpopulation).
...he second way to attempt to decrease the population is through increased active family planning programs. Especially in poor countries, it is a lot harder for women just to jump into the work force, and even harder for a poor country to become industrialized. For example, in Bangladesh, one of the world's poorest countries, birth rates have decreased from seven children per family to only 5.5. This is largely because forty percent of Bangladesh's woman now take part in some form of family planning.
Throughout the chapter the text exerts more emphasis on the economical evaluation of a country's development rather than the alternative method. It begins to branch off quickly into the classification of countries deriving new topics all relating back to the economical approach. Beginning this discussion is the topic of underdevelopment.
According to the United Nations Social Policy and Development Division, inequalities within income distribution, access to information, productive resources, basic social services, and markets, causes poverty to be exacerbating. Gender discrimination is one of the main factors in holding women and children around the world in poverty.
Economic development is fundamentally about enhancing the factors of productive capacity, such as land, labor, capital, and technology, of a national, state, or local economy, as stated by the U.S. Economic Development Administration. Economic development influences growth and restructuring of an economy to enhance economic well-being. We experience economic growth when our standard of living is rising. Rather than being a simplistic process, economic development typically is a range of influences aimed at achieving objectives like creating jobs and wealth and improving the quality of life. It incorporates coordinated initiatives targeted at expanding infrastructure and increasing the volume and/or quality of goods and services produced by a community. A common measure of economic development is a country’s gross national ...
Culture and society can be affected everywhere in the world by poverty. In addition to maintaining a low level of awareness among community members, poverty includes restricting access to service such as health, education, decision-making. Factors that contribute to poverty can be lack of community facilities such as road, transport, water, sanitation, and communications.Poverty is a social issue and deep-rooted, the solution must be a social
...ndustrial capacity, technology, and infrastructure to compete with the industrialized countries, which have been honing their economic might for over a century.