Introduction
According to the United Nations, landlocked developing countries are often the developing world's poorest, growing at the slowest rates. They typically rely heavily on a limited number of commodities for export earnings and do worse than non-landlocked countries in every component of the Human Development Index; their average per capita GDP is approximately 57% of the average for countries with access to bodies of water (Faye, et al., 2004, 33).
Burkina Faso is one of them. Landlocked and relatively resource-scarce, it is one of the poorest countries in the world. It had a per-capita GDP of just under $1,000 in 1998, adjusted for differences in purchasing power, and 61% of its rural population was below the national poverty line (World Bank – “Poverty gap…”). At more or less the same time, Mongolia was doing markedly better in both respects, though with a still-low adjusted per-capita GDP of $1,958 and a third of its rural population in poverty that same year. Mongolia, though also landlocked, is endowed with notable amounts of natural resources such as copper and coal. Many of these deposits, however, have gone undeveloped or been underdeveloped, with quite a few having only been recently discovered or exploited (Lichtor, 2012).
Research Question and Argument
Both countries have pursued efforts to develop economically and cut rural poverty. During the five-year period from 1998 to 2003, landlocked Burkina Faso reduced its rural poverty rate by 9%. In the same length of time, and roughly the same period (between 1997 and 2002), Mongolia saw its rural poverty rate rise by 10%. These two countries share remarkably similar characteristics in terms of their being landlocked, with similar GDPs (both on the lower end), ...
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United Nations Development Programme. "Assessment of Development Results: Mongolia." 2011. .
United Nations Development Programme. "Assessment of Development Results: Burkina Faso." 2010. .
United Nations Statistics Division. " Millennium Development Goals Indicators." . 14 Dec. 2013.
World Bank. "Poverty gap at rural poverty line (%)." Web. . 13 Nov. 2013.
World Bank. “Reducing Poverty Through Sustainable Equitable Growth.” . 2005. 12 Dec. 2013.