International News

"El África subsahariana sigue perdiendo la batalla contra la pobreza extrema"

The article from La Vanguardia on April 20th, 2009 says that all developing regions except the African Sub Saharan are doing well on the road to reduce extreme poverty by 2015 a date that was set forth in the “Objectives of the Millennium” in 2000. There were 8 objectives established during the Summit of the Millennium of the UN in 2000, one to reduce poverty. Another goal was primary universal education, the reduction of child mortality, the reduction of malaria, improvement of maternal health, etc. The latest report says that the attainment of these objectives has been uneven among the countries it was created for and only 49 of the 87 countries on the list are on a good pace to reach the goals. However, they note that since 2000 37 million more children have been capable of and attending schools and more than 14 million have been vaccinated against disease. According to the last available data, seven of each ten people in developing countries have reached the universal schooling. Despite improvements school and other things like major access to drinking water or equality in schooling, the World Bank insists in its study that it has not advanced enough in the reduction of child mortality and malnutrition. Thus, some 8.8 million children die yearly before reaching age five, a lower figure to the ten million in 2000 but it is still too high. Furthermore, despite all the improvements, there are still 72 million children of school age that do not attend school, the majority of them in the south of Asia and the Africa sub-Saharan. This report surfaces on the eve of the semiannual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Washington this weekend. They say that the World Bank expects to receive the go ahead to spend 3,500 million more dollars over the next 20 years to help the developing countries. They also plan to transfer at least three percent of the power of the rich countries to the developing countries. The picture above is from the African Sub Saharan and shows the poverty where everything is flooded and houses do not seem sturdy or livable.