1. From development to sustainable development


1. Distribution of Wealth







2 Measuring development

HOW CAN WE MEASURE DEVELOPMENT ?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/gcsebitesize/geography/development/contrasts_development_rev1.shtml
 BASICS
Countries exhibit different levels of development. The factors which affect development may be economic, social, cultural or technical.
Studying development is about measuring how developed one country is compared to other countries, or to the same country in the past. Development measures how economically, socially, culturally or technologically advanced a country is. The two most important ways of measuring development are economic development and human development.

 
Economic development

It measures a country's wealth and how this wealth is generated (for example agriculture is considered less economically advanced than banking).
àTo assess the economic development of a country, geographers use economic indicators including:
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is the total value of goods and services produced by a country in a year.
Gross National Product (GNP) measures the total economic output of a country, including earnings from foreign investments.
GNP per capita is a country's GNP divided by its population. (Per capita means per person.)
Economic growth measures the annual increase in GDP, GNP, GDP per capita, or GNP per capita.
Inequality of wealth is the gap in income between a country's richest and poorest people. It can be measured in many ways, (eg the proportion of a country's wealth owned by the richest 10% of the population, compared with the proportion owned by the remaining 90%).
Human development

It measures the access the population have to wealth, jobs, education, nutrition, health, leisure and safety - as well as political and cultural freedom. Material elements, such as wealth and nutrition, are described as the standard of living. Health and leisure are often referred to as quality of life.
Development often takes place in an uneven way. A country may have a very high GDP - derived, for example, from the exploitation of rich oil reserves - while segments of the population live in poverty and lack access to basic education, health and decent housing.
Hence the importance of human development indicators, measuring the non-economic aspects of a country's development.
Human development indicators include:
Life expectancy - the average age to which a person lives, eg this is 79 in the UK and 48 in Kenya.
Infant mortality rate counts the number of babies, per 1000 live births, who die under the age of one. This is 5 in the UK and 61 in Kenya.
Poverty indices count the percentage of people living below the poverty level, or on very small incomes (eg under £1 per day).
Access to basic services - the availability of services necessary for a healthy life, such as clean water and sanitation.
Access to healthcare takes into account statistics such as how many doctors there are for every patient.
Risk of disease calculates the percentage of people with diseases such as AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis.
Access to education measures how many people attend primary school, secondary school and higher education.
Literacy rate is the percentage of adults who can read and write. This is 99% in the UK, 85% in Kenya and 60% in India.
Access to technology includes statistics such as the percentage of people with access to phones, mobile phones, television and the internet.
Male/female equality compares statistics such as the literacy rates and employment between the sexes.
Government spending priorities compares health and education expenditure with military expenditure and paying off debts.
The United Nations Human Development Index (HDI) is a weighted mix of indices that show life expectancy, knowledge (adult literacy and education) and standard of living (GDP per capita). As Vietnam has a higher literacy rate and life expectancy than Pakistan, it has much higher HDI value even though it has a similar per capita GDP.HDI is measured between 0 and 1. The USA has an HDI of 0.994 whereas Kenya has an HDI of 0.474.


3 MEDC versus LEDC



Source: Philip Allan for Hodder Education - November 2012



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