Why is Africa less developed than other continents?

e-lover

How naive can you get?

Name me one resource that the west steals from Africa.

just one?

ok. minerals.

Reply 62

iwilson03

16

I think you can really split it into physical factors i.e. often bad terrain which is very dry (with notable exceptions, but those exceptions tend to perform better). Political i.e. corruption and dictatorial regimes which scare off investors, and AIDS.
AIDS is a massive problem, costing governments large amounts as well as diverting aid resources and seriously damaging entire economically active generations (it is most prevalent amongst the young adult age group).

Reply 63

KiiNGofLONDON

.:excel4100%:.

I still don't think this can a strong enough factor as to why the African countries are less developed!

They're taking diamonds from South Africa but they build infrastructure and such. Also, there is a thing called 'external economies of scale' which means the benefits spill over to society so more private investors may start to put money down and more businesses can operate around the area that the western companies operate.

I answered why it's less developed earlier. I was just answering your question.

What have economies of scale got to with a country as a whole? That's very much a micro concept.

Reply 64

Libtolu

13

centuries of infighting before colonisation ****** it up to start with and then all the different periods of colonisation.

It was colonised by greece,rome,ottoman empire, british empire, other european empires etc. some middle eastern empires.

Rarely has africa been governed by africans and when it has it was either stuck on tribal warfare or totally corrupt like now.

However some african nations are developing where as some are doing nothing.

The countries that are getting worse are the problems, the countries that are developing are okay because they will one day be prosperous but some fo the sub saharan countries(not all) are failing to develop at all and are thus left in a state of **** holeness for ever.

Read a book by paul collier called "The Bottom Billion"

This explains a lot of the current problems surrounding africas development problems.

Cap doesn't help but it is in noway the cause.

The cause of africa's problems lie within africa not outside of it.

Reply 65

.:excel4100%:.

14

KiiNGofLONDON

I answered why it's less developed earlier. I was just answering your question.

What have economies of scale got to with a country as a whole? That's very much a micro concept.

lol i was going off a bit talking about firms seeing as they do make up the economy's GDP and your comment about them using Africa's natural resources

I never asked a question :confused:

Reply 66

Libtolu

centuries of infighting before colonisation ****** it up to start with and then all the different periods of colonisation.

It was colonised by greece,rome,ottoman empire, british empire, other european empires etc. some middle eastern empires.

Rarely has africa been governed by africans and when it has it was either stuck on tribal warfare or totally corrupt like now.

However some african nations are developing where as some are doing nothing.

The countries that are getting worse are the problems, the countries that are developing are okay because they will one day be prosperous but some fo the sub saharan countries(not all) are failing to develop at all and are thus left in a state of **** holeness for ever.

Read a book by paul collier called "The Bottom Billion"

This explains a lot of the current problems surrounding africas development problems.

Cap doesn't help but it is in noway the cause.

The cause of africa's problems lie within africa not outside of it.

African Empires + Look it up = Success :smile:

Where did this ridiculous idea come that African had never been able to govern themselves. Please research before saying such things as these statements only make you look ill-informed and hence give your points less validity.

Reply 67

Rule Britannia

Would you like to explain why these are not issues in places like Singapore and Hong Kong?

Answers on a post card.

sure:

At the end of the Korean war, South Korea was poorer than Sudan.

Between 1963 and 1972 its manufacturing sector grew by 18.3% per year (!) - the fastest since records began.

In similar circumstances, growth in sub Saharan Africa fell from 36% in 1980 to -15% in 1998 - and as a direct result the number of people living on less than a dollar a day increased by 60million.

Why?

Because the IMF and WTO force Africa in a free trade agreement with the US and Europe - leaving them open to being constantly exploited by greedy, remorseless MNCs who take over local companies and export all the raw materials back to the US, playing the locals peanuts.

Japan, Korea and Taiwan refused this agreement, and operated a protectionist market - as a result they are amongst the rich, most developed and least poverty stricken countries in the world today.

Two cool, unrelated facts:

Did you know: between 1980 and 1996, the nations of Sub-Saharan Africa paid TWICE THE TOTAL SUM of their entire debt in interest, and still ended up owing the west more than they started with. Even if they spent every penny of this years GDP on repaying the debt - they would still be more in debt next year than they are now. That is how ludicrous this situation is.

The US pays $352 billion dollars - over 6 times the amount it gives to Africa in aid - to its OWN farmers - specifically so that they can undercut their Africa competition - and as a direct result keeps over 100 million Africans in poverty. Aid is a complete sham. They throw them a penny with a smile on their face, and steal £40 out of their back pocket.

Reply 68

.:excel4100%:.

14

py0alb

sure:

At the end of the Korean war, South Korea was poorer than Sudan.

Between 1963 and 1972 its manufacturing sector grew by 18.3% per year (!) - the fastest since records began.

In similar circumstances, growth in sub Saharan Africa fell from 36% in 1980 to -15% in 1998 - and as a direct result the number of people living on less than a dollar a day increased by 60million.

Why?

Because the IMF and WTO force Africa in a free trade agreement with the US and Europe - leaving them open to being constantly exploited by greedy, remorseless MNCs who take over local companies and export all the raw materials back to the US, playing the locals peanuts.

Japan, Korea and Taiwan refused this agreement, and operated a protectionist market - as a result they are amongst the rich, most developed and least poverty stricken countries in the world today.

Two cool, unrelated facts:

Did you know: between 1980 and 1996, the nations of Sub-Saharan Africa paid TWICE THE TOTAL SUM of their entire debt in interest, and still ended up owing the west more than they started with. Even if they spent every penny of this years GDP on repaying the debt - they would still be more in debt next year than they are now. That is how ludicrous this situation is.

The US pays $352 billion dollars - over 6 times the amount it gives to Africa in aid - to its OWN farmers - specifically so that they can undercut their Africa competition - and as a direct result keeps over 100 million Africans in poverty. Aid is a complete sham. They throw them a penny with a smile on their face, and steal £40 out of their back pocket.

Those facts are amazing.....link?

Reply 69

.:excel4100%:.

Those facts are amazing.....link?

I've heard similiar from someone else.

Reply 70

.:excel4100%:.

Those facts are amazing.....link?

Chang, 1994, "ThePolitical Economy of Industrial Policy", MacMillan.

OECD, 2000, "Agricultural Policies in OECD Countries: Monitoring and Evaluation" OECD.

Reply 71

Bishamon

I've heard similiar from someone else.

They can all be found in Monbiot's seminal "Manifesto for a New World Order" along with about a thousand more well researched and frankly jaw dropping facts.

If you only read one book in the next year...

Reply 72

King AOO

THe last few posts have been a good read and has taught me a lot.

Reply 73

Sakujo

14

KiiNGofLONDON

'Not sufficient' is the exact meaning I wanted. I did not, however, mean 'not enough'.

As much as I'd like to debate the difference between not enough and not sufficient I have better things to do.

KiiNGofLONDON

If you want to negate a fact, backed up by economic theory and application in a book written by one of the leading experts in Development Economics targeting Africa, then fine, but to do so without even having read the book is not going to get you very far...

Very far in what? I'm not particularly interested in economic theory, so your suggestion that I should go out and but a book on it is quite silly.

KiiNGofLONDON

What did you think I meant? Accumulation of foreign resources? It was evident.

So inadequate resources means bad resource distribution?

Reply 74

Lil Piranha

12

Someone mentioned earlier about Africa's debts, my understanding was that most countries' (if not all) debts had been totally written off by the G8 summit a few years ago?

I think it can be summed up as "extremely poor management and massive corruption". How many billions of pounds must have been pumped into that continent over the past few decades? And yet we see no progress. Throwing aid and money at it isn't the answer anymore. The ethos of the African leaders needs an entire overhaul. All we have done by giving them aid is made them dependant, with no "incentive" (that is the wrong word, but for example, farmers don't farm anymore because people can get the food for free from aid packages) to rebuild their own country. We have to help them, but we cannot help them if they won't/can't help themselves.

Reply 75

yoyo462001

16

Lil Piranha

Someone mentioned earlier about Africa's debts, my understanding was that most countries' (if not all) debts had been totally written off by the G8 summit a few years ago?

I think it can be summed up as "extremely poor management and massive corruption". How many billions of pounds must have been pumped into that continent over the past few decades? And yet we see no progress. Throwing aid and money at it isn't the answer anymore. The ethos of the African leaders needs an entire overhaul. All we have done by giving them aid is made them dependant, with no "incentive" (that is the wrong word, but for example, farmers don't farm anymore because people can get the food for free from aid packages) to rebuild their own country. We have to help them, but we cannot help them if they won't/can't help themselves.

The debt wasnt wiped of by the way, people just wanted it to be. Its not that they dont want to help themselves there are many leaders there who want it to improve their countries but you also have understand that the west is probably their biggest obstacle in this, institutions like the IMF make things so bad for some countries in AFRICA with their 'egos'. You also have to see the unfairness the west imposes on AFRICA, things like opening of trade barriers or having them reduce production so the world is a greener place.

Reply 76

Libtolu

13

Bishamon

African Empires + Look it up = Success :smile:

Where did this ridiculous idea come that African had never been able to govern themselves. Please research before saying such things as these statements only make you look ill-informed and hence give your points less validity.

By africa i'm talking about sub saharan africa.

And i was saying thaqt africa has been colonisaed for huge amounts of their history and in recent times have not been doing fine.

happy and if you tell me the african empires you were talking about i will review them thank you.

Reply 77

Lil Piranha

Someone mentioned earlier about Africa's debts, my understanding was that most countries' (if not all) debts had been totally written off by the G8 summit a few years ago?

I think it can be summed up as "extremely poor management and massive corruption". How many billions of pounds must have been pumped into that continent over the past few decades? And yet we see no progress. Throwing aid and money at it isn't the answer anymore. The ethos of the African leaders needs an entire overhaul. All we have done by giving them aid is made them dependant, with no "incentive" (that is the wrong word, but for example, farmers don't farm anymore because people can get the food for free from aid packages) to rebuild their own country. We have to help them, but we cannot help them if they won't/can't help themselves.

You simply cant trivialise complex economic issues so candidly as there are so many underlying factors which must be considered. Why dont you actually do some research?

However, seeing as most people probably wont I'll do it for you:

At the 2008 G8 meeting it was agreed to increase aid to Africa for food security and agricultural development from an earlier figure of $15 billion to $20 billion.

A summary judgement of the G8 Summit must be that against the multiple crises the world is currently facing, the outcome of the discussions was a whimper, a puny response to an acknowledgement of the magnitude of the challenge. It is not surprising, then, that the world media largely hyped up the promise of $20 billion for there was very little else that was on show.

So the question is: how significant is the promise of $20 billion?

To properly appreciate the significance of the $20 billion envelope, let us put the facts and a proper perspective to it.

First, it is just a promise. Promises have been known to remain just that – promises. Second, if past experience is any guide, the money is not likely to be ‘new’ money, but recycled from previous unfulfilled commitments. Third, the $20 billion package is for three years; about $7 billion per year. This is to be shared between 53 African countries, an average of about US$132 million per country.

Compare this with the following:

•

Between 1990 and 2003, African countries had received US$540 billion in loans and had paid back US$580 billion in debt and service charges (US$40 billion more than what they had received), and yet by the end of 2003 US$330 billion debt had still remained to pay.

•

In 2003 alone African countries had paid over US$25 billion in debt servicing while 2.3 million lives were lost lives because of HIV/AIDS. Many of them spent more per capita on debt servicing than on health care. For example, in 2002 the Democratic Republic of Congo – where 1.1 million people live with HIV/AIDS – spent more than four dollars on external debt servicing for every dollar spent on health care. And in the same year Angola had paid out US$106 per capita in debt servicing compared to US$38 per capita on health. Compare this also with the ‘promise’ made by G8 at the 31st G8 Summit of July 2005 at Gleneagles. The issue that got most media hype on that occasion was debt cancellation – to write off the entire US$40 billion debt owed by 18 Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) to the World Bank (WB), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the African Development Bank (ADB). Four years down the line, a more sober assessment exposes the scenario of ‘business as usual’. What are the facts about the much-touted debt cancellation and the ‘road to recovery’ for Africa?

•

The US$40 billion debt write-off applied only to 18 HIPCs. How were they identified, and who selected them? Africa itself had no say in this. They were selected by the ``donor community'’, not by any agency of Africa, such as the African Union. On what criteria were they selected? These 18 countries were identified as those that had faithfully followed the IMF/WB strictures on structural adjustment programmes (SAP – policy prescriptions that demanded pro-cyclical, deflationary, measures from these countries). The G8 stated that 20 more countries, with an additional US$15 billion in debt, would be eligible for debt relief on condition that they met targets on fighting corruption and continued to fulfil SAP conditionalities and provided they eliminated impediments to foreign private investments in their countries.

Since the debt cancellation only referred to multilateral institutions, the crippling bilateral official and corporate debts of Africa still remained intact. So what did the G8 achieve at the Gleneagles summit? As far as Africa is concerned, very little. In fact, it was "business worse than usual''. Why? Because of two reasons:

•

The debt write-off managed to tone down, to neutralise, the pressure from African civil society on their governments to unilaterally repudiate those debts that were illegitimate or odious – a technical concept recognised in international legal practice.

•

Furthermore, it triggered fresh false illusions in and about Africa. Some people concluded that this was going to be the turning point for Africa. With debts written off, Africa was expected now, finally, to get down to using its resources to develop the economy and look after the welfare of the African people without the crippling debt burden.

Africa must realise that neither the G8 or the west in general are there to help them. Humanity is locked in a ruthless battle for power, influence and resources so people will be willing to take the piss when they can. I will agree that things will only change once Africans helps themselves. But lets not make out as if Africa is benefiting from western aid because, quite clearly, it is not.

Reply 78