600 Million Asian Children in Poverty, Group Says

[sintax]

600M Asian Children in Poverty, Group Says


Monday August 22, 2005 4:01 AM

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) - Nearly half of Asia's 1.27 billion children live in poverty - deprived of food, safe drinking water, health or shelter, a development agency said in a report released Monday.

While 600 million children under the age of 18 lack access to one of these basic human needs, more than 350 million are deprived of two or more of these needs, said Growing up in Asia, a report from the child humanitarian organization Plan.

Plan said half of Asia's families are not benefiting from economic growth and globalization. It blamed the pressure of rapid population growth on scarce resources; lack of access to education, healthcare, clean water and sanitation; caste discrimination; and weak governance and corruption.

``Asia has more than twice as many severely deprived children as sub-Saharan Africa. This scale of child poverty will have a serious impact on Asia's future prospects, unless it is addressed now,'' Michael Diamond, Plan's Asia regional director, said in a news release.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,1280,-5225143,00.html

Got Globalization?

[Maple]

1. They haven't got it,

which is why they have such a problem.

Globalization will halt the continual stream of starving children we've seen forever.

[rayofreason]

2. Could you elaborate...

...please?

[Maple]

4. There have always been

starving children in Asia. And in many other places for that matter.

Globalization will involve all the countries of the world in development and trade instead of keeping them out of the international system the way they are at present.

At the moment many countries can't compete against the heavy subsidies of the west...an artificial barrier that keeps them down.

Globalization involves viewing the world as one planet, not one privileged country, or one privileged section of the planet. And all of us as equally worthy of a decent life.

[rayofreason]

5. I agree...

...with you and disagree with Sintax.

Korea (South) used to be one of the poorest places on Earth. They didn't get rich by plundering anyone. They created things other people would buy.

Korea (North) used to be the rich part of Korea. 'Nuff said.

[Maple]

7. Well be warned

that's not a popular viewpoint on here. I have been thumped many times for it. :D

[rayofreason]

9. Indeed...

...that is why I found your initial post worth a query.

[Maple]

14. I am constantly

getting into trouble on here because I'm 'contrary'. I don't mean to be, nor do I mean to cause trouble, but since I work on a global basis daily, I often feel compelled to set the record straight.

Sometimes political ideology, fear of job loss, the current situation in Iraq, the internal problems with Bush and the Republicans, fear of the unknown, etc interfere with reality on the ground. People see things that aren't there, and don't see the things that are.

[sintax]

8. Maybe you could explain the abject misery of the Globalized South

or the poster child of Globalization, Argentina, as in COLLAPSE. The beast called Globalization is just New World terminology for Old World Colonialism. Global Pillage.
Globalization was/is never meant to help the poor, any thoughts that it is are chimerical.
Same old Song

Globalization and its Discontents by Joseph Stiglitz

[Maple]

10. Argentina is not a poster child

for anything, much less globalization.

As long as you persist in misdefining it, you will see it where it doesn't exist.

[sintax]

11. Argentina was put on display by the World Bank and the IMF as the model

for Globalization and how wonderful it was, the prosperity that would come to all if only you followed the Diktats of the Financial Fundamentalists. We see the truth as many of us have pointed out for years. Globalization is total bullshit. Even Thomas Friedman knows and admits to that.

You don't need to speculate on this just read the words of the World Banks chief economist Joseph Stiglitz or read the works of Herman Daly another high level World Bank economist whose conscious told him to come forth and blow the whistle.



Seeing things and remaining quiet about them will change nothing, not even ourselves. But saying things - having the courage to testify to our own forbidden knowledge - could be the way the world changes.

[Maple]

12. The IMF and the World Bank

have zik all to do with globalization. Stop listening to them.

And Friedman is very pro-globalization. He has a new book out on it in fact.

[sintax]

16. i'm well aware of Friedman's positions

World Bank and IMF have everything to do with globalization. You are wrong. Their policies, trade agreements GATT,NAFTA,CAFTA etc. are the codification of the "globalized" economy, again code word for stealing from the resource rich South for the right to be indebted to the spoiled children in the North.

What are your thoughts on this:

Economic globalization has become a war
against nature and the poor.
from Resurgence issue 202

ECONOMIC GLOBALIZATION is leading to a concentration of the seed industry, the increased use of pesticides, and, finally, increased debt. Capital-intensive, corporate-controlled agriculture is being spread into regions where peasants are poor but, until now, have been self-sufficient in food. In the regions where industrial agriculture has been introduced through globalization, higher costs are making it virtually impossible for small farmers to survive.

The globalization of non-sustainable industrial agriculture is evaporating the incomes of Third World farmers through a combination of devaluation of currencies, increase in costs of production and a collapse in commodity prices.

Farmers everywhere are being paid a fraction of what they received for the same commodity a decade ago. In the us, wheat prices dropped from $5.75 to $2.43, soya bean prices dropped from $8.40 to $4.29, and corn prices dropped from $4.43 to $1.72 a bushel. In India, from 1999 to 2000, prices for coffee dropped from Rs.60 to Rs.18 per kg and prices of oilseeds declined by more than 30%.

http://www.resurgence.org/resurgence/issues/shiva202.htm

"The hidden hand of the market will never work without a hidden fist. McDonald's cannot flourish without McDonnell Douglas... And the hidden fist that keeps the world safe for Silicon Valley's technologies to flourish is called the U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps."
-- Thomas Friedman, The Lexus and the Olive Tree

[Maple]

18. Then why claim

he said it was bullshit when you know very well he didn't?

No, I'm sorry but the IMF and the World Bank have zik all to do with it.

Poster children for globalization are Japan China India Ireland Brazil, the EU...no one that either group wants to 'help'

They are old organizations...post WWII groups..over half a century old, and still dealing in the past. Both groups are past their due date, and will soon disappear.

Bilateral trade agreements are also temporary...free trade will become global shortly. NAFTA joins the EU kind of thing.

Your north/south version is from the what...70s?

The Lexus and the Olive Tree was a good read in it's time, but also very outdated, as Friedman points out in his latest book: The World is Flat.

[sintax]

19. it's all so seventies isn't it?

So you won't address any of the points by Vandana Shiva who wrote that article based on Real Life experiences, not theory, in the 21st century? Didn't think so.

Free Trade is Newspeak for investors rights.

The stock Marketeers destroying the air and water.

[Maple]

20. Is the US the same as it was

in the 70's? No.

Well neither is anything else.

I deal with globalization everyday, but as I said if you persist in misdefining it, you'll see it where it isn't...and not recognize it when it's right in front of you.

Vandana Shiva is part of globalization I'm afraid. She is Dr Shiva in a country long noted for intolerance to women. The UN is also part of globalization. She does very well by attacking the very force that allowed her to become prominent.

PS. It has nothing to do with the stock market either.

[sintax]

23. And Globalization is?

Economic globalization had its birth at the end of World War II, Mander noted, at the infamous Bretton Woods meetings of the worlds leading economists and political leaders in New Hampshire. There soon followed the formation of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Next came GATT (the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade), and most recently the World Trade Organization, NAFTA, Maastricht, and OPEC.


The structure they chose to build this brighter future was the global corporation, to which they gave extraordinary power. As Mander noted, Now these institutions of economic globalization are arguably producing the most fundamental redesign of the planets social, political, and economic arrangements, at least since the Industrial Revolution. Theyre producing a power shift of gigantic proportions, moving real economic and political power away from national, state, and local governments toward global corporations and banks, and to the global bureaucracies they have created. The net result is what many of my colleagues call monoculture-culture -- the global homogenization of culture, lifestyle, economic practice, and ideology, with the corresponding sacrifice of local traditions, values, arts, and traditional small-scale economic practice.

Economic globalization actively undermines all values, except economic values. It enshrines the free market and its principal actors -- global corporations -- as the engines and the benefactors of the process. It places first importance on the achievement of ever-more rapid economic growth and the constant search for new markets, new resources, and cheaper labor, which is why everyone is so excited by Chinas joining into this experiment.

To achieve rapid economic growth, globalization of course requires totally unrestricted free trade, privatization of enterprise, and deregulation of corporate activity. Together they remove all impediments that might stand in the way of expanded corporate activity. In practice, the impediments are usually environmental laws, or public health laws, or food safety laws, or laws that pertain to worker rights and opportunities, or laws that permit nations to control investment on their soil, or laws that try to retain national controls over local culture.

http://www.sustainable-city.org/intervws/mander.htm

[Maple]

24. That was just about international trade

However, the British Empire had international trade. The Phoenicians had international trade for goodness sakes.

Globalization is quite different.

And economics is only a small part of it.

The UN, Kyoto, the peace movement and a myriad of other things are globalization.

One world, one race...the human one. No borders.

A mixing of cultures. A sharing of knowledge. An appreciation of new ideas, and the energy and spark that comes from a joining together in all areas.

Something far bigger and more involved than what you imagine it to be.

[sintax]

26. I agree with these things also

Unfortunately what the term has come to mean is quite different in practice, hence the people moved off their lands and the mass starvation as we see in the 'negative' headline.

"One world, one race...the human one. No borders.

A mixing of cultures. A sharing of knowledge. An appreciation of new ideas, and the energy and spark that comes from a joining together in all areas."


Ain't it just like the night to play tricks when you're tryin' to be so quiet?
We sit here stranded, though we're all doin' our best to deny it. - Bob Dylan

[Maple]

30. Then rejoice

because a global village is what's occurring.

The world has always had mass starvation and people moved off their land. That's not globalization and never was.

The formation of a global village — closer contact between different parts of the world, with increasing possibilities of personal exchange, mutual understanding and friendship between "world citizens", and creation of a global civilization. THAT is globalization.

[Psephos]

39. Maple and rayofreason: how cool to see both of you working the thread

Brings a smile to my face.

Keep up the good work. Each in your own way, you both signify what's best about the liberal mind to me.

Peace.

[rayofreason]

13. Abject misery...

...increasing relative poverty, and increased vulnerability is the fate of societies that isolate themselves. Japan figured that out in the 19th Century, and China in the 20th. And so must indigenous peoples everywhere (are not the Japanese "indigenous?").

[sintax]

17. Examples?

Perhaps you measure the world in the imaginings of fiat currency, I do not know but this way of looking at things that is destroying the life systems of the Biosphere.

Without exception the remaining pockets of biodiversity exist where there are remaining pockets of indigenous people.
Western culture will never listen or wake up as you cannot awaken one who is pretending to be asleep.

Economy from the term oikonomikos means household stewardship and industrial-moneyed society has no rapport with stewardship.

Entire forests cut down in Indonesia with a single transaction on Wall Street and the children in the village get water borne diseases. Progress.

The planet is dying, being killed by the globalizers who want it all.

[sintax]

3. Their land has been plundered

Globalization is just Newspeak for Worldwide Theft. All the position papers and wordy rationales are just pretty lies.

[wli]

6. clear results of "globalization" n/t

[Maple]

15. Opposite of globalization I'm afraid

They have never been prosperous, but they will be as things continue to advance.

[Name removed]

21. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[sintax]

22. When the house is on fire pull the alarm

Sorry from here on out I'll try to keep it Happy McNews.


Seeing things and remaining quiet about them will change nothing, not even ourselves. But saying things - having the courage to testify to our own forbidden knowledge - could be the way the world changes.

[oscar111]

25. HANSEATIC LEAGUE: is globalization similar?

i seem to recall some prussia-area league of business types about fifteen hundred or so... that took state power upon itself.

seems a parallel transfer of power.\

am i right?

[Maple]

28. Not even close

The importance of nations are greater in internationalization, while globalization in its complete form eliminates nation states.

[oscar111]

27. WORLD GDP - 3O Trillion says UN

Is calories/person/day still about 3OOO? Produced, is the meaning of those calories, not body-need.
body needs 12OO to avert starvation.

anyone know the world wealth stat?
{GDP is like income, wealth is like savings account}

so hard to find . been looking a long time on and off.

{the title's stat is sourced with a link in Demopedia page Capital}

[sintax]

29. Who possesses that wealth-Who defines what wealth is?

If the GDP is up why are so many down?
If the GDP is so high and a positive indicator why are the life systems of the Earth on the brink of collapse.

$$$$$

Possessions:
The history of Western man has been a progressive peeling back of the psyche, as if the earliest agriculture may have addressed itself to extenuation of adolescent concerns while the most modern era seeks to evoke in society at large some of the fixations of early natality rationalized, symbolized, and disguised as need be. The individual growth curve, as described by Bruno Bettelheim, Jean Piaget, Erik Erikson, and others, is a biological heritage of the deep past. It is everyman's tree of life, now pruned by civic gardeners as the outer branches and twigs become incompatible with the landscaped order. The reader may extend that metaphor as he wishes, but I shall move to an animal image to suggest that the only society more frightful than one run by children, as in Golding's Lord of the Flies, might be one run by childish adults. 
Paul Shepard, Nature and Madness

[oscar111]

31. Good points sintax

i wasnt trying to say all is well, i was saying what you just did -- the GDP shows the non-necessity of hunger.

[Maple]

32. Knowledge is wealth

Human minds are wealth.

GDP, in the end, is just so many conch shells.

And the world can't survive on small farms...that was the agricultural age, and long past.

[oscar111]

33. WORLD WEALTH - anyone have the stat?

i have GDP, which is like income/yr.

still want to get the wealth no., which is like savings account.

and, why is it so hard to get this stat?

[Maple]

34. Because it doesn't exist

There can be no definitive statement of 'world wealth'.

Wealth is whatever a sociey deems it to be at any given time. Conch shells, pig iron, coal, oil, gold, dollar bills, technology....

More to the point is the trillion dollars spent on war in one year.

[oscar111]

35. Econ 101 text should begin with "world wealth is..., world GDP is..."

but instead, these two framework stats are very hard to find. Took me on and off, a year to get the GDP off the net

still looking for Wealth.

[Maple]

36. Not measurable

You will find stats on millionaires, and also how many live on less than a dollar a day...but there is no way to say Planet Earth is worth X amount of dollars. Waaaaaaaaaay too many variables.

And unless you're planning to sell the planet to the Martians...pointless.

Your CIA has made the attempt though. :D

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/fields/2001.html

Remember their other 'facts' before you buy their version. :7

[oscar111]

37. "Ignored" posts a lot, but i dont see him. Anyone else?

sometime long ago i hit the Ignore button on whoever that is.

anyone else want to reply?

[Maple]

38. Your problem I'm afraid

You miss a lot that way. :rofl:

[SoCalDem]

40. Underpriviledged people have TWO choices

Accept it..Fight it.

The ones who accept it and survive, become slaves to corporations.

The ones who fight it , and survive to teens & beyond, become the insurgents of tomorrow.

They will be the ones who fight our children and grandchildren

Globilization is creating the enemies of our future:(

The child of my enemy, is the enemy of my child

[oscar111]

41. kck

[beetbox]

42. That's astounding

Half of the Asian Children?

[oscar111]

43. half of WHOLE WORLD's kids are orphans, dying of disease, or face starvati

starvation.

so said .. i think it was at site povertywatch or povertyview.org, quoting a UN report.

see Poverty forum here, for my old post on it, with title like this title here. Usually it is on the first page near bottom, or near top of second page. Few ever post on my favorite forum, so posts scroll down slowly.

sadly, the link to the site gives a page that changes daily, so the orig story is lost somewhere in the back pages. I could not find it again.

if you dig it up, pls paste whole report or summary here. Thanks.

PS the dying of disease figure was including indirect effects of illness, such as having nonfatal diseases but that disease lowering resistance to secondary infections, etc.

[oscar111]

44. sintax, the PM "reply" button

does not work for you, nor does the icon in this thread for PM'ing you. "no such user" it says.

glitch, i guess. Just want to let you know in case you wonder why you arent getting any PM's.

Trust all is well and you are still among the living.

[oscar111]

64. kck

[MisterP]

45. in '02, UNICEF pointed to globalization as putting 1 billion people

in ABJECT poverty and another billion in overall poverty

[Maple]

46. UNICEF

is a global institution itself, so that seems unlikely.

[OfireitupO]

47. We need to face the stark reality

That we cannot do anything about those people because of the problem of overpopulation and resource expendature.

If all these people get food then everyone here will claim victory. Until they start reproducing and then 10 billion people are in abject poverty because there isnt enough resources for them now.

The fact is, with overpopulation and limited resources there is going to be poverty and theres nothing anyone can do about it but make it worse by trying to help.

Until we come up with a machine that makes unlimited food or until we come to learn to live within our means and stop reproducing theres not much we can do, actually theres nothing we can do.

Just be thankful you were born here and the roll of the dice made you a fortunate one.

[Maple]

48. 'These people'???

Actually we have more than enough food to feed everyone on the planet.

And we aren't overpopulated.

And 'these people' are human beings, not write-offs.

[OfireitupO]

50. Not writing them off at all

I referred to these people as the people who the post was directed at, the 600 million poverty stricken asians.


AND NO there arent enough resources, and YES we are overpopulated.


Think about it for a second, if we feed them, they will reproduce and then there will be 2x the problem.

Look, im not trying to look like the bad guy here, but lets be realistic, we are a species on Earth that is reproducing at an exponential rate. Every species in the past that have done so have died off rather quickly.

Totalitarian agriculture got us into this predicament, and it cant get us out without a lot of unfortunate people dying. I truly wish there were unlimited resources, but there ARENT. The population must go down if we are to survive as a species, there is no doubt about it.

[Maple]

52. We have plenty of food

and plenty of land.

And we aren't going to let people starve because it would 'solve' a non-existant problem.

Actually we can support 15 billion

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,15714594%255E1702,00.html

[OfireitupO]

53. Then what?

We get to 15 million people and then what? We have to stop this direction we are in. Reproducing at an exponential rate WILL destroy us all eventually. Overpopulation is a disease and its shown in all the poverty stricken people in the world. If we had enough resources we would feed them, but we DONT. We cannot rape the Earth anymore or we'll have nothing left for future generations.


The problem is existant, but your idealism keeps you from realizing it. Id like to feed everyone too, but its just not possible.

Where is this food coming from that you said we have enough of? If we had unlimited food I highly doubt that our leaders would decide to kill off others through starvation just for the hell of it.

We can feed everyone for a while maybe, but then what? They reproduce then we cant feed them then people start to die in mass numbers. You CANNOT get around that fact.

[Maple]

54. As countries get wealthier

...which is what globalization is aiming to do...people have fewer children.

The western world did the same thing for a very long time in history...20 kids, of which maybe 2 lived.

And as we got wealthier, we introduced pensions so you didn't need kids to support you in your old age. Women were able to be educated, and went out to work and again our population dropped.

The same thing is happening elsewhere. The UN figures the world will level off shortly, and then start dropping.

Many countries in fact are now very underpopulated, as their populations age, and they don't have many children.

Btw...for the first time in history we have surplus food. Tons of it in fact. We even pay farmers NOT to grow food.

The problem isn't lack of food...the problem is civil wars, lack of intfrastructure and transportation to get it to them. Politics, not food is the problem.

[beetbox]

60. Who is using all those resources?

"These People" would be well fed if their land weren't being stripped to feed the insatiable appetites of Americans and Europeans.

Approx. 88% of the Worlds Resources are used by 4% of the Worlds population, almost all of that 4% is in the West.

Yes we are overpopulated but there is still enough food for all.

[PunkPop]

63. Are you serious?

What a piss-poor attitude based on faulty logic.

Just be thankful you were born here and the roll of the dice made you a fortunate one.

Oh, ok. Forget all this concern for humanity stuff. I'm going to 'just be thankful' now. Cripes. That's cold.

Do you think poverty keeps people from reproducing? How do you think you get starving children? Are the countries of Europe poverty stricken, because I believe populations are shrinking in many of those countries?

[geckosfeet]

49. We must invade and plant the seeds of de-mock-arcy. nt

[imperialismispasse]

51. Imagine how many kids we could have fed

with the money we've wasted so far in Iraq.

[beetbox]

58. All of them for 7 years

The War in Iraq Costs the United States


$189,328,188,283


Instead, we could have fully funded global anti-hunger efforts for
7
years.

http://costofwar.com/index-world-hunger.html

[saigon68]

55. Future workers for the WALMART SUPPLIERS at 25 cents an hour.

[Maple]

56. Well then they wouldn't be starving

and they could go on to get an education, and become engineers and doctors and scientists.

China produces more engineers in a month than the US does in a year.

[saigon68]

57. What the fuck

25 cents an hour,!! get a life.

I'm sure every exploited child is going to become a rocket scientist. A factory owner, a slave owner, Martha Stewart, Dick Cheney, Condosleeza Rice etc etc etc.

[Maple]

59. Pardon me?

Do you know how far 25 cents an hour goes in those countries?

Have you ever been there?

Do you know that makes the difference between life and death? And starts them on the road up?

Have you read your own labor history?

Did you expect them to leap from Communism to 26 bucks an hour on an assembly line, with a 3 bedroom in the burbs overnight?

[oscar111]

61. dont populations stop growing when progressives grarantee pensions?

lots of kids are the chaos-economy way of being sure that when old age hits, daddy will have someone to feed him. A pension, sort of.

when progressives are in power and set up pensions, the birth rate declines as you would expect.

so i was taught in college.

Currently, progressive Europe has population shrinkage, IIRC. Japan too.

====================
as to food now, the FOOD AND AGRICULTURE ORGANIZATION of the UN puts out a YEARBOOK with the

calories / person/ yr

for all nations and global totals, or did the last time i looked, many years ago.

then, there were three thou or three thou five hundred/ person globally. IIRC Not sure of those figures, check them before quoting.

1200 needed to avert starving.
============

to a degree, more people means more to farm the land, to adapt currently unusable farms, and new geniuses like you dear reader, to invent better farming methods {even scifi hydroponic farms where electricity grows plankton for plankton-bread, enough for oodles of billions of new folks}.

but never mind that... Progressives are the solution to overpopulation... just set up pensions. Look at Europe and Japan. Or use China's method.. a law, "one kid is enough".

PS hasnt global population growth also slowed and shrunk? My memory right? or wrong on this?

[SoCalDem]

62. When girls/women are educated, birth rates drop

and when decent medical care arrives, birth rates drop. If a family can be convinved that their children will live to adulthood, they can plan for smaller families.

Look at feral animals.. a mother cat will often give birth to 5 or 6 kittens, but by the time you see them out and frolicking, there are only a couple.. Nature insures that at least one will live to reproduce...

If you are in a place with bad water, little food, you are more likely to have many children..in hopes that at least a few will survive:(