Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Oxfam Resolution
A small child dies every 2.4 seconds
from poverty.
Oxfam
Report
X
Working for a Fairer World
© Oxfam 1991
DAVID BRYER
Overseas Director,
Oxfam UK and Ireland
Contents
Introduction
Global relationships 17
'•* ••'*?.«•/•''.;'i
Introduction
The .
experience
of poverty
A
FTER THREE YEARS of children with her, doing odd jobs on the
alternating drought and flood, way in return for a meal. She and two
the once lush and fruitful Chama friends pool their meagre resources to
District of Eastern Zambia is now a buy a bag of maize meal between them.
virtual wasteland. There is no more game There is no money for the children to
to hunt, and it is impossible to grow attend school.
maize, the staple crop. For the poorest Christina believes that many of her
members of the community, times are problems could be solved by the
desperate. construction of a road to her isolated
'We sometimes go without a meal for village, so that food could be obtained
days; mangoes and wild okra are all there more easily. But this would be a massive
is to eat/ says Christine Ngulube, whose project, beyond the means of Zambia's
husband left the area four years ago to virtually bankrupt economy.
Watering livestock at a seek work. She has received money from Any one of millions of poor people
water hole in Degaan
him only once in those four years. The around the world could tell a similar
village, near Haradere,
Somalia. nearest food depot is three days' walk story. The underlying features of poverty
Jeremy Hartley/Oxfam away. Christina takes one of her six are the same: lack of access to essentials
like food, clean water and land, poor
health care or educational facilities,
physical isolation, powerlessness, and
extreme vulnerability to adversity. All
these different aspects combine to create a
chain of circumstances from which it
becomes increasingly hard to break out.
Involving people
In Oxfam's experience, development
which puts people in charge of their own
future offers the best possibility of real
and lasting change. Successful
development projects aim to build
communities' confidence and ability to
identify problems - and implement
solutions - for themselves.
Ismael Issa had to abandon his farm in
the Erigavo District of Somalia a few
The experience of poverty 5
Causes of conflict
Whether expressed in racial, ethnic,
religious or other terms, it is the
inequitable distribution of wealth and
power which commonly underlies civil
conflicts. In Sudan, for example, it is the
historical 'underdevelopment' of the
south of the country, with its largely
Bantu population, in contrast with the
investment in the Arab north, which is
one of the major causes of the civil war.
The fomenting of civil unrest in South
Africa is another obvious example.
Inequalities in access to land are a major
source of poverty and conflict. And the
imbalance in wealth at the national level
is often made worse by international
economic relationships.
In El Salvador, as in much of Central
America, most of the land is owned by a
tiny number of companies and
individuals. During the earlier part of the
century, the country's growth was based
on coffee and cotton, produced on large
plantations. Subsistence farmers, who
received little support, were pushed into
the mountains.
Ciudad Segundo refugees around the world, and a further The collapse of coffee and cotton prices
Montes, El Salvador: 24 million people displaced within the in the 1970s led to widespread
Refugees from the civil borders of their own countries.
war organised literacy impoverishment, and helped to
classes for themselves Impoverished families trek into the strengthen a growing demand for land
while in exile in nearest centres of potential relief, swelling from the poor. The popular land reform
Honduras. the shanty towns and refugee camps, movement was met with violent
Jenny Matthews/Oxfam
where insanitary conditions increase the repression, which plunged the country
likelihood of disease and death. Besides into a civil war which has continued until
creating large numbers of refugees and today.
internally displaced people, conflict A million El Salvadoreans were driven
disrupts the production cycle in rural from their land during the 1980s. Oxfam
areas. The economically active may be has supported a community of 8,000 who
killed or forcibly conscripted. Abandoned
took shelter in Honduras. Unable to
farms are laid waste, destroying the
cultivate land, they set up workshops to
chances of a speedy return to cultivation .
develop practical craft skills, recycling
The impoverishment caused by war
systems, and a semi-industrial approach
increases pressure on the environment,
to workshop management and
often with disastrous effects.
maintenance.
Poverty and conflict 1 1
Poverty
and the
environm*
E
NVIRONMENTAL CRISES are no Environmental refugees
longer in the future: they are Many of the world's poorest people live
already here. The poorest people in its most fragile environments. Denied
are the hardest hit, because they are access to the most productive land, or the
directly dependent upon natural means to farm land effectively, they find
resources for their livelihoods, and they themselves eking out a meagre existence
have no other options when these in an environment increasingly unable to
resources are threatened. Worldwide, the support their growing numbers.
pace of environmental degradation is For some, this condition is a result of
accelerating. colonial patterns of land occupation; for
Within the developing world, poverty, others, it is the result of more recent
conflict, misguided economic policies, developments: the concentration of land
rapid population growth, and lack of ownership in the hands of a few, or the
accountable government all play their introduction of big infrastructural
part in preventing long-term investment schemes, such as dams.
in the conservation of natural resources. The drive during the 1980s to boost
Yatenga province,
northern Burkina Faso:
2 0 years of drought
and deforestation have
cost many Sahelian
villages half of their
cultivable land.
Mark Edwards/Oxfam
14 The Oxfam Report
Amazonia, north-east production of crops for export has mainly Their growing numbers add to the
Brazil: primeval benefited the wealthier farmers. Poor sprawling shanties at the margins of
rainforest is burned to
farmers, unable to afford fertilisers and cities, which in turn become the sources
make way for cattle
ranching. pesticides needed to grow commercial of major environmental hazards.
Tony Gross/Oxfam crop varieties, have lost out. Few
governments have provided support for Involving local people
the production of traditional staple crops Many people in the South have the
on which many small farmers depend. knowledge to manage renewable
Violent conflict frequently adds a resources in sustainable ways. Before
further dimension, both through the their indigenous knowledge is lost, local
deliberate destruction of the environment people need to share and build upon their
in counter-insurgency operations, and experience and be supported in their
through the disruption of normal attempts to create a sustainable lifestyle.
agricultural life. Above all, they must have recognised
The growing pressure on fragile rights to share in decisions about the
environments exhausts soils and destroys management and development of
vegetation, causing erosion, drought, and resources. Development which draws on
the further loss of soil fertility. local knowledge of the environment has
Desertification is not a natural the best chance of sustaining that
phenomenon: it is the result of human environment.
interaction with the environment. But development based on these
At present rates of destruction, one fifth principles does not happen in most areas
of the world's crop lands will have of the world. Instead, millions of people
disappeared by the end of the century. are either ignored by existing models of
The United Nations Development development, or damaged by them.
Programme estimates that up to 14 Governments in some developing
million people have already become countries have banked on the quick
'environmental refugees'. returns which they believe investment in
Those abandoning the land make for the rapid industrial development will bring.
cities, where they hope for a better life. The destruction of the Brazilian
Poverty and the environment 15
Global
relationships
Action for a
Fairer World
IOWEVER GENEROUSLY the been reached, because the USA and Japan
public in developed countries were objecting to some elements of the
I may give in times of emergencies proposal. The plan would establish the
overseas, this will not eliminate world important principle that debtors should
poverty. Nor can the local actions of poor pay no more to service their debt than is
communities, supported by voluntary consistent with their long-term
agencies, alone provide the solution. The prosperity. It is vital that these principles
problem requires coherent and complex be extended immediately to the debt of
long-term strategies, including action by developing countries as a whole.
international institutions and
governments in the South and the North. • Southern producers need improved
The growing gap between rich and poor access to markets, through the removal of
is producing ever more suffering, conflict, Northern trade barriers, and stabilisation
instability, and environmental damage. of commodity prices. Developing
The high-consuming North cannot expect countries also need help to diversify their
the South to tackle environmental economies away from reliance on a
problems unless it is equally prepared to narrow range of exports.
tackle structural injustices in its
relationships with the South. • More and better aid is needed,
Building a fairer world means: including a five-year timetable for the
richest countries to reach the target of 0.7
* Taking urgent action in the North per cent of their gross national product,
to redress the inequity of the global set by the United Nations. The positive
new emphasis in donors' statements on
economy which marginalises and
the need for poverty reduction,
impoverishes so many of the world's environmental appraisal, and popular
inhabitants. participation is encouraging. If aid is to be
effective, these principles must be
• Debt reduction is essential to ease translated into practice.
poverty and suffering and promote
sustainable economic growth. The * Supporting the aspirations of
'Trinidad Terms' proposed by Prime people in the South for more
Minister John Major to the London
accountable, democratic government.
summit of 'G7' nations in July 1991 would
represent a welcome step forward, but (at Poverty and suffering could be reduced if
the time of writing) agreement had not governments in the developing world
Action for a Fairer World 23
committed themselves to the following • Appointing a new Deputy Secretary Bangladesh: the Tek
policies: General with the authority and funds to Para Women's Society
leads a demonstration
coordinate a prompt and effective for women's rights.
• respecting human rights and giving response to emergencies from the Badal/Oxfam
the poor a say in their societies; international community.
• tackling the massive inequalities in the • Investing the UN with a bigger role in
distribution of wealth in their countries; conflict mediation, the protection of
human rights, and the curbing of the
• meeting the basic needs of poor people arms trade which adds to the scale of
for food, shelter, education, employment, suffering and represents such a massive
and health; drain away from development.
3 Human Development Report 1990, United Wales: Oxfam, 46-48 Station Road,
Nations Development Programme, Llanishen, Cardiff CF4 5LU
Oxford University Press, 1990
Ireland: Oxfam, 52-54 Dublin Road,
4 Human Development Report 1991, United
Belfast BT2 7HN; Oxfam, 202 Lower
Nations Development Programme,
Rathmines Road, Dublin 6
Oxford University Press, 1991