New Delhi
2 July 2007
Almost 30 per cent of the population in South Asia is still living on a
dollar a day, according to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Report 2007
released by the United Nations on Monday.
The report suggested that there is evidence that the benefits of economic growth are not
being shared across different parts of the continent despite the dramatic progress by
Asia in the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger.
It went on to caution that South Asia's path to the MDGs might be obstructed by
challenges in other areas such as health, environmental sustainability and gender
equality. These include deforestation, unplanned urbanisation and the fast rate of
HIV/AIDS infections in some parts of the region.
Planning Commission Member Syeda Hameed, who released the report in New Delhi,
said that India has recorded the highest maternal deaths and the largest number of AIDS
patients. "Despite economic growth there are pockets of extreme depravity and poverty,"
she said.
According to the report, progress in improving child nutrition is still unacceptably low. "If
current trends continue, Asia will fall short of reaching the MDG target of halving the
proportion of underweight children, in large measure because of slow progress in South
and South-East Asia. They are still among the sub-regions with the highest percentage of
children under five suffering from malnutrition -- with 46 and 28 per cent of children, in
the two sub-regions respectively, still malnourished in 2005," it read.
The UN detected that Asia is lagging in meeting the goal of promoting gender equality
and empowerment. A large number of women are still shut out of jobs and receive poor
health care.
"South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa share the distinction of having the highest number of
maternal deaths and the lowest proportion of skilled health attendants at birth," the
report added.
No comments:
Post a Comment