Chowrangi

Rapid economic growth has spurred progress in eradicating extreme poverty and hunger in Asia, where the proportion of people living on a dollar a day has been cut by half, but inequality is also growing in parts of the region, says a new United Nations report.

According to the report, Eastern Asia where the proportion of people living in extreme poverty fell from 33 per cent in 1990 to 9.9 percent in 2004, saw the greatest gain. In South Eastern Asia, where extreme poverty was already down to 20.8 per cent in 1990, the percentage had dropped to 6.8 per cent by 2004.

These figures put the region comfortably on track to achieve the first millennium development goals set by United Nations in 2000. Those goals also include the calls for halving extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. But Asia’s unprecedented poverty reduction is uneven. In South Asia, nearly one third of the population is still living on the equivalent of a dollar a day.

Inequality is also rising within countries. Statistics show that Asia’s path to progress and prosperity and self-reliance may blocked by challenges in other areas such as health, environmental sustainability and gender equality. Factors like deforestation, unplanned urbanization and the fast rate of killer diseases like HIV/AIDS infections in some parts of the region are the major obstacles for Asia.

Children are the future of any nation, but Asia’s most alarming weakness is the dismal and terrible plight of most of the children. Progress in improving child nutrition is still unacceptably slow compared to other parts of the world. If the current trends continue Asia will surely and sadly fall short of reaching any semblance of prosperity and progress in the future.

Digital divide is yet another challenge faced by Asia. Though some countries like China and India are progressing at the speed of light and other countries like Pakistan following them steadily, there still is a great, wide and frightening chasm between the haves and have-nots.

Its high time Asian countries should join forces and start finding the solutions to these challenges. Periodic reports by United Nations have become routine, and their value has just become academic. We need to rise above it.

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