What is development? Book reference: Unit 4.1 page 98 The simplest definition is ‘the process of countries becoming richer’

2 ‘process by which countries become richer’. All countries are trying to increase their wealth. As people earn more, they can afford to buy more ‘things’ and so we say their ‘standard of living’ improves. Not all countries are developing at the same rate, and the gap between the rich and poor is growing.

3 In 1980 the term North-South divide was coined But as we know it is not as simple as that. There are many countries, like NICs, who neither very rich nor very poor.

4 But knowing how much money a country earns does not tell you much about the way individuals live – Development involves more than just the wealth of a country. You need to take into account:  that standard of living and  the quality of life of the people who live there.

5 standard of life The standard of life is the material well- being of a person:  the value of their possessions,  the type of home they live in and  whether they own such things as oa TV, oa washing machine, oa car, oa telephone or oa computer

6 quality of life The quality of life is the general well- being of a person. It includes  the standard of life but also  access to education and  health care,  availability of the utilities oi.e. electricity, owater, orubbish collection,  but also political and religious freedom,  social opportunities,  environmental quality

So development is the improvements in standard of living and quality of life that follow on from a country becoming richer Most of these things need money

8 Geographers love classifying things! So in order to classify the level of development they have concentrated on the level of economic (money) development So there are 3 basic groups that you have come across before:  MEDC  NIC  LEDC Do you remember what these stand for? In addition, the EDEXCEL syllabus uses an extra grouping  LLEDC - LEAST Less Economically Developed Countries Now these are the ones that are really at the bottom of the heap!

9 What are MEDCs like? They tend to have well developed industries, often high- tech – why is that? What are they saving on? Farming is for profit and uses machines and chemicals MEDCs have many service industries because people have spare money for luxuries Children have free education and almost everyone can read and write People have plenty to eat and in fact many are over weight Clean water comes directly into their homes Healthcare is easily available and is of high quality

10 On the other hand, LEDCs Industry tends to be primary – do you remember what that is? It is industry that needs a lot of people and is much less mechanised – why is that? Farming is often subsistence – what does that mean? There are fewer service industries because people do not have much money to spend on leisure Most of the children go to school although many people have to pay towards the secondary education. Girls in particular have less chance of education. Healthcare where available is often basic as there are too few doctors and hospitals

11 But where do NICs fit in? For the others, we talked about: Industries Farming Service industries Education Food Water Healthcare

12 Lastly LLEDC These guys have the worst of everything. An even greater number of people are involved in primary activity There is little industry and a minimum number of services – including education and healthcare Not everyone has enough to eat There are 1.1 million ( 1/6 of the world) are without access to clean water – many in these countries Very often in the poorest countries there is a lot army/other action and the human rights of individuals are breached. The main reason why they are failing to develop is that money and resources are given to the armies and/or guerrilla groups. Can you think of any other examples?

13 Facts about World development 1/5 of the world are MEDCs but they own 4/5 of the wealth The richest 3 people own more than the poorest 600 million 100 million people are homeless 900 million have no education 880 million do not have enough to eat Only 1/3 of the world can read 1% go to university and 1% have a computer The cost of providing basic healthcare and food for everyone who does not have it would be less that Europe and USA spend on pet food each year. What is the population of the whole world?

Measuring development So how do you measure economic development, standard of living and quality of life?

15 One measure of the wealth of a country is … …the GDP which is usually given in dollars ($). GDP GDP stands for  G  G ross (All the money earned)  D  D omestic (Just the one country) P  P roduct (added together) Large countries will have bigger incomes than smaller countries who were just as wealthy. So the population size need to come into it too If you divide the income by the population, then this gives a figure of dollars per head GDP per capita This is called GDP per capita.

16 These are 2008 figures

17 Take a look here – fairly obvious?

18 Take a look here – fairly obvious? Outside Kabul in Afghanistan $1000 Parkersburg in West Virginia Small town America $45,800

19 But take a look at these

20 But take a look at these Tokyo, Japan $33,500 Bangkok Thailand $8,000

21 And these?

22 And these? Wezhou, China $5,400 Sheffield England $35,000

23 This is Equatorial Guinea GDP – is it: $50,000 $30,000 $10,000 $5000 $1,000? CountryGDP per capita USA$ 48,000 Italy$ 31,000 Brazil$ 10,300 Egypt$ 5,500 Ethiopia$ 800

24 But there are lots of other measures development indicators These are called development indicators, for instance:  Fresh water per capita (cu m /year),  Infant mortality/1000 live births  Life expectancy  Age structure –% of children, working adults and people over working age All these are about life and death and so indicate how healthy the people are  Pop growth  Birth rate/1000 pop Tell you about whether population is growing – fast growth is a symptom of lower development – why do people have more children if they are poor?

25 And some more …  Labour force by occupation  Unemployment This tells you about the level of economic activity – this is also an indicator of development  Household income by % share This looks at the how much money the top 10% and the bottom 10% get – the smaller the gap is supposed to measure higher levels of development – however, the gap between the rich and the poor is variable across all types of country  Internet users This is yet another of many ways to divide countries up, that indicates access to personal services

26 In conclusion GDP gives a general idea of the level of development But other indicators tell you more about the quality of life of the people. However, without money, indicators about health, education and food and water supply cannot improve. So how can we can we a get a measure of how good or how bad things are?

What are the problems with GDP per capita as a measure of development?

28 Issues Some parts of a country will reflect its GDP but others will not. There will be countries with a low GDP where there will be large modern buildings and MacDonald's And there will be parts of countries with a high GDP that are underdeveloped.

29 So development is not just about how much money a country makes It was generally thought that as a country got richer, the standard of living of the people would increase – but as we can see, parts of every country are very modern, but not all of them. So we need to think about ‘quality of life’. It is only when we look at this, that we can begin to see how developed a country is. Because then we know how well the individuals who live there are fairing.

30 Homework Is looking at a selection of indicators for 3 countries  Italy  Brazil  Ethiopia Why do you think these 3 have been chosen? They will form the basis of mini-case studies next week – but this way you will get a feel for the similarities and differences between them. So, look at the figures and comment on values of the indicators for each country. Using these as examples, what can you tell me about development in different parts of the world?

31 WARNING! LOTS You will be coming across LOTS of figures from various sources EXACTLY They will rarely if ever be EXACTLY the same. This is for a variety of reasons  There are a number of places they can get the figures from  They may be from different years  They may ‘do things’ to them – for example there are at least 3 ways to work out the GDP per capita So it is unlikely that you would be expected to quote the run of the mill figures from memory – much more likely that you would be given some data and ask to comment on it. The one exception is the HDI (Human development index) which is constructed by the UN based on its own figures. You will need to have idea of what this is for your 3 mini-case studies (More next week)