UNDP’s human development report, which was officially launched recently, indicated that even though African countries have made significant strides in advancing human development the emergence of new inequalities is undermining further progress. This fact is observed particularly around tertiary education, seismic effects of technology and climate crisis.
According to the report, while poverty rates have declined across the continent, progress has been uneven. If current trends continue, nearly nine of ten people in extreme poverty; more than 300 million people will be in Sub-Saharan countries by 2030.
The Human Development Index (HDI) in the report also reveals that the continent experienced the highest regional loss in human development value due to inequality. It is facing dual challenges in ensuring that those farthest behind make progress with the basics, while paving the way for those farther ahead to keep pace with the emerging requirements of today’s world.
Despite improved gender parity in education, the report notes that African women and girls continue to face deeply entrenched challenges to their human development progress. The Continent has the world’s highest incidence of early marriage and adolescent childbirth, with 36 percent of women being married before their 18th birthday. The deep rooted social norms that yield disparate outcomes for men and women often affect people even before they are born, according to the report.
Turhan Saleh, UNDP’s Resident Representative in Ethiopia, says people’s attitude towards gender inequality is becoming very negative worldwide. Meanwhile, the long standing social norms or traditions stand on the way in addressing gender inequality in African countries.
As the inequality increases in a country, the loss in human development also increases, stresses Turhan while briefing the report to journalists. The HDI measures long term progress in three basic dimensions of human development; a long and healthy life, access to knowledge as well as a decent standard of living. In cases of Ethiopia, Turhan says life expectancy has increased by 19.1 between the years 1990 and 2018.
There are also improvements in terms of income as well as primary education. However, the country’s human development progress in general varies from one dimension to another and makes the progress unbalanced. Although Ethiopia’s HDI value show 65.8 percent increment between 2000and 2018; from 0.283 t0 0.470, it is still positioned under the list of low performing group five countries; most of them in Sub-Saharan Africa.
In terms of Gender Inequality (GII), Ethiopia is ranked 123 out of 162 countries with a value of 0.508, while only 37.3 percent of parliamentary seats are held by women and only 11.5 percent of adult women have reached at least a secondary level of education compared to 22.0 percent of their male counterparts.
Meanwhile, with the multifaceted socioeconomic developments that Ethiopia and other African countries are set on, inequality is not an issue beyond solutions, says Turhan adding but quick action is the best way. “The longer we wait to deal with inequality, the tougher it will be to tackle. Every country better start now,” he suggests. He also argues that passing strong laws on deep rooted harmful traditions would play significant role in the efforts to address gender inequality.
Ethiopia has passed several laws that would hold accountable people who are involved in harmful traditions like FGM, abduction, early marriage, etc. and the improvement has been exemplary. There is a system that is established to tackle early marriage, where brides and grooms would have a checkup in hospitals or nearby health centers to assure that they are on the right age and be certified to get married. This has brought a crucial change in reducing the impact of early marriage that has been affecting women’s life and even societies for a long time. However, there is still much to be done in tackling inequalities not only from the gender side but also other dimensions.
The UNDP report has put the alternative solutions with three basic steps; thinking beyond income, looking beyond averages and planning beyond today. Turhan says that human development or addressing inequalities is not all about maintaining income. For instance, “Ethiopia is doing better in terms of income but it still has issues with education, health and life standards”.
The report recommends policies that go beyond income and are anchored in lifespan interventions starting even before birth. Such human capital must continue through a person’s life from pre-natal care to education, the labour market and retirement.
It is indicated that averages would hide what is really going on in society while they can be helpful in telling about larger story. In this case, the necessity of much more detailed information is stressed for effective policies to tackle inequality. While climate change and technological transformation are considered as the factors that would shape the future, planning beyond today would be crucial and every society has a choice about the level and kind of inequality it is prepared to tolerate, says Pedro Conceicao, Director and Lead Editor of the report team.
The Ethiopian Herald Sunday Edition, December 22/2019
BY HENOK TIBEBU
