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UN Millennium Goals.
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AFRICA: A Continent in Crisis
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AIDS development trade debt
AIDS
Every day, 6,000 Africans contract the HIV virus.
- 25 million people in Africa have HIV, this is 70% of global infections. Almost 2 million of African cases are children under the age of 15. (UNAIDS)
- Every day in Africa 6,300 people die and another 8,500 contract the HIV virus, 1,400 of whom are newborn babies infected during childbirth or by their mothers’ milk. (UNAIDS)
- Currently more than 12 million children in Africa have lost at least one parent to HIV/AIDS; that number is expected to reach 18 million by 2010. (UNAIDS/UNICEF)
- The main way AIDS is transmitted are sexual intercourse, unsafe injections, transmission from mother to child at birth or through breastfeeding, and transfusion of contaminated blood or blood products. (World Bank)
- In Uganda, effective AIDS programs have helped reduce the HIV rate from 15% to 5%. (USAID)
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DEVELOPMENT
Development assistance to Africa from the world’s wealthiest nations if falling far short of need.
The United States gives the lowest percentage of assistance to poor countries.
- In 1970, wealthy nations agreed to a goal of spending 0.7% of GNP on development assistance. Last year, these countries spent on average just 0.23%. Only five countries have reached the 0.7% target: Denmark, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. The U.S., the world’s richest country, gives the smallest percentage of its wealth, 0.12%, to poor countries. (OECD)
- The World Bank estimates that the 30 best governed countries in Africa will need an additional $20-$25 billion each year to achieve global anti-poverty goals by 2015.
TRADE
Protectionist trade policies are causing Africa’s trade imbalance to fall farther behind.
- If Africa’s share of global trade had stayed at 1980 levels, the continent’s share of world exports would be double today’s figure. Annual growth would have been higher, raising per capita income to a level 50% above the current figure. (UNCTAD)
- Rich countries spend $100 billion a year to protect their markets with tariffs, quotas and subsidies. This is twice as much as they provide in development assistance for developing countries. These barriers limit the trade possibilities for developing countries. (Oxfam)
DEBT
Africa is helping financial institutions instead of its people.
- • Every year Sub-Saharan Africa, the poorest region of the world, spends $14.5 billion dollars repaying debts to the world’s rich countries and international institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. (IMF)
- Benin completed the HIPC debt relief process in April 2003. As a result, as debt payments began to decline, spending on health (such as investing in health care infrastructure) and education (eliminating school fees in rural areas) more than doubled. (Jubilee Research)
- 23 African countries are getting debt relief through the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) program. This means they have an extra billion dollars a year to spend fighting poverty, but each year they still have to repay $1.7 billion on old debts. (IMF)
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