DEVELOPMENT: China, India Fail Their Children, Says UN

By Marwaan Macan-Markar Reprint | | Print |

Marwaan Macan-Markar

BANGKOK, Sep 8 2005 (IPS) - They may be the standard bearers of Asia’s economic growth, yet the continent’s two giants, India and China, have failed to ensure that such achievements benefit their children, says a U.N. report.

That is reflected in the rate at which children under five years die annually from among the poor in both countries, states the ‘Human Development Report 2005’, an annual publication by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), released on Wednesday.

In China, while the per capita income growth rate increased from 8.1 percent in 1980 to 8.5 during the 1990-2003 period, the annual rate of under-five child mortality fell from only 2.3 percent in 1980 to 1.9 percent during the 1990-2003 period, states the report.

India’s drop in under-five child mortality rates are even slower, adds the 372-page report, pointing to annual child mortality rate declining from 2.9 percent in 1980 to 2.3 percent during the 1990s.

”Developments in India and China have global implications,” the report states, given that they account for a sizeable number of the estimated 11.4 million children under five years who die every year, many during the neonatal period.

India accounts for 2.5 million child deaths annually, while China accounts for another 730,000 – ”more than any other country except India,” according to the report.

Yet, at the same time countries that trail both India and China in the region on the economic front, such as Bangladesh and Vietnam, have done better to save the lives of their most vulnerable. ”Had India matched Bangladesh’s rate of reduction in child mortality, 732,000 fewer children would die this year,” says the report. ”Had China matched Vietnam’s, 276,000 lives could be saved”.

In 1970, Bangladesh had an under-five child mortality of 239 per 1,000 live births, which dropped to 69 under-five child deaths per 1,000 live births by 2003. In the same period, Vietnam went from having 87 children dying per 1,000 live birth in 1970 to 23 children dying per 1,000 live births by 2003.

This story of contrasts has compelled the authors of the report to conclude that impressive economic growth in a country does not necessarily translate into an equally impressive human development condition.

”Although India and China are the darlings of globalisation, high growth has not reduced child mortality,” Arunabha Ghosh, co-author of the report, said. ”These countries are not paying much attention to inequalities”.

Another factor is low priority in public health spending. According to the report, China spends two percent of its gross domestic product (GDP) on public health, while setting aside 2.3 percent of its GDP on military expenditure.

India, on the other hand, sets aside 1.3 percent of its GDP for public health, while 2.1 percent of the GDP goes for military expenditure.

”The governments have a responsibility for addressing the inequalities and the resource constraints on the spending for health,” Ghosh told IPS. ”Child mortality is an issue of national public policy”.

More resources have to be invested to improve health facilities in the rural areas, which is home to most of the poor. ”Often doctors are not present in the health facilities that exist in the rural areas”.

Child mortality rates are a key indicator of human development, for they reflect the ”links between income and social progress,” states the report. ”On average, mortality rates fall as incomes rise”.

Malaysia’s achievements mirror such a reality. Its economic success has enabled it to have a better infant mortality rate than the United States, says the report. While in the U.S. eight children die for every 1,000 live births, in Malaysia the under-five mortality rate is seven deaths for every 1,000 live births.

In Norway, the country that tops the human development rankings in the world, four children die for every 1,000 births. While Niger, which has the worst human development indicators of the177 countries surveyed, the under-five mortality is 262 for every 1,000 live births.

Besides India and China, countries with high under-five mortality rates in Asia include the Maldives, Burma, Cambodia, Laos, Bhutan, Pakistan, Nepal, East Timor and Papua New Guinea.

Cambodia has the highest death rate, with 140 children under five years dying for every 1,000 live births, followed by the newly-independent nation of East Timor, with 124 deaths per 1,000 live births, states the report.

The report’s findings on child mortality adds to the pressure developing countries face to meet a pledge made by their leaders to reduce by two-thirds the under-five mortality rate by 2015.

That pledge was one among the eight that made up the time-bound Millennium Development Goals aimed at improving the quality of life of the world’s 1.2 million poorest people who live on less than a dollar a day.