DEVELOPMENT IN AFRICA GRAVELY THREATENED BY AIDS

By Roberto Savio and - - Reprint | | Print |

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ADDIS ABABA, Jun 1 2003 (IPS) - We are now halfway through the 25-year period set in 1990 for achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Africa, writes K. Y. Amoako, Executive Secretary, Economic Commission for Africa. In this article for IPS, Amoako writes that nothing is more critical than overcoming HIV/AIDS. The epidemic has a clear impact on the first three MDGs: poverty eradication, education, and gender equality. Families afflicted by AIDS are less able to grow food and to withstand shocks such as drought. Girls are being withdrawn from school in order to assist with essential domestic duties, including caring for the sick. The author stresses that women bear the brunt of the AIDS epidemic. They shoulder the burden of caring for people with AIDS and bringing up children orphaned by the disease. They grow most of Africa\’s food. An estimated 58 percent of those infected with HIV in this continent are women. One of the factors driving the AIDS epidemic in Africa is the unequal status of women and their vulnerability to exploitation and sexual abuse. In a vicious twist, it seems that the epidemic itself is intensifying women\’s vulnerability. Overcoming the effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on women is crucial if we are to promote gender equality and empower women.

We are now halfway through the 25-year period set in 1990 for achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in Africa, which include eradicating absolute poverty and hunger, halving the number of people living on less than one dollar per day, and meeting a number of other key indicators of social and economic progress for the world’s poor.

Perhaps the most remarkable fact about the MDGs is that they were adopted at all. At the United Nations Millennium Summit in 1990, there was a powerful consensus among all UN member states on the need to reduce poverty and improve social conditions in the world’s poorest regions. To fulfil the common commitments set out in the MDGs, there must be a true and more effective partnership between rich and poor nations.

It is important to note that rolling back the HIV/AIDS epidemic is both desirable in itself and central to achieving all of the other MDGs. AIDS is not only a survival issue for millions of Africans; it is also pivotal to our aspirations to sustainable development and good governance.

The Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) believes that nothing is more critical than overcoming HIV/AIDS, which has claimed 20 million lives already in Africa and may well claim that many more in the coming decade. We are now confronting the equally stark reality that suffering and death on this scale will severely undermine our ability to meet all of our other development goals. As we try to do more, we are faced with a frightening erosion of our human resources. Too often, we are struggling just to maintain today’s limited capacity.

The epidemic has a clear impact on the first three MDGs: poverty eradication, education, and gender equality.

The first MDG is to halve, between 1990 and 2015, the number of people whose income is less than one dollar a day and the number of people who suffer from hunger. Success in this requires an annual growth rate of about seven percent, which is considerably higher than what Africa has achieved in recent years.

Economists currently estimate that HIV/AIDS is cutting about one percent off the growth rates of affected countries. Although this size of setback is well within the range of what can be caused by policy errors, drought, or commodity price fluctuations, consider what it means when compounded over a decade: that in ten years key national economies, such as those of South Africa and Kenya, will be substantially smaller than they would have been otherwise, and that the goal of poverty reduction will be much harder to achieve.

The MDGs commit us to eliminating hunger, but the depth of poverty in much of Africa means that millions are vulnerable to acute hunger should the amount or rain decrease or the prices of key export commodities fall. Families afflicted by AIDS are less able to grow food and withstand shocks such as drought. The wider community bears the burden of caring for and educating the growing number of children orphaned by AIDS.

One of the most common responses of households to desperate poverty and hunger is to take children out of school. This is particularly true of girls, who are kept home in order to assist with essential domestic duties, including caring for the sick. School attendance of children orphaned by AIDS is much lower.

Thus the second MDG, achieving universal primary education by 2015, is directly jeopardised by the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

We must always keep in mind the fact that women bear the brunt of the AIDS epidemic. They shoulder the burden of caring for people with AIDS and bringing up children orphaned by the disease. And they grow most of Africa’s food. Add to this the fact that an estimated 58 percent of those infected with HIV in this continent are women, and we see that the burdens falling on Africa’s women are becoming unsupportable.

One of the factors driving the AIDS epidemic in Africa is the unequal status of women and their vulnerability to exploitation and sexual abuse. In a vicious twist, it seems that the epidemic itself is intensifying women’s vulnerability. Overcoming the effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic on women is crucial if we are to meet the third MDG, promoting gender equality and empowering women.

Africa has lost too much time in coming to grips with the daunting challenges posed by this epidemic. Too many lives have been lost. But I am confident that the resourcefulness and spirit of Africans, who have endured so many hardships with such resilience, will triumph over this encroaching threat. (END/COPYRIGHT IPS)