Human Development: Families in Poverty - Literature review Example

 Human Development: Families in Poverty Cultural Background Culture can be defined as a system through which customs, values, behaviors, beliefs can be shared. The members of the country use this beliefs, values and customs to cope with one another and the world. Cultural background means life experience in which language, socio economic status; religion, geographical area, sexual orientation etc are included. Here South Africa is the selected nation. Discussing about the cultural background of South Africa at first it can be said that there is a range of different cultures which is the most outstanding thing comparing with the other country’s cultures. It is the culturally most diverse country in the world and hybrid mixture of culture exists across the country. There are 11 official languages in South Africa. English, Africans, Xhosa, Tsonga, Tswana, Venda, Sepedi, Ndebele etc are few languages used by the people of the country (Afọlayan, 2004). The population of South Africa is also in a diverse situation in the world. Out of the total population approximately 51millions are South Africans, 41 millions are black population, only 4 millions are white population, 1.3 millions are Indian or Asian and 4.6 millions are colored population. 51% population of the total population is female and 49% are male. So here it can be showed that female population is slightly higher than the male. Black population of this country is divided into four major groups. These are Zulu, Ndebele, Swazi and Xhosa. Music is one of the integral parts of this country. Jazz, black jazz, classical music etc are some of the categories of music. South African musicians are very much talented and form their own category of music which is not similar to any of the existing music category in the world (Ross, 2008). The food of the country is meat based and the local people prefer to gather socially which is known as barbecue. The country is famous for wine production. World’s oldest art has been discovered in the caves of South Africa. The people of the country create arts by using domestic materials like plastic strips, by-cycle spokes etc. This country is also famous as the Rainbow nation in the whole world. Historical/Political Context Sun people were first settled the country at the southern part of Africa. Khoekhoe and Sun people were lived before the arrival of the European seafarers. White South Africans came from Netherland, Britain and other European countries and black people were coming from the northern part of the Africa. The colored people were coming from the Madagascar, East Indies and East Africa. So many South Africans are Chinese and Indian origins who were slaves and labors in those countries. Bantu kingdoms, Boer republics, rule of Dutch etc are the major parts of history of South Africa. African National Congress came to rule the political context of the country after the year 1994. After the emerging of African National Congress Nelson Mandela became the first black president of democratic South Africa (Coombes, 2003). The democratic government of this country is under the pressure of politics and social needs at the present stage. The country is still in developing condition and more development and reconstruction are required to meet the entire social need. Izimbizo program was launched for the purpose of regulation. The officers involved in this program are engaged to examine the government activities and performance. They highlight the required area of the scheduled activities. So Imbizo can also be called as interactive governance. The current government of this country is encouraging the vibrant civic culture and some campaigns are formed to do the functions of volunteers. Community Crime fighting forum, Schools Governing Bodies, Community-based Organizations, Council Ward Committees etc are included in those campaigns (Hennon and Wilson, 2011). The Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed to maintain the human rights procedures. International and continental environment are much more improved in the present context. Women are got placed at every level of government in this country. But the fighting against inequality still exists in the country. All the citizen of the country is not literate and employment opportunities are also very less. For this reason poverty is not demolished from the society. The country is facing highest rate of public protest in the world at each and every year. During 2004-2005 financial years 6, 000 protests were recorded officially. Since 2004, 80% protests were regarding basic needs of the people. People were denied to elect any leader of the country as they were not getting land, house and employment for living their lives in proper way. Sources and distribution of wealth Inequality of income is the main reason of wealth inequality in this country. The major sources of wealth are coming from agriculture, manufacturing products; mining, electricity, construction, wholesale and retail trade, hotel & restaurants, storage, transportation and communication, business services, real estate and finance, personal services, general government services, etc. 25% of the total population is unemployed in the country and the percentage is increasing day by day. The gap between poor people and rich people are widening in every year. The democracy of the country is threatened by increasing the inequality of wealth. Within the employed population 655 people are very poor. 34 mine workers were killed few days before as they were protested for higher wages. These types of protest which are related to minimal mining wage are very common issue in the South Africa. The country is ranked at the top most position among the richest countries in the world for mineral deposit. But unfortunately the wealth is distributed in very unjustified and unfair way. No remedies are given to the common people and the political institutions are getting benefitted day by day after consuming the national wealth (Davies, 2008). The contribution factor has to be improved from the end of the government and then only revolution can be occurred. Again African National Congress has not taken proper steps yet for the improvement of black community. Their fortune has not changes from the past decades. The difference between white and black is also very wide and blacks are always not getting equal opportunities like others. This is the reason to increase the percentage of crime. This political and social instability prohibit the foreign investors to invest in the country. 56% of the total population is living below poverty line and they are from black community where as only 2% white community people are in such situation. Statistic report says that the % of annual per capita income is always low for the black community and high for the other community. Rich people are earning 58% of total income of the nation. In the year 1993 the worst situation was raised in case of income distribution. 5% top richest people of the country earned 38% total income in that year. Economic and non-economic indicators of well-being  Economy of this country is the 2nd largest economy in Africa after the economy of Nigeria. The economic indicators of the country are income per capita, income poverty lines and income inequality. Income per capita indicates the income level of each person. When country’s total income is divided by the total population then per capita income can be get. GDP per capita, Real wages and Unemployment rate are included in per capita income. In South Africa GDP per capita are 6003.46 USD as per last updated record and the figure is quite high than the previous record. It is a positive indicator towards the growth of the nation. The real wage rate is 422676000.00 ZAR THO and the rate is increased from the previous statistical data. Sector wise details of real wage rates are as follows: In the above figure, green line indicates the real wage (deflated by GDP prices), red line for labor productivity and blue line for real wage (deflated by CPI). Unemployment rate is 25.20% which is high than the previous data. So it indicates that the unemployment rate in increasing day by day in the country. In case of income poverty line, percentage of the population living under a dollar-a-day per capita is 31.3% which indicates more than a quarter of population is living under the poverty line. Poverty headcount ratio of the country is $2 per day which is quite low. A poverty gap and severity index at a dollar-a-day per capita is 2.3% and headcount ratio is 13.8% (Eo, 2008). The above graph shows that poverty gap in South Africa is reducing from the year 2000. Gini coefficient is remained at 0.7 [approximate value] since the year 2000. This is an indication about the position of the country in the basis of inequality. Unfair distribution of national wealth and income of the country are main reasons behind the above mentioned figure. The above figure shows that the condition of unequal distribution of national income and wealth remain almost same from the year 2000. Non economic measures include     Education, Health and nutrition, Environment, Empowerment and participation. Education enrolment rates in 102% as per recent statistical data [2004-2008]. Survival to the final primary or secondary school grade completion of primary or secondary school is 43.9%. Literacy rate is 86.40% which is good but needs to be improved. From the above figure this is shown that secondary school completion rate is much lower than the primary school enrolment rate. So percentage of higher educated people is very less in the country. Half of the total population is not higher educated at all. In case of health and nutrition, we can see malnutrition % is 30.4 in stunting, 4.6 in wasting and 8.7 in underweight during the year 2008. Mortality and morbidity rate under 5 is 46.70 per 1000 live births as per data in 2011. From the above figure we can see the actual figure is much more behind to achieve the target of mortality rate. The % of children is 92.8% in the year 2011 who were all vacancies and health facilities. Diarrhea incidence among children in health facilities is 102.1% in the year 2011. Access to "improved" water sources is 90.8% which is quite good. From the above figure it is clearly observed that access to "improved" water sources is increasing year after year. Access to "adequate" sanitation is 76.9% and it needs to be improved. In case of household infrastructure the high income group used permanent material for building their houses. 57.64% of total population participates in general and local election voting. Only the % of highly literate people [i.e. 49% approx] has the extent of knowledge of local projects and district budgets and high income group is only involved in the activities of NGO. The above indicator tells that living condition should be more improved and government has to take initiative regarding the said issue. % of high educated people should be increased and target should be achieved in case of mortality rate. The above data are collected from secondary sources. So here approximate facts and figures are given and probable conditions have been discussed. Differences are shown as per gender, age and geographic location. For example female mortality rate is higher than the male and child mal nutrition is higher than the adult malnutrition. Differences arise because of the inequality of income and wealth of the nation, poverty, education etc (Mwaniki, 2012). Poverty relief efforts United Nations Development Program in South Africa has done so many Poverty relief programs. Some agreements have signed with the government for reducing poverty. They tried to generate real gas from cow dung. They implemented HIV policy, take steps to save environment etc. Expanded Public Works Program was launched for water program and land care. Consultancy Africa Intelligence was another program for developing the condition of women, their living standards, legal rights and reducing poverty. Compare poverty alleviation efforts to those in the US In comparison with US this must be said that as the population in South Africa is not highly literate so the implementation of the entire above mentioned program was not successful to the highest level of extent. Creating awareness among people about the program was very much time consuming (Iqbal, 2006). In US such procedure has been done in very smooth and systematic way. References Afọlayan, F. (2004). Culture and Customs of South Africa. Boston: Greenwood Publishing Group. Coombes, A. (2003). History after Apartheid: Visual Culture and Public Memory in a Democratic South Africa. Durham: Duke University Press. Davies, J. (2008). Personal Wealth from a Global Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Eo, G. (2008). GEF Country Portfolio Evaluation: South Africa (1994–2007). Washington: GEF Evaluation Office. Hennon, C. and Wilson, S. (2011). Families in a Global Context. Florence: Taylor & Francis. Iqbal, F. (2006). Sustaining Gains in Poverty Reduction and Human Development in the Middle East and North Africa. Washington: World Bank Publications. Mwaniki, M. (2012). Multilingualism and the Public Sector in South Africa. Matieland: AFRICAN SUN MeDIA. Ross, R. (2008). A Concise History of South Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Read More