Landlocked countries and the eradication of poverty
Introduction
Eradicating poverty in landlocked have been discussed in UN for the past decades but unfortunately non delegate have come up with a solution or resolution that can help this problem and solve it.
Fifteen years ago, in Copenhagen, global leaders at the World Summit for Social Development described poverty eradication as an ethical, political and economic imperative, and identified it as one of the three pillars of social development. Poverty eradication has since become the overarching objective of development, as reflected in the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals, which set the target of halving global extreme poverty by 2015.
Landlocked countries are located in different parts of the world 15 are located in Africa, 12 in Asia, 2 in Latin America and 15 in Europe. Landlocked countries all have the same problem, problem such as trading, they have to export and import goods to travel hundreds or thousands of KM to and from the closest maritime ports. Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are very important for every country and if they say that a country is far from MDGs that means that the country is poor and not developed. And that’s what is happening to these LLDCs in fact many of them are even moving further from MDGs.
Water is very important for countries and useful, water can help in economy, the countries development and also transporting through sea and oceans are much cheaper than land or air transportation. And when a country doesn’t have such source the country will have loads of problems. LLDC developing countries are among the poorest developing countries due to all the problems such as weak institutional and productive capacities, small domestic markets, and high vulnerability to external shocks, as well as poor physical infrastructure and remoteness from world markets. Most of the LLD countries are primary and not so much but a bit of secondary, for LLDCs it’s very hard to be Secondary or Tartary because its very expensive for them to transport final goods around the world by land or air and if they want to transport these to other continents first they have to transport through land and then to the nears water transport and that will cost them more than normal. And that’s why more than half of LLDCs are LDCs (least developing countries). Only five LLDCs, namely Botswana, the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Kazakhstan, Swaziland and Turkmenistan, have a per capita GDP exceeding the average level of the per capita GDP of all developing countries.
Poverty is a lack of human needs, and human needs are the Millennium Goals. If a country can not get to a level of satisfaction in the Millennium Goals, the country would have many different problems that if the politics cant solve it these problems will get so big that the country can not do anything about it but asking aid from other countries. A land locked country asking for aid from other nations is difficult, since the transportation it self will cost a lot so mostly only the neighbor countries can help them.
Definition of Key Terms
Landlocked Countries (LLDCS)
Landlocked countries are countries surrounded by land and not in touch of any ocean or river or sea, there is overall of 44 countries that are included in LLDCs.
Least developed countries (LDC)
These countries are based from country’s state of development, namely, its income level, its stock of human assets and economic vulnerability. There are aproximatly Africa (33 countries, Asia (10 countries) and only Americas (1 country) and Oceania (5 countries)
Gross Domestic Product (GDP)
GDP is a way of measuring the countries out put and in put. It’s the final goods made and trade through the year across the countries borders. Growth in GDP is what matters, and the U.S. GDP growth has historically averaged about 2.5-3% per year but with substantial deviations.
Millennium Development Goals (MDG)
The United Nations (UN) millennium development goals are Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger, Achieve universal primary education, Promote gender equality and empower women, Reduce child mortality, Improve maternal health, Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, Ensure environmental sustainability, Develop a Global Partnership for Development. These goals were adopted in 2000 and the dead line for all the countries is 2015. These goals are for all the nations to get together and make a better and a safer place to live.
Primary production
Primary producers are creators that produce the primary good of a product. Primary products are mostly natural, or made or anything, they send these products to secondary producers. Primary producers are usually in least development countries.
Secondary production
Secondary producers get the product from primary producers and put them in factories and make the goods and then after packaging sell it to shops keepers which are the tertiary producers to sell it to the final costumers. Secondary producers are usually in the developing countries.
ESCAP
ESCAP is the regional development arm of the United Nations and serves as the main economic and social development centre for the United Nations in Asia and the Pacific.
History
Historically being a landlocked country is a disadvantage, because such countries have a lot of different problems. Being a landlocked country takes advantages or recourses such as fishing but more importantly it doesn’t let the country have seaborne trade which even now is the most important way and best and cheapest way of trade from countries to countries. But through the history many attempts to solve this problem have been done also some attempts have been done which have made the problem even worse.
In 1885 Democratic Republic of the Congo was given a piece of land through Angola, which connected Democratic Republic of the Congo to sea this attempt was done by Conference of Berlin; this attempt helped the Democratic Republic of Congo a t through the years.
There are over 30 landlocked countries and due to unavailability of water resources; the infrastructure, tourism, and sea freight are not available or are in very poor conditions. Landlocked countries are usually very poor. Most of these countries are in Asia and Pacific region. Part of the landlocked countries became poor after the separation of Soviet Union as they were not getting help from their allies. In 2003 a conference was held in Almaty, Kazakhstan and the conference agreed to join efforts to help landlocked countries. This agreement was called Almaty Programme of Action. Programme of Action along with World Bank have agreed to provide financial help for landlocked countries especially in Africa. So the major help that major parties provide to landlocked countries are the following: The transit countries ( The nearby countries with water access) provide water and other marine resources to the landlocked countries. International Air freight provides services for landlocked such as export and import of goods in and out of the country. Emergency products are imported into the country and exotic fruits, agriculture etc are exported from the country to benefit their economy.
Even though many countries and nations have tried to help and solve landlocked countries problems but they have not been able to help the poverty. When a country is not able to make jobs for its nation more people will be jobless and would not be able to pay for there taxes and other payments and that’s when the countries starts going toward poverty or even under poverty line. NGOs have tried to solve this problems, such NGOs lend money to people with no bank history and get back there money in a very long period of time, or other NGOs make places such as schools, hospitals and etc. the educate the people and then help them get jobs.
Key Issues
Human development
As the LLDCS are mostly going to ward development, nine of the twelve countries with the lowest human development are landlocked, that’s more than one third. In contrast, the landlocked countries in western Africa are doing the worst relative to their maritime neighbors.
Trade cost
The cost of trades in land locked countries are much more than countries with water connections. Ratio of transport and insurance costs in land locked countries is much more because these transportations have to be done throw airline transportations or landline transportations and that makes the distance much more and also this distant will increase the cost of transportations.
Export
In line with their higher trade costs, landlocked countries on average export less than one-half of the per-capita amounts of their maritime neighbors. Landlocked countries are usually primary producers but even that is hard for them to export to other countries in far distance because first they have to transfer the production to the nearest water transporters then to the other country and that will cost a lot.
Political relationship between landlocked countries
The only way land locked countries can have a safe trade is through politics, the need to be friends with there neighbor countries, because ay time that there is the smallest conflict the neighbors countries can close there borders or adopt regulator impediments to trade
Worst affected areas
The landlocked countries of the South Caucasus and Central Asia are now in are now having arguments with the neighbor countries which make there situation worse than the other landlocked countries.
Vulnerability to civil conflict within transit countries
Even when landlocked countries have no problem with there neighbor countries and they are in peace there is still a possibility of closing the transit roads because the neighbor country can be in war and the roads might be damaged or a big risk of taking the productions thro the roads that might be attacked any time.
Policy implications
To address the challenges that limit landlocked countries’ potential gains from trade and hence limit the resource base for investing in human development, several key policy priorities can be stressed.
Major parties involved and there point of views
The reform of national trade and transport systems
Every country has different rule of allowing products to enter goods to there country but in land lucked country the reform of nation trade and transportation system is much cheaper and easier even though that they still make sure the product entering the country will be 100% good.
NGOs
NGOs are non-governmental organization helping problems all over the world; these organizations also helped a lot through the landlocked countries, such as extending job promotions and other hospitalities. NGOs can help build bridges and establish channels of communication and cooperation between people and communities on one side, and governments, development institutions, and funding agencies on the other.
United Nations
The United Nations took many different actions toward fixing the landlocked countries problems and they also had many different projects for there actions and some of the most famous ones would be Almaty which was one of a kind in 2003 and also the Laos Project which was named after the small landlocked country.
Timeline of Relevant Resolutions, Treaties and Events
1982
There is a legal basis for rights of landlocked transit as outlined in Article 125of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea in practice, this right of access must be agreed upon with the transit neighbor and is determined by the relationship between the countries.
1989
Indepentence of 10 landlocked countries
1990s
recognition that landlocked countries typically face greater
difficulties than others to achieve a good pace of development.
1991
The Lao project started in 1991 to help the small landlocked country called Lao.
1993 and 1994
Ghana suffered from ethnic violence primarily.
1996
Bolivia created a administration for port service-Bolivia which could help for more organization.
1997
In 1997 started Pediatric Residency Program and graduated more than 50 Lao pediatricians
1999
According to world bank, the LLDCs pay 50% more transportation cost than the other countries that have access to water (coastal countries) and they also have 60% less amount of trade in there countries
2001
Armenia’s only alternative transit routes, through Georgia and Iran, are restricted by mountainous terrain and relatively weak infrastructure
2002
The international medicine program started in 2002 and graduated lot of internists in Lao.
2003
Russia’s Volga-Don Canal was used to deliver a cutter gifted by the US Government to the Azerbaijan Navy.
2003
In 2003 an conference was held between International Ministerial Conference of Landlocked and Transit Developing Countries and Donor Countries and International Financial and Development Institutions on Transit Transport Cooperation called the almaty conference.
2008
In 2nd October 2008 Ban Ki-moon asked all nations for help for the 31 landlocked countries.
2008
The United Nations today began three days of high-level consultations aimed at boosting foreign direct investment in the world’s 31 landlocked developing countries (LLDC) to strengthen their participation in international trade and the global economy.
Evaluation of previous attempts to resolve the issue
Lao’s Project
This project was to help the small landlocked country, this was to help them with there economic growth and help them to achieve the Millennium Goals. This project also helped for the country to get useful recourses and also improve them technology. This project also helps the Lao’s nation wealth, health and also education. But the problem with Lao’s nation was that they weren’t so much interested in education and by the report given in 2009 not many student attend to school.
The Almaty
The Almaty program was held in Almaty, Kazakhstan, this was a project with many different partnerships, which later on got the attention of all the world’s landlocked country. This program was to establish transit system. This program also helped out the landlocked countries in many different ways. This was one of a kind project. The objective of the Almaty Program of Action is to establish a new global framework for developing efficient transit transport systems in landlocked and transit developing countries, taking into account the interests of both landlocked and transit developing countries.
Possible solutions
Providing acknowledge about the countries to other nations and informing them about all the fascinating and good features of the country so that more people can be interested in visiting the country and through that the country can make a lot of income by the visitors.
Making places for the visitors from other nations to be in and rest and other fun activities and festivals in the country for attracting people toward the country.
Slowing down the import of goods and starting new factories and producing secondary products with the neutral resources in the country.
Making charity foundations and building new educational places for students to get educated and learn different jobs and charity helps for the people in need so they can satisfy there lives.
Calls up on different NGOs for more help and making job promotions and more loans for all the land locked countries so the nations will be able to saticfy there needs and help the economy of the country.
Develop a global partnership for development of all land locked countries.
Command all landlocked countries to aim for the millennium goals and try harder to reach these goals for ther own goods and futer.