Human Development
Human development strategy
Description:
Within the framework of the United Nations International Development Strategy and the United Nations Development Decade (1970-1980), a strategy for human development was specifically identified as follows:"Those developing countries which consider that their rate of population growth hampers their development will adopt measures which they deem necessary in accordance with their concept of development. Developed countries, consistent with their national policies, will provide support on request, through the supply of means for family planning and further research. International organizations concerned will continue to provide, when appropriate, the assistance that may be requested by interested governments. Such support or assistance will not be a substitute for other forms of development assistance.
Developing countries will make vigorous efforts to improve labour force statistics in order to be able to formulate realistic quantitative targets for employment. They will scrutinize their fiscal, monetary, trade and other policies with a view to promoting both employment and growth. Moreover, for achieving these objectives they will expand their investment through a fuller mobilization of domestic resources and an increased flow of assistance from abroad. Wherever a choice of technology is available, developing countries will seek to raise the level of employment by ensuring that capital-intensive technology is confined to uses in which it is clearly cheaper in real terms and more efficient. Developed countries will assist in this process by adopting measures to bring about appropriate changes in the structures of international trade. As part of their employment strategy, developing countries will put as much emphasis as possible on rural employment, and will also consider undertaking public works that harness manpower which would otherwise remain unutilized. These countries will also strengthen institutions able to contribute to constructive industrial relations policies and appropriate labour standards. Developed countries and international organizations will assist developing countries in attaining their employment objectives.
Developing countries will formulate and implement educational programmes taking into account their development needs. Educational and training programmes will be so designed as to increase productivity substantially in the short run and to reduce waste. Particular emphasis will be placed on teacher-training programmes and on the development of curriculum materials to be used by teachers. As appropriate, curricula will be revised and new approaches initiated in order to ensure expansion of skills at all levels in line with the rising tempo of activities and the accelerating transformations brought about by technological progress. Increasing use will be made of modern equipment, mass media and new teaching methods to improve the efficiency of education. Particular attention will be devoted to technical training, vocational training and retraining. Necessary facilities will be provided for improving the literacy and technical competence of groups that are already productively engaged, as well as for adult education. Developed countries and international institutions will assist in the task of extending and improving the systems of education of developing countries, especially by making available some of the educational inputs in short supply in many of these countries and by providing assistance to facilitate the flow of pedagogic resources among them.
Developing countries will establish at least a minimum programme of health facilities comprising an infrastructure of institutions, including those for medical training and research, to bring basic medical services within the reach of a specified proportion of their population by the end of the Decade. These will include basic health services for the prevention and treatment of diseases and for the promotion of health. Each developing country will endeavour to provide an adequate supply of potable water to a specified proportion of its population, both urban and rural, with a view to reaching a minimum target by the end of the Decade. Efforts of the developing countries to raise their levels of health will be supported to the maximum feasible extent by developed countries, particularly through assistance for the planning of health promotion strategy and the implementation of some of its segments, including research, training of personnel at all levels and supply of equipment and medicines. A concerted international effort will be made to mount a world-wide campaign to eradicate by the end of the Decade, from as many countries as possible, one or more diseases that still seriously afflict people in many lands. Developed countries and international organizations will assist the developing countries in their health planning and in the establishment of health institutions.
Developing countries will adopt policies consistent with their agricultural and health programmes in an effort towards meeting their nutritional requirements. These will include development and production of high-protein foods and development and wider use of new forms of edible protein. Financial and technical assistance, including assistance for genetic research, will be extended to them by developed countries and international institutions.
Developing countries will adopt suitable national policies for involving children and youth in the development process and for ensuring that their needs are met in an integrated manner.
Developing countries will take steps to provide improved housing and related community facilities in both urban and rural areas, especially for low-income groups. They will also seek to remedy the ills of unplanned urbanization and to undertake necessary town planning. Particular effort will be made to expand low-cost housing through both public and private programmes and on a self-help basis, including through co-operatives, utilizing as much as possible local raw materials and labour-intensive techniques. Appropriate international assistance will be provided for this purpose.
Governments will intensify national and international efforts to arrest the deterioration of the human environment and to take measures towards its improvement, and to promote activities that will help to maintain the ecological balance on which human survival depends."
A report of the Integration Group A of the "Goals, purposes and indicators development project" of the United Nations University (June 1983) suggests that human development must start at the micro level and questions the premise that the local cannot control the global. The "participation" and "perceptual" gaps between the individual person and global processes, and the concomitant cycle of apathy and myth of incompetence, can be bridged through motivating to learn and participate.
A false image of detachment from the world as a whole can be superseded by demonstrating the nearness of the people involved in "world scale" activities and decisions. Local people could cooperate in participatory learning with people of similar interests in their locality (chambers of commerce, churches, unions, and so on). The need for local experts in global problems would reduce the "brain drain" of such experts to the major centres.
Such an organic growth of communities could be independent of and across national borders, with regional interests having priority over national interests; local people would define their own communities in terms of their own needs and interests. Border areas would be junctions rather than barriers between countries. In this case, national and international policies would stem from rather than be imposed on "grass roots" organizations.
To enable the effective participation of individuals and local units in global affairs which influence their lives, a new set of indicators must be developed. These would offer insight into everyday affairs and not those concerning only an elite set of politicians and planners. Having developed a conceptual basis for indicators at the local level, these concepts could be adopted to improve indicators at the national and international levels, which are seen as still retaining importance.
Related:
Human development