UN Development Research Articles

Third World Cities: Sustainable Urban Development, 1

Both the World Bank and the UN Development Programme have emphasized growing urban poverty as a threat to political stability in the third world. There are several conflicting ideas and processes that currently affect the theoretical and practical roles of urban management in the 1990s. One idea receiving attention in strategy documents is building local capacity or increasing economic productivity by allowing the informal sector to thrive through the removal of constraints. Yet with the exception of the unsystematic recyling of waste materials by individual households or scavengers there is very little that the informal sector can do for the current crisis in land management and public utilities such as water or sewerage. One major role of urban management is to ensure that the private sector particularly industry does not contribute more than it should to urban environmental problems. The private sector can manage certain profitable services but it rarely takes on the more troublesome burdens of service provision and it sometimes charges exorbitantly for those it does. There may be a place for small community-level organizations in the provision of public utilities to urban residents. Where these organizations have been principally involved in protesting the lack of services there are examples of their actually managing them. The management of Third World cities is complicated by conflicting influences including national and international banks and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Under the guidance of the World Bank the current tendency is for the state to play a limited role in basic service provision usually at the level of the central government. A new concept decentralized cooperation between cities holds promise provided that local control emerges and that efforts are not weighted down by bureaucracy.

The human development index: A portrait of the 75 districts in Nepal

A Human Development Index (HDI) is computed for Nepal's 75 districts based on minimum and maximum values. Life expectancy and literacy data are based on the 1991 census. Real per capita Gross Domestic Product is in purchasing power parity (PPP) in US dollars in 1994. Resource access per capita uses data on bank deposits and credits in mid-1991. Results show a range in life expectancy from a low of 37 years in Mugu district to a high of 74 years in Kathmandu district. National literacy averages about 40% of total population. District averages range from 21% in Humla district to 71% in Kathmandu. Resource access ranges from Rupees 147 in Kalilot district to Rupees 47,000 in Kathmandu district. The national average is Rupees 2590 (Rupees 37.2 = 1 US dollar in 1991). Correlations between the 3 HDI indicators show a stronger correlation between life expectancy and literacy. Each indicator appears to represent some unique aspect. District level correlation among the 3 indicators is weaker. The highest HDI ranks are in Kathmandu, followed by Lalitpur, which has a substantially lower rank. The 5th highest rank is in the industrial city of Biratnagar, and the 8th highest rank is in Chitwan. The traditional garments and brassware district of Palpa ranks 17th. Modern Gorkha district ranks 32nd. The Mount Everest district of Solukhumbu ranks 43rd. Kapilbastu, the birth place of Buddha, ranks 56th. Districts north of Kathmandu rank 51st and 54th. Only 5 districts have a rank of over 5. 14 districts have HDI values ranging between 0.4 and 0.5. 30 districts have values between 0.3 and 0.4. 15 districts have values between 0.2 and 0.3. The worst 11 districts have values under 0.2. The UN Development Programme considers a value below 0.5 a low level of human development, which means 70 of Nepal districts. Only Kathmandu has a high level. Lalitpur, Kaski, Bhaktapur, and Morang have a medium level of human development. Correlation of HDI with other development indicators indicates close correspondence.

Concerned about reproductive health? Strengthen the HRP

Based at the World Health Organization in Geneva and co-sponsored by the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) the UN Development Program and the World Bank the Special Program of Research Development and Research Training in Human Reproduction (HRP) is the worlds foremost multilateral program devoted to reproductive health. The HRP was launched in 1972 to build reproductive research capacity in developing countries and to advance contraceptive research and development. Support over the first two decades came largely from Sweden the UNFPA the UK Norway and other governments. Income over recent years however has declined from $23 million in 1990 to a projected $20 million for 1994. Pledged support is also down and fears that estimated income will not be forthcoming have led to sweeping budget cuts. Waning support may reflect donor fatigue but it also stems from debate among donors and lobbyists over the focus of HRP research. Womens health activists argue that the programs current research agenda is too traditional overly focused upon contraceptive research and development and insensitive to health and human rights. These critics instead want the HRP to incorporate feminist concerns over sexual health and guard against coercive or abusive contraceptive delivery in family planning programs. Research into contraceptive vaccines and other long-acting methods should be scaled back in favor of accelerated research on barrier methods and microbicides. While some of these recommendations should be welcomed by the research community the suggestion that HRP make such radical changes risks trivializing the scientific demands of addressing sexual health and the specialized research capacities of the existing program. It would be a serious mistake to withdraw support for continuing research on long-acting methods to fund new initiatives and objectives. Barrier methods and microbicides may be needed but so are long-acting contraceptive methods and the fruits of other ongoing HRP research. Current HRP research must therefore continue and additional objectives be incorporated only pending the pledge and receipt of necessary supplementary funding. Constructive evolution of HRP may require systematic review and the targeting of future growth the outmoded names of some HRP task forces need to be updated and the participation and leadership of women scientists should be increased at HRP. Moreover stronger scientific literacy and better understanding of the research and development process among skeptics would make criticism more constructive.

Measuring environmentally sustainable development.

National accounts are a highly imperfect measure of a nations well-being. Aggregate income figures do not account for inequality and poverty human development achievements environmental damage or the social political and spiritual aspects of welfare. This article considers the issues of how to develop better measures. It is much easier to measure the transactions in the market place. Aggregation of pollution effects is complicated by the high number of toxic pollutants (over 300). Measures are being explored that would reflect dose-response relationships such that an environmental impact would reflect the number of people at risk and the health impact in the present and in the future. Single measures should not conceal more than what is revealed. The question remains as to whether adding together indices of education health nutrition income and civil liberties means anything to policy makers or is potentially misleading. The Human Development Index of the UN Development Program suffers from criticisms of its methods and findings. It is however much more difficult to derive aggregate indices such as adjusting the national accounts to reflect broader development concerns. Progress is being made in adjusting national accounts to incorporate environmental impacts. Net capital accumulation must account for natural and human capital as well as human-made capital stock. Norway uses resource accounting that estimates physical stocks in key sectors (oil minerals fish forestry and hydropower). The Netherlands measures the loss of environmental functions. France is experimenting with patrimony accounting of economic social and ecological features. The 1993 UN Integrated Environmental and Economic Accounting Handbook procedures were applied to accounts in Mexico and New Guinea and found to be successful. However further measurement development is still needed.

Editorial

Male perpetration of intimate partner violence (IPV) is under-researched. In this Article, we present data for the prevalence of, and factors associated with, male perpetration of IPV from the UN Multi-country Cross-sectional Study on Men and Violence in Asia and the Pacific. We aimed to estimate the prevalence of perpetration of partner violence, identify factors associated with perpetration of different forms of violence, and inform prevention strategies.We undertook standardised population-based household surveys with a multistage representative sample of men aged 18–49 years in nine sites in Bangladesh, China, Cambodia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Papua New Guinea between January, 2011, and December, 2012. We built multinomial regression models of factors associated with lifetime violence perpetration: physical IPV, sexual IPV, both physical and sexual IPV, multiple emotional or economic IPV versus none, and calculated population-attributable fractions. In the analysis, we considered factors related to social characteristics, gender attitudes and relationship practices, victimisation history, psychological factors, substance misuse, and participation in violence outside the home.10 178 men completed interviews in our study (between 815 and 1812 per site). The response rate was higher than 82·5% in all sites except for urban Bangladesh (73·2%) and Sri Lanka (58·7%). The prevalence of physical or sexual IPV perpetration, or both, varied by site, between 25·4% (190/746; rural Indonesia) and 80·0% (572/714; Bougainville, Papua New Guinea). When multiple emotional or economic abuse was included, the prevalence of IPV perpetration ranged from 39·3% (409/1040; Sri Lanka) to 87·3% (623/714; Bougainville, Papua New Guinea). Factors associated with IPV perpetration varied by country and type of violence. On the basis of population-attributable fractions, we show factors related to gender and relationship practices to be most important, followed by experiences of childhood trauma, alcohol misuse and depression, low education, poverty, and involvement in gangs and fights with weapons.Perpetration of IPV by men is highly prevalent in the general population in the sites studied. Prevention of IPV is crucial, and interventions should address gender socialisation and power relations, abuse in childhood, mental health issues, and poverty. Interventions should be tailored to respond to the specific patterns of violence in various contexts. Physical and sexual partner violence might need to be addressed in different ways.Partners for Prevention—a UN Development Programme, UN Population Fund, UN Women, and UN Volunteers regional joint programme for gender-based violence prevention in Asia and the Pacific; UN Population Fund Bangladesh and China; UN Women Cambodia and Indonesia; UN Development Programme in Papua New Guinea and Pacific Centre; and the Governments of Australia, the UK, Norway, and Sweden.

Future role of oil and natural gas in OPEC and non-OPEC regions up to and beyond the year 2000

OPEC ReviewVolume 16, Issue 3 p. 253-283 Future role of oil and natural gas in OPEC and non-OPEC regions up to and beyond the year 2000 Dr Ibrahim A.H. Ismail, Dr Ibrahim A.H. Ismail The author is Petroleum Geologist in the Energy Studies Department, OPEC Secretariat, Vienna, Austria. He expresses his appreciation to SA. Al-Fathifor his valuable comments, and to A. Barnettfor preparing the graphs and typing the paper. The paper was presented at the Interregional Symposium on Gas Development and Market Prospects by the Year 2000 and Beyond, held in Damascus, Syrian Arab Republic, on 20-26 June 1992. The Symposium was organized by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia and the Energy Division of the UN Economic Commission for Europe, in cooperation with the Syrian Ministry of Petroleum and the UN Development Programme.Search for more papers by this author Dr Ibrahim A.H. Ismail, Dr Ibrahim A.H. Ismail The author is Petroleum Geologist in the Energy Studies Department, OPEC Secretariat, Vienna, Austria. He expresses his appreciation to SA. Al-Fathifor his valuable comments, and to A. Barnettfor preparing the graphs and typing the paper. The paper was presented at the Interregional Symposium on Gas Development and Market Prospects by the Year 2000 and Beyond, held in Damascus, Syrian Arab Republic, on 20-26 June 1992. The Symposium was organized by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia and the Energy Division of the UN Economic Commission for Europe, in cooperation with the Syrian Ministry of Petroleum and the UN Development Programme.Search for more papers by this author First published: September 1992 https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0076.1992.tb00432.xCitations: 2AboutPDF ToolsRequest permissionExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditWechat Citing Literature Volume16, Issue3September 1992Pages 253-283 RelatedInformation

The United Nations development system and environmental management

Integration of environment and development tasks within the United Nations has not occurred. Lacking the capacity for coordination, the UN development system does not handle complex, cross-cutting issues such as the environment well. Changes in the relationship of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) with its executing agencies make a review of its environmental activities particularly urgent. As UNDP assumes greater direct responsibility for its project portfolio it must develop the technical skills to ensure that the environmental imperative is respected. UNDP's current approach to these issues does not suffice to meet the needs of environmental management and the move to more sustainable patterns of development.

The Bertrand critique of the role of the United Nations in the economic and social fields

In a 1988 report, Maurice Bertrand concluded that “improvement of the UN's efficiency in the economic and social fields is a more likely prossect than improvement in the field of peace and security” and suggested that current failures are due to the UN's institutional weaknesses. While Bertrand is correct on one level, the problem goes deeper than institutional failures. The UN Development Decades reflected an international political consensus on the need for international economic cooperation. That consensus is dissipating. UN effectiveness in economic and social fields requires an international political commitment to act together for the common good.

Niger: SAFE MOTHERHOOD

The issue of maternal mortality was discussed at a conference in Niamey for francophone African countries. The conference was organized by the World Bank in cooperation with UNICEF WHO UNFPA the UN Development Programme and the African Development Bank. It marked an important milestone in raising of social and political awareness as did the Conference of anglophone African countries in Nairobi in 1987. About 500000 women die each year in childbirth. The main cause of maternal mortality in developing countries is lack of medical care at the place of delivery. Maternal mortality ranges from 300-1500/100000 in the third world compared to 5-15/100000 in the industrialized nations. In comparison infant mortality is only 10 times higher. The causes are hemorrhage obstructed labor and hypertension the same as in developed countries. These complications tend to occur in very young women and in grand multiparas. Technical solutions such as manual placental removal forceps cesarean section anesthesia and blood transfusion can be made available or accessible at modest cost. Maternal morbidity related to mechanical difficulties in delivery will also be eased. It is time to recognize the right of women everywhere not to die in childbirth.

Developing Rights: The UN Declaration on the Right to Development

On 4 December 1986, the United Nations General Assembly adopted Resolution 41/128 which contained the Declaration on the Right to Development. The Declaration was a further attempt by the United Nations to develop a normative regime to deal with one of the most pressing issues of our day – underdevelopment. It was a logical culmination of a movement that started with the Charter of the United Nations and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and continued through the period of the anti-colonial struggle. Once the right to self-determination was no longer challengeable as a political entitlement, attention shifted to its socio-economic corollary. In 1969, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on Social Progress and Development. The different UN Development Decades were also meant to address the problems of underdevelopment and the ever-increasing gulf between developed and developing countries. In 1974, a major attempt was launched by the UN General Assembly to change certain basic aspects of international law in the hope that this would lead to a new international economic order. Those efforts are yet to be substantially rewarded.

Measures to facilitate the reintegration of returning migrant workers: international experiences.

Bilateral and multilateral measures implemented to assist migrants who return to their country of origin have been designed to respond to a number of different but specific situations. 2 bilateral agreements are briefly described: 1) an agreement between the Federal Republic of Germany and the Republic of Turkey signed in the early 1970s, and 2) an agreement between France and Algeria signed in 1980. 3 different types of multilateral activities are described: 1) the operation of the so-called Return of Talent program by the Intergovernmental Committee for Migration, 2) the Transfer of KNow-how Through Expatriate Nationals program of the UN Development Programme, and 3) the elaboration of a model machinery on return migration by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. While the 1st 2 activities are operational programs, by which annually between 1000-2000 professionals are assisted in their permanent return to or temporary sojourn in their developing countries of origin, with the financial support of both the developed and the developing countries concerned, the 3rd initiative is a conceptual effort aimed at assisting governments to implement policy measures designed to make return migration commensurate with national development goals. 3 recent proposals include 1) the proposal for an international labor compensatory facility, 2) an international fund for vocational training, and 3) an international fund for manpower resources. A common factor shared by all these programs is that they have all involved on 1 side industrial receiving countries which feel themselves obliged to observe a number of principles guaranteed by law and which govern employment conditions and working relations. The reintegration measures implemented or proposed in cooperation with them have been adopted in full consideration of the prevailing standards of these countries, as different as they may be from 1 country to another. A common consideration has been that the returning migrant should reintegrate in his country of origin as far as possible in conditions allowing the returnee to attain self-sufficiency and social security coverage. However, this underlying context does not necessarily prevail in all world regions where different forms of labor migration take place. Therefore the measures experienced in the relationship of specific countries cannot be easily copied for implementation in other countries. Multilateral measures benefited a rather limited number of individuals only, in many instances skilled and highly skilled migrants.

Budgetmaking in the United Nations Development Program: An Analysis of the Expenditures for Technical Assistance

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP), charged with promoting development projects in the second UN Development Decade, faced a serious financial crisis during the first half of the 1970s. In this paper I investigate the UNDP's budgetmaking to determine the sources of its financial crisis. Unlike municipal, state or national governments, this analysis finds that the UNDP, which is financed by voluntary contributions from member states, is less likely to use an incremental method of budgetmaking. The financial conditions strongly constrain the budgetmaking of the UNDP. However, the UNDP Secretariat's estimates of available resources for technical assistance have been optimistic, allowing the agency rapidly to expand its activities in response to the demand of developing countries, but also leading to the UNDP's serious financial crisis.

United Nations—projects from Benin to Bali

Technical assistance for tourism in developing countries comes under the auspices of the UN Development Programme. Of the about 4700 projects that the Programme runs tourism specifically accounts for 137 although there are also spin-offs from other funded projects such as communications and transport. Tourism is an especially important part of the UNDP's efforts in developing countries as Daphne Miller, of the UNDP Division of Information, reports.

A Banner of Hope? North-South Negotiations and the New International Development Strategy for the Eighties

Holm, H.-H. A Banner of Hope? North-South Negotiations and the New International Development Strategy for the Eighties. Cooperation and Conflict, XVI, 1981, 197-215. In this article the development strategy for the Third United Nations Development Decade is analysed through a comparison with the previous UN development strategies and by looking at the negotiations preceding the adoption in the General Assembly. It is shown that the development strategy is without realistic goals and has no means for ensuring that the development is guided in the direction wanted. Through discussion of the content of the new development strategy, the North-South debate is treated on the basis of four different models: the union-bargaining model, the ideological model, the power model and the economic structure model. The co-existence of confrontation and compromise, posi tive-sum game and negative-sum game is explained by combining factors from these four models, and it is concluded that there is a great need for concrete analysis of the political economy of international negotiations.

UN development strategy for the eighties

The recently held 11th Special Session of the UN General Assembly reached agreement on an international strategy for the Third Development Decade which is to be formally passed by the current 35th General Assembly. In the discussion it became obvious that the developing countries’ interest still focusses on a New International Economic Order. There are however grave doubts about the possibility of reaching, by institutional reforms, a real solution for the development problems to be faced in this decade.

International cooperation in water resources

Advancements in hydrology proceeded slowly until the late 1800's when new ventures created a surge of interest and accomplishment. Progress waned again until the middle 20th century when an International Hydrological Decade was conceived, eventually receiving wide multinational support from governmental agencies and nongovernmental institutions. Organized by UNESCO, the Decade program was launched January 1, 1965. Participation included 107 nations, six United Nations agencies, and more than a dozen international scientific organizations. The initial program emphasized scientific research, and international cooperation; the second half of the Decade, emphasized technical assistance and technology transfer, largerly through education, training and demonstration. The success of the Decade led to the establishment of the International Hydrological Program, again under the aegis of UNESCO, to continue the work of the Decade indefinitely. The five major program activities, now involving about 90 countries and several international organizations, include: the scientific program, the promotion of education and training, the enhancement of information exchange, support of technical assistance, and the enlargement of regional cooperation. A significant amount of activity related to hydrological data networks and forecasting is carried on in an Operational Hydrology Programme by the WMO, chiefly through its Commission for Hydrology. Other international governmental organizations with a strong interest in water include the UN, the UN Development Programme, the FAO, the WHO, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN Environment Programme, the International Standardization Organization, and developmental institutions such as the World Bank. The specialized interests of researchers outside of the governmental structure, are met through association in various scientific and technical organizations which are world wide in scope and membership. Notwithstanding a sometimes bewildering variety of organizations, there certainly exists, for any nation, group, or individual, a demonstrated mechanism for almost any conceivable form of international cooperation in hydrology and water resources.

Public and Private Savings of Selected Developing Countries in the First UN Development Decade

The developed countries contain about one-third of the world population and they produce more than 80 percent of Gross World Product (GWP). The remaining two-thirds of the population of our Globe who lives in Asia, Latin America and most of Africa produces less than 20 percent of the GWP. A small segment of the population of these countries is wealthy but the over¬whelming majority subsists on substandard incomes and is characterised by mass illiteracy, mal-nutrition, bad housing and lack of medical care. Because of these characteristics they have low productivity, which yields low level of income; low incomes, in turn, imply a small capacity to save resulting in an economic situation where there is barely a possibility to moblize resources for development. The question has often been raised: 'Is there way out for the developing countries' ? 1960s were declared as the First UN Development Decade and it was hoped that during these years the pre-conditions for a successful development would be established in various developing countries. The present study analyses data on public revenue, public expenditure, public savings and private savings for 12 selected developing countries pertaining to the years of the First U.N. Development Decade. The general conclusion that emerges from the study clearly suggests that with appropriate economic policies resources for development can be mobilized in the developing countries.

The United Nations Development System and Colombia

The purpose of this essay is to show how the United Nations system including the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and such specialized agencies as the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), UNESCO, and the International Labour Organization (ILO), etc. has been incorporated into the international network of aid agencies and to discuss some of the consequences for host countries. Specifically the UN development system has been coopted into providing what is known as preinvestment which paves the way for investors of all kinds, generally foreign investors. Preinvestment is a kind of technical which consists of sending ''experts (generally from the specialized agencies) and equipment to a host country and financing fellowship trainees from the country. Preinvestment projects were designed especially to identify and prepare projects for investors, particularly the World Bank and other international financial institutions. In this way the UNDP joins the other agencies in financing the infrastructure necessary for further productive investment, public and private, local and foreign. I show how this occurs in Colombia by describing the country programing exercise of 1971. Country programing is the process by which the resident representative of UNDP and the host government agree upon a list of technical projects that UNDP will finance over a five-year period. Colombia provides an excellent case study. A prime example of an open or outward-looking economy, Colombia has been selected by many international aid agencies as a testing ground for their various programs. In 1948-1949 it was the first nation to be surveyed by an economic mission of the World Bank. In the 1960s it was one of the first four nations to have a consultative group organized by the World Bank. In 1969-1970 it was chosen to be a test case for comprehensive preinvestment planning by the Bank. In 1969 the ILO selected Colombia as the first nation to study under its World Employment Program (International Labour Organization, 1970). It hoped to convince the Colombian government to try ILO strategies for coping with employment problems. In 1971 Colombia became one of the original eighteen nations to undertake country programing with the UNDP. Colombia was also one of the original Latin American nations to receive assistance from the Alliance for Progress. According to the study prepared

Women and War

“ Fearful for their safety and unnerved by last weekend's attack on a high-ranking female official, Iraqi women activists are retreating from the public sphere and choosing to keep their work low-profile …They do not want to be featured because they have seen what has happened to Aqila Hashimi." This was how Noeleen Heyzer, executive director of the UN Development Fund for Women, described how Iraqi women felt after the murder of Aqila Hashemi, a member of the interim governing council. Unidentified armed men had shot at Hashemi in September, while she was standing in front of her house in Baghdad, and she had died a few days later from her wounds. Hashemi’s murder came as a shock to Iraqi women, and heightened their feeling that they were direct targets in this war.

Capital requirements of developing countries

In conclusion it can be said that the UNCTAD study represents an improvement over the former UN estimates in that it is based on individual country studies, employs a more refined methodology and an improved statistical basis as well as more realistic assumptions. The target rates of growth of GDP of the developing countries are ambitious. Even the low assumption of 5.2 per cent per annum is higher than their recent growth performance and exceeds the UN Development Decade target. The universal treatment of the trade gap as the dominant constraint on growth minimises the role of the mobilisation of domestic resources—as expressed by the savings performance—in economic development. One basic weakness, admitted in the study, is the fact that it is based on past standards of performance. Another shortcoming is the assumption of the stability over time of the crucial parameters used in the projection. The study also fails to explore alternatives: i.e., the effect on the results of changes in the assumptions and vice versa. The underlying country studies, though based on a similar methodology, differ greatly in depth and quality which effects the reliability of the aggregate figures accordingly. The assumptions about the various means of closing the gap are highly arbitrary and lead to some incongruous results.