GLOBALISATION – HAND OUT

 

The Era of Globalisation

 

Under the new regime of global capitalism, we have entered an era of neo-colonialism and globalisation legitimized by the international financial institutions like the World Bank, IMF and the WTO. A market driven ideology accompanies the changing roles for corporations, both multinational and national. The world has become unipolar. Capitalism has emerged apparently as the only answer to the economic ills of the world. Some ideologues see this trend as the end of history’, 'end of ideology’ and the end of hope’.

 

Globalisation is not new, the colonisation of the entire world by European powers was the first stage of globalisation.   The second stage began after the ex-colonies gained political independence. The universalisation of production and consumption patterns of western industrialised countries across the world became as “development”. The Western model is based on 20% of the world population using the 80% of the world’s resources; the globalisation of this pattern needs five more planets and not one.  The third phase of globalisation is by the trade treaties like GATT and establishment of the World Trade Organisation.

 

Quoted from The Book Review of ‘Marketing in the New Era’ in The Hindu, ‘The term ‘globalisation’ was first used by Theodore Levitt in 1983 in an article he wrote in Harvard Business Review. He used it in a narrow sense, as a synonym for standardising a brand for international markets. Today the word is understood in marketing parlance in a much broader sense; it implies complete and integrated participation in world markets; making goods and services competitive, whether that competition takes place inside the country or abroad.  An extract from the World Bank report sums up the story aptly, “In the textile industry, yarn supplied from Java (Indonesia) is converted to cloth in Rajasthan (India), tailored in Bangkok (Thailand according to fashions designed in Taipei (Taiwan) and eventually sold in Dusseldorf (Germany).’

 

In the five decades since the end of World War II, the world has witnessed an impressive record of economic growth in the industrialized countries, transforming those societies into modem one with high standards of living. The sale of 10 largest companies in the world was equal to that of combined GNP of world’s 100 smallest countries.  This process of economic growth has created benefits of prosperity and progress in the west and bypassed the southern hemisphere leaving in a condition of poverty and underdevelopment. Such a pattern of development is clearly not sustainable.

 

One World, One Village: If the world were to have 1000 people: 564 people will be Asians, 86 - Africans, 80 - South Americans, 210 - Europeans and 60 - North Americans, in other words 730 of them would belong to the South and 270 from the North. There would be, 300 Christians, 174 Muslims, 128 Hindus, 55 Buddhists, 47 Animists and 296 of them will be without any religion or atheists.

 

Out of every 1000, 500 go hungry, 600 live in shanty slums.

 

The present global scenario reveals that 1.5 billion people live in abject poverty.

• One and a half billion people are deprived of primary health care.

• A billion adults, i.e. 35% are illiterates, out of which  2/3^rd are  women

• Every day 37000 children die from mal-nutrition.

• One billion people live in areas that are in various stages of desertification.

Keeping this reality in mind, one wonders, the silence and the insensitivity to these grave problems by elected leaders, the Governments who boasts of economic growth competing the rich nations.

 

The failure of the so-called socialist experimentation has added great legitimacy to the ideological shift to global capitalism, which permeates global injustice. We seem to be facing a world without alternatives. Even, if were to pursue an alternative sustainable development, it will be difficult to implement in the developing countries because of the negative impact of sweeping globalisation on the growing population.

 

Beginning of the 20th Century, the global population was about 1.6 billion, today it is 6.2 billion, out of which Asia accommodates nearly 3.85 Billions (62%) and India and China alone houses nearly 2 Billions of them. In 1800, only 5% of the world populations were urban dwellers and now it is more than 45%.

 

The greatest challenge today, is however, the Mammon evil - the Globalisation, Structural Adjustment Programme, Liberalisation and the New Economic Policy -, which is the root cause of all evils that affects humanity, society and the fragile eco-system.  Growth driven economic model accompanied by greed, selfishness and unsustainable life-styles supported by exploitation of natural resources and the people is called today “the development”.

 

Control of the North over South

 

The world today is virtually governed by the G-7 counties (USA, UK, Japan, Canada, France, Germany and Italy). The IMF, World Bank, GATT and the World Trade Organisation are neatly co-opted into managing the world resources.

 

In 1982, the world’s top 200 corporations had combined sales worth US$3,046 billion. This was equivalent to one-third the value of the World’s Gross Domestic Product. A few multinational banks also control the world’s financial System. The top 100 commercial banks in 1982 had joint assets worth US$4,500 billion, equivalent to half the world’s Gross Domestic Product. And the giant Japanese and American banks control 40% of these assets. In the area of primary commodities, three companies alone dominate 70% - 75% of the banana trade; six companies account for over 70% of the cocoa trade; and six companies control 85% - 90% of the trade in leaf tobacco. Major corporations established in the developing country often pre-empts large areas of productive agricultural land, water and other natural resources in the process denying the right to livelihood of millions of people.

 

Unscrupulous ways of Resource Appropriation from South to North - Who will Challenge?

 

The major challenge is to find means and ways to stop the resource flow from the South to North. Due to global unequal economic structures, there is a massive outflow of financial and economic resources from the South to the North. A majority of Southern countries are still exporters of mainly raw materials and commodities to the North.  The structure of the world economy seriously impedes the possibility for many Southern countries to implement programs towards sustainable development.

 

Resource flow through Debt Crisis

 

The unbalanced structure of the economy, due to lack of capital and skills in processing these primary products and the creation of the bulk of value added is accomplished outside the country leading to structural deficit in the balance of payment. Most developing countries also import more than they export. Many developing countries food also imported. The resulting balance of payment deficit is covered by external debt. This raises the dependency of the South’s economics on the North.

 

The external debt crisis, which originated in the 1970s, has been a major source of financial drain on the South. The drain on resources from the South due to debt servicing has been enormous. According to U.N. Secretariat data, interest payments of capital-importing developing countries were $ 46 billion in 1980 and $ 60-70 billion annually from 1981 to 1992 (United Nations, 1991, p-237; United Nations, 1993, p.253). Total interest payments during the period 1980 - 1992 were $771.3 billion paid out by the Southern countries on their external debt. From OECD debt tables it can be calculated that between 1982 and 1990 the developing countries have remitted to the North in debt service alone $1,345 billion (interest and principal), which is $418 billion more than the total resource flow.

 

Sub-Saharan Africa’s debt increased by 113% (The Debt Boomerang: How Third Third World Debt Harms Us All, Susan George). Debt in the Philippines has increased from $561 million in 1972 to $ 31 billion in June 1993.  Jamaica’s debt of $780 million in 1977 to $3.9 billion in 1991. Brazilian foreign debt rose from $64 billion in 1980 to $115 billion in 1988. Most often these external debts borrowed by the development countries is used to keep the corrupt Governments in power who are the collaborators continuing to siphon of the resources and ultimately the common people have to face the brunt of external debts.

 

Of the $70 billion in foreign debt held by Indonesia’s private sector, a significant percentage is thought to be owned by companies or controlled by First Family members of Suharto and his cronies. More than 2 million workers were laid off in the last four months of 1997.  It is estimated that out of every 100 Dollars lent by the World Bank to Indonesia, 30 Dollars disappear somewhere inside the Government.

 

Flow of Human Capital- The Brain drain

 

Another form of resource transfer form South to North is the migration of highly skilled manpower contributing “intellectual technology” to the North. Through the brain drain, the South loses economic resources in two ways. First, a substantial amount of money  (usually public money) had been expended to educate and train professional or skilled personnel in the expectation that they would in turn contribute their skills towards the nation’s development; when the personnel migrate, the funds expended on their training are thus lost to the country. Secondly, the country also suffers a cost in terms of the loss of future economic benefits that could have arisen from the application of skills of the migrating personnel.  The brain drain thus represents a flow of economic capital from South to North. In 1970, there were 11,236 skilled immigrants entering the US alone, representing a brain drain or reverse transfer of technology amounting to $ 3.7 billion in that year alone. UNCTAD study estimates that the industrial countries gained about $51 billion of ’human capital” from 1961 to 1972 as a result of migration of professionals from the Third World. (Khor Kok Peng, 1983, p.29).

 

Biodiversity & Patents

 

The bio diversity convention was aimed at providing a framework for global exchange and use of genetic resources. The convention clearly recognize national sovereign rights to bio diversity and its utilization. In addition, the convention recognize the role of local communities, farmers and Adivasis in the conservation of knowledge about biological wealth.

 

The Asia - Pacific area is proved to be the richest region of bio diversity in the world. US based scientific body has a massive project ($20 million) for studying the genetic diversity of 465 communities of indigenous people of which some 75 groups are on the verge of disappearance.

 

Ecologists have warned against the unfathomable extinction of species, pollution due to toxic chemicals, nuclear and ionizing radiation, global warming and whole scale distribution of the eco sphere that the 21^st century is ravaged by.

 

Patenting in Developing Countries:

 

From the United States Patent and Trademark Office source, it was understood that between 1978-97 some thirty patents have been registered on tamarind (18 between 1978-89 and 12 between 1990-97). More than 80% of the patents in developing countries are owned by foreigners, mainly transnational companies (Third World Development or Crisis). 70% out of2050 patents filed in India in 1995 were by foreigners. If we change our patent laws and allow MNCs to usurp our seed stocks, it will erode people’s access to resources and increase dependence, leading to pauperization and dis-empowerment in a very fundamental way.

 

Unfair exchange of Genetic Resources:

 

According to the Rural Advancement Fund International, US owe the South $302 million for royalty for farmers’ seeds and $ 5.1 billion for pharmaceutical. In other words in just these two biological industries the US owes $ 2.7 billion to the South. Even the US Department of Agriculture Report states that germ plasm import has contributed $ 70 billion to the US economy.

 

These genetic resources have provided genes of enormous commercial importance to agriculturists in the North. Wild plant varieties contributed $ 340 million per year between 1976 and 1990 to the US farm economy with wild germ plasm contributing $66 billion that is more than the total international debt of Mexico and the Philippines combined.

 

The losses to the South due to this unequal and asymmetric biological exchange are illustrated by the following:

 

·     Of the 127 base collections of genetic resources. 81 are in the industrial North and 17 in the national collection of developing countries in the South.

 

·     The value of the South’s contribution to the US wheat farmers in any year is not less than $ 500 million; It is $120 million for rice, and $ 60 million for beans. In total, American farmers receive for these three crops alone the value of $ 680 million from the South.

 

·     A Turkish barley land race resistant to barley yellow dwarf virus was donated free saving US farmers $ 150 million a year.

 

·     The Indian selection that provided American sorghums with resistance to green bug has resulted in $12 million in yearly benefits to American agriculture (FACTS Against Myths).

 

These illustrations merely hint at the losses being suffered by the South in an unfair exchange of genetic resources. If royalty payment is unjustly added to this uncompensated flow the debt burden of the South will increase tenfold. In a global economy of $ 25 trillion, this is a scandal - reflecting shameful inequalities and inexcusable failures of national and international policy (UNDP Human Development Report 1997).

 

Impact of Globalisation on the Political structures and Governments

 

During the pre-colonial period, these already existed problems with regard to the integration of minority or dominated ethnic communities under the governance of a ruling group. Nation states as we now know then did not exist. Various kingdoms flourished and, when they acquired enough wealth and military power, brought other ethnic peoples or less powerful or declining kingdoms under their power. In either case, the paying of tribute and other subservient practices were imposed, which were sources of internal tension often contributing to political instability and sparking off attempts at separation.

 

Separatism assumed larger and more severe proportions during the colonial period or as a result of attempts by Western colonizers to integrate subjugated economics into the international market. An important prerequisite for this integration was the establishment of a Central Government directly or indirectly controlled by the colonial power. Indigenous leaders who could politically facilitate the exploitation of natural resources and human labor were co-opted and integrated into the colonial bureaucracy.

 

Military officials or political leaders not elected democratically remained in power by the support of global corporations. Ethnic groups continue seek to secede or gain autonomy from the control, of a given state.  More often than not, the use of force is utilized, i.e. acts of revolutionary violence, to express rejection of the political and social System and the determination to bring about progressive changes by overthrowing the system. Arise in armed separatist movements are seen in Burma, Indonesia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand and countries ranging from Zaire, Kenya, Sudan, Peru and Brazil. In recent times, new democracy movements and people’s struggles in the Philippines, Pakistan, Bangladesh and some Latin American countries have had dramatic responses to repressive regimes and military dictatorships.

 

The global political economy has changed dramatically in the last half century. At the end of Second World War the international arena was dominated by a handful of nation states in Europe and North America, particularly the United States. Vast stretches of what we have since come to call the Third World were still under colonial rule. Today, direct political colonialism hardly exists, although many analysts of international economic and political relations regard developing countries as subject to neo-colonial rule through indirect means, both political and economic. What is perhaps more striking, especially in more recent decades, has been the emergence of giant global corporations with gross incomes greater than the gross domestic products of most nation states controlling the political structure and the economies in the South.

 

The tenets of market liberalism claim that the free market is the essential foundation of political democracy - guarantor of the rights of people against the abuse of state power. Political democracy vests rights in the living person, one person, one vote. By contrast, the market recognises only money, not people - one dollar, one vote. It gives no voice to the penniless, and when not balanced by constraining political forces can become an instrument of oppression by which the wealthy monopolise the society’s resources, leaving the less fortunate without land, jobs, technology or other means of livelihood.

 

As globalisation allows increasing transfer of the resources from the public domain, either under the control of communities or of the state, discontent and dissent necessarily increase, leading to law and order problems.

 

Globalisation has de-linked the relationship between the community and the state and strengthened the freedom of corporations further eroding the powers and freedoms of the people.  In the process, the State itself is undergoing a major transformation, becoming more one-sided in representing corporate interest and falling to represent citizen and community interest. State protectionism, which had undermined community protectionism, is now itself being undermined by corporate protectionism. This undermining is the heart of the globalisation process. The power is vested in the hands of corporations; It does not give power downwards into the hands of communities but moves upwards into the boardrooms of corporations. Globalisation has caused massive environmental damage, and the competition for resources between states, capital and people resulting in conflicts and territorial disputes left with ecological and political refugees.

 

Militarisation as an instrument to safeguard the political structures conducive to the present growth centred development

 

Most Often, the Southern Governments to keep them in power against all struggles, agitations, movements and sessionism have indulged in spending the money in defence and arms purchase.  This allowed an ever-growing trade in arms and perpetuating undemocratic institutions and regimes. The interests of the military and the aims trade are increasingly becoming powerful and profitable. Together these processes - globalisation and continued militarisation - intensify human rights violations, undermine the values of pluralism and equity, and create a climate of instability by which traditional and existing security Systems have proved incapable of addressing.

 

The South unbelievably buys 75% of the arms traded each year. India stood number one, among developing countries in the purchase of arms and weapons during 1996. In many countries, in Africa and South Asia, military spending is two or three times the total spending on education and health (from Common Responsibility in the 1990s, the Stockholm Initiative).  According to the South Commission (in its report The Challenge to the South), more than twenty million people have been killed in wars fought in the third world between 1945 and 2000 and left behind millions as war refugees. Many of the conflicts are between states and their citizens, for example, because of austerity measures taken in relation to the foreign debt crisis.

 

In Situations of conflict the military expenditure bills, the loss of lives and skills, the direct damage to property and productive facilities, have devastating effects on the economics. For example the landmines in the South is a reality of war, many thousands of innocent people were killed or maimed.  World wide 26000 people loose their lives per year (72 people a day). 100 million mines were sown in the world today. A land mine can cost USD 3.00 to produce but takes more than USD 1000/- to clear. Still landmines remain in the soil to kill and maim innocent women, men and children particularly the poor. Often the land less and the poor are the victims. It is a shame on humanity.

 

Current military activities employ 50 million people to meet demand for military goods and services, occupying about 500,000 square miles of land, and account for 40% of the world’s research and development employing 500,000 scientists. On the other hand, nearly 40% of the world’s population have no adequate medical services, nearly 750 million are severely under nourished, about 3,000 million lack access to safe water, and nearly 750,000 die every month from water-born diseases in the Third World. The world spends an annual $ 750 billion a year on military activities - roughly 6% of the global GNP. A single nuclear submarine costs as much money as the annual education budgets of 23 developing nations with 160 million school-age children. So far, Five Nuclear weapon States have conducted 2044 nuclear tests amounting several trillion dollars.

 

Impact of Globalisation on the Economy

 

The developing world has more than 80% of the Global population but consume 15% of Global energy, 17% of the world’s Gross National Product, 6% of world’s health expenditure, 30% of the world’s food, 18% of world export earnings, 8% of world industry and 5% of world science and technology. On the contrary between 1960 and 2000, the countries with the richest 20% of the world population increased their share of global wealth from 70% to 93%. The countries with the poorest 20% of the world population saw their share falling from 2.3% to 1.4%. In 1960, the top 20% received 30 times more than that of the bottom 20%, but by 1999, they were receiving 60 times more. In 1999, the richest fifth of the world received 150 times more income then the poorest fifth.

 

On the energy sector, oil, gas and coal accounts for 90% of the world’s energy and the world population bum about 70% of its fossil fuel. US alone consume 25% of world’s commercial energy. If energy consumption were to remain constant at current levels - proved reserves would supply world petroleum needs for another 40 years, natural gas for 60 years, coal well over by 300 years. Vehicles account for half the world’s use of oil. Industrial countries with less than a quarter of the world’s population bum about 70% of its fossil fuel. The North with about one fifth of the world’s population consumes 80-85% of the world’s energy. 75% of its metals, 85% of its wood and 70% if its food.  On the use of Minerals, between 1971 and 1975 the developing countries used only about 7% of the world’s aluminium production, 9% of the copper and 12 of the iron ore.

 

The world has been shaped by the G - 7 countries. It is a world where the top 20% of the world’s population is earning 150 times more than the income of the bottom 20%. It is a world where control over natural resources, industrial power, science and technology, information, military, banks and finance, rests overwhelmingly with this dominant minority. It is a world in which the 15 largest global corporations have gross incomes greater than the gross domestic products of over 120 countries. Further, this control is being constantly sustained by corruption, repression, and a series of military interventions by the North in the South.

 

From the figures that Chandra Muzaffar gives us - 95% of scientific knowledge, 80% of industrial processes, and 85% of global trade is controlled by the North - it is clear we are reaching now a really problematic situation. In fact, that remaining 10% and 5% - whatever little remains with us -is something the North is trying to grab. And it is being eyed through GATT.

 

Constraints on the local Economics

 

The result of increasing domination of market forces in the food sector and reduced public policy intervention for food security, food prices increased by 63% between 1989-90 and 1993-94, leading to a decline in per capita food consumption. Liberalisation of agricultural exports have also led to the exports of cotton and yam. Export of cotton has led to a doubling and tripling of the cost of yarn and the creation of massive unemployment in the decentralised handloom weaving sector. The handloom sector employs 9 million workers, largely in home-based production. The main reason for the destitution of the weavers was that between 1991 and 1994 the prices of yarn had more than doubled from Rs. 226.30 to Rs. 415 per bundle of 40’s count (New Wave, September 15,1996).

 

Due to the elimination of price controls and a series of devaluations, the cost of living in Jamaica increased 1,888% between 1977 and 1991, outstripping teachers pay hikes, for instance by two and a halftimes. In Brazil, which always had one of the most skewed income distributions in the world, the poorest half of the population saw its share of national income fall further during the 1980’s during SAPs from 14.5% to 11.2%.  At the same time in Brazil, the financial sector, primarily through speculation facilitated by SAPs had its share of Gross Domestic Product more than double from 9% to 20%. A similar widening of the income gap took place in Jamaica and Indonesia. In Brazil, annual inflation increased from 105% in 1981 to 2938% in 1990.  Under the first year of the SAP in India, prices of food grains went up 30%, fuel and power rose 12.8% and manufactured goods increased in price an average of 11%. Women in the slums of Bombay were spending 60% more on food than they had the previous year.

 

Declining Economics

 

The characteristic of globalisation is the creation of macro economic instability, as revealed by a high rate of inflation. Inflation can destabilize the economy and squander natural resources, which is not conducive to sustainable development. Development that takes place without touching the poor will widen income inequality and hence raise social instability, which in the long run makes development unsustainable.

 

According to the HDR, no less than 89 countries are worse off economically than they were a decade or more ago. In particular, 70 developing countries - mostly in Africa, Latin America and the Common wealth of independent States (CIS) - have returned to levels of per capita income that they first reached in the 1960s and 1970s. Contrary to popular perception, not all of these countries are “basket cases’, thrown apart by civil war, like Rwanda, Liberia, Sudan or Nicaragua. Even resource-rich countries like Venezuela or the IMFs one-time model reformer, Ghana have experienced negative growth as far as per capita income is concerned. In the last two countries, per capita income today is actually less than the 1960 level.

 

A survey of 69 countries over the past decade shows that, in 46 countries which recorded economic growth only 27 saw employment increase while 19 experienced ‘jobless growth’. The latter group includes both India and Pakistan. We learn that the world has 358 billionaires and that their combined assets exceed the total annual income of the world’s 2.3 billion poorest people that is, 45 percent of the global population. If the process generating such inequalities is not held in check, the HDR warns that it will generate a world‘ gargantuan in its excesses and grotesque in its human and economic inequalities.

 

The 1992 Human Development Report calculates that the developing countries presently suffer a potential annual loss of at least $500 billion from restrictions in global markets for goods and services, and for capital and labor - in other words, a market loss 10 times as large as the total foreign assistance they receive each year.

 

After 18 devaluations of Sudan’s currency since 1974, the price of food has soared to more than three times the minimum wage. After a year of SAP, the number of homeless in India, as in many other countries is up sharply. Between 1980 and 1988 the real prices of non-fuel commodity exports from developing countries declined by some 40%. In 1990 alone, the prices for 34 commodities that are expressed in IMF Special Drawing Rights (a composite currency designed to avoid the distortions of an oscillating dollar) dropped a further 13%. At the same time the international prices for the manufactured goods produced in the North and which the South needs to import rose by some 25%.

 

According to a report from International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, Four-and-a- half billion people, or 85 percent of world’s total population, occupying 72 percent of the land area of the globe, belong to the category of low-and middle-income countries of the South, with a per capita income ranging from US$80 (Mozambique) to US$7,820 (Saudi Arabia) in 1991. If the countries in the South, in their endeavour to raise per capita income, had to follow the same path as the industrialized countries, the impact will be catastrophic to the global environment.

 

‘Globalization ‘ and Market Forces’ are today the presiding deities of the New World Order. Development is increasingly defined in economic rather than human terms. In 1992, India launched its “New Economic Policy’ to stabilize and restructure the economy and designed a structural adjustment plan to cope with a critical external payment crisis with out any debate.

 

The “Human Development Report 1997” places India at 138 in its ranking of 175 countries on a composite index based on life expectancy, adult literacy and the GDP per capita. Over 170 million Indians - one in every six - don’t have access to safe drinking water. Nine Indians are born every ten seconds. 71% of national income or consumption is shared by 30% Indians and 12% and ragi combined is 4.8% while 5.4% irrigated land is devoted to produce cash crops like sugar and tobacco. 53% of India’s population barely lives less than l dollar a day. Out of every 100 Indians, 16 Indians enjoy electricity, safe drinking water and toilet facilities. Value of a poor Indian is estimated to Rs. 10,000 (250 USD). In the fifty-first year of independence, India finds itself a misfit in the world’s hierarchy: a subcontinental nation, almost a billionaire in population, but with more citizens in poverty and illiteracy than any other country (Politics India - Feb’98 -Steering Steady m the Post-Cold war world - A Madhavan).

 

When the British left India in 1947, our resources were already depleted by the exploitative colonial regime. ‘The process of globalisation since 1991 continues and intensifies the anti-people process of development that has been going on since Independence. The aims are neither to reduce poverty and unemployment nor to provide basic need’s (The World Bank and Globalisation of Indian Economy - Dalip S. Swamy).

 

Globalisation and Food insecurity in the South

 

Trade liberalisation has been generating food insecurity at three levels. Firstly, it is transferring the resources from peasants to industry. Secondly, shifting the land use from the production of staple foods to luxury and non-food crops such as shrimp, tobacco, coco, banana and flowers for exports. Thirdly, it is removing food subsidies, thus lowering domestic consumption and increasing food export. The resource and livelihood insecurity linked to land alienation, the production insecurity linked to decline of food production, the consumption insecurity linked to decline in consumption are all contributing to food insecurity for the people in the South.

 

Dr. Kamal Malhotra Co-Director of FOCUS on the Global South, referring to South Korea reported that how the country has shifted from food self-sufficiency 40 years ago to dependence on US today. During the five-year period from 1986 to 1991 agricultural imports in South Korea went up from US$1.8 billion to US$5 billion. In Philippines acreage under rice was declining while it was increasing under eut flowers. Shifting from corn, rice and sugarcane to flowers and vegetables for export destroyed 350,000 rural livelihoods. The import of 59,000 metric ton under the minimum access requirement of GATT displaced 15,000 families annually.

 

Dr.Regassa Feyissa, Director of the Biodiversity Institute of Ethiopia said, Africa was being treated merely as a cheap source of labour. Kenya was importing 80% of its food, while 80% of its exports were accounted for by agriculture. In Kenya, grain imports have risen, subsidised by the European Union, undermining local production and creating poverty by oversupply. In 1992, EU wheat was sold in Kenya 39% cheaper than the same wheat was purchased by the EU from European farmers. In 1993, it was 50% cheaper. In 1995 Kenyan wheat prices collapsed through over supply. All this in a country, which was self-sufficient in the 1980s.

 

Five companies control 70% of the food market in the U.K. There is growing food insecurity even in rich countries as food Systems become more centralised. The distance for shopping for food had increased from 2 miles to 5 miles, increasing “ food miles” embodied in food and creating a motorway food System. Globalisation is expected to double the C02 emissions through increased transportation, leading to more unpredictable fluctuations in climate, which undermine food security. The Environment Minister of Denmark Mr.Svend Auken while opening the First Organic World Exhibition in Copenhagen had stated that a l kg of grapes imported from South Africa to Europe contributes to 10.5 kg of C02 emissions.

 

India has the second largest population in the world. The country has low incomes compared to world standards and the per capita availability of calories and food grains (the main staple food of the poor) are among the lowest in the world. It has been shown that the proportion of people below the poverty has not declined significantly over the years. This is sufficient show that while food deficit at the national level has been contained, food insecurity for the poor still exists.

 

Dr. Amitava Mukherjee, Executive Director, ACTIONAID, India in his paper on International Trade and Food Security confirmed that the area under food crop production in India is on the decline, from 100.7 to 97.3 between 1990-91 and 1994-95, while the index for the area under non-food crops increased from 120.0 to 125.7 during that period. Production of course cereals and pulses, the main food for the poor has shown a declining trend.

 

The agricultural exports increased by about 71% from Rs. 21.98 billion in 88-89 to Rs. 377.66 billion in 1992-93. The Indian prices of staple food grains are lower than world prices. Indian rice prices are about 54% lower than world prices, the wheat are 17% lower. These crops get exported. Thus the domestic prices rise, taking the staple food grains beyond the reach of poor people.

 

The freedom to export food grain under liberalised trade has already benefited the giant grain traders Cargill and Continental. They bought wheat at $60 to $100 per tonne from India and sold it at $230-240 per tonne at the international market in 1996, making a neat $130-170 profit per tonne, while India lost $100m in exports because of the concentration of power in the hands of five merchants of grain.

 

Growing dependency on Food imports:

 

Today, almost 1/3 of all cereals consumed are imported from abroad in several countries burdened with SAPs. In the Caribbean and parts of Latin America, food self- reliance is also on the decline. In 1991-92 in India, the production of cash crops for export rose 3%, while the cultivation of basic grains fell 1.5% as the country’s SAP got underway. In 1992, Mexico was importing 20% of its food. In 1996 it was importing 43%. Eating “ more cheaply on imports is not eating at all for the poor in Mexico”. One out of every two peasants is not getting enough to eat. The intake of food has been destroyed by 29%. 2.2 million Mexicans have lost jobs and 40 million are in extreme poverty.

 

Even after achieving a great break though in food grains production by the ‘Green Revolution’, over 800 million people are malnourished in Afro - Asian countries and mainly in India.

 

Decline in productive capacity:

 

Rising interest rates and drastic reductions in imports during the 1980s have strangled Brazilian industry’s technological modernization. . Thousand died in Ethiopia in the 1970s and 80s while Ethiopian lentils, coffee, cotton and beef continued to be exported to the North.

 

Globalisation and Environment  - Conflict and the Challenges:

 

The “green” agenda has been widely discussed in recent years - The cumulative threats of global warming, the destruction of the protective ozone layer, land degradation through deforestation, erosion, desertification, salienation and pollution of water, air and land, must be traced more or less directly back to industrial processes which human beings have undertaken with a view to wealth creation, It is shocking and frightening that the human species on this earth, which came on the scene some where around 80,000 years ago, in the 4.5 billion year-long history of this earth, has been able to threaten the very foundations of life on our planet in only about two hundred years of industrialization - a greed for wealth.

 

Environmental degradation, including the destruction of forest, marine resources, increased soil erosion, and industrial waste pollution - caused by an emphasis on exports and rapid resource extraction, intensive agricultural methods reveals that in Thailand, because of increased industrialisation during the 1980s, the percentage of industries spewing hazardous waste doubled from 29% to 59%, creating severe health and environmental problems.

 

Climate Change-The Greenhouse Effect

 

The UN fund for Population Activities forecasts that the present population will virtually double from 6.2 billion in 2000 to at least 12 billion in 2050. Some 95% of the see extra people will be born in the South. However, the strain on the environment caused by demographic developments has to be seen in perspective.

 

In 2000, the richest 20% consumed about 60 times as much as the poorest 20%. One fifth of world’s population living in industrial countries contribute emissions of the gasses that cause global warming, 85% of CFC is emitted by them destroying the ozone layer that contributes to greenhouse effect. The average person in the North uses about ten times as many of the increasingly scarce resources of energy and other raw materials. About 75% of total global “greenhouse gas” emissions is due to the 25% richest people.

 

The increase in carbondioxide and other pollution from coal burn and industrial processes, the world has warmed up considerably and is expected to increase another 1.5 to 4.5 degrees centigrade by 2030.  At the moment C02 in the atmosphere shows an annual increase of 0.4%. On the basis of a combination of business as usual and efficient policies, IPCC has estimated that the global energy consumption level is on an annual increase of 0.7% in Western Europe, 1.3% in Northern America and the OECD countries in the Pacific and 3.6% in developing countries. Ten percent more carbon is steaming out of American smokestacks in 1999 than in 1990. The developing world will go from emitting 27% of the world’s C02 in 1990 to 46% in the year 2025 (Sustainable Production and Consumption - 1995, Global Equity and the Quality of Life).

 

The report, authored by the international group of climatologists and environmental scientists, state that the mean sea temperature will rise between one and 3.5 degree by 2100, increasing the sea level by 15 to 95 cm leading to submergence of vast coast lines in the south and several island nations.

 

Water: Globally 3,240 cubic kilo metres of fresh water are withdrawn. Of this total 69% is used for agriculture, 23% for industry, and 8% for domestic use. One sixth of the world’s cropland that is irrigated produces about a third of the world’s food. Of the 235 million hectares currently under irrigation, 10 -15% have been degraded by salination and water logging. On an average, stream water takes 16 days to be fully replaced, swamp water 5 years, Iake water 17 years and ground water 14000 years. More than 230 million people live in water scarce countries. Water shortages and contamination kills nearly 25,000 people a day worldwide. Nearly 30% of the people in the third world do not have safe water to drink. Diarrhoea kills some 4 million children every year. Acid rain affects more than seven million hectares of forests in 20 countries.

 

Forests: Of the 8080 million hectares of forests in the world 8000 years ago, only 3044 million hectares remain today. This means nearly two thirds of the world’s original forests have been destroyed. Ranging across roughly 30% of the planet’s land surface, forests play a critical role in the maintenance of the planetary ecosystem. They help regulate temperature and rainfall. In 1950, forests covered 30% of the earth. Worldwide, at least 40% of rain forests have been lost in the last 50 years. Each year, 12 million hectares of forest (an area almost the size of England) are being eliminated. By 1975, the area covered by tropical forests had declined to 12%. World’s forest and wooded land area declined by 100 million hectares - area about the size of Egypt – 1980-90 (Change occurred in Tropical area).

 

Tropical areas are being destroyed at the rate of 16-20 million hectares a year for industrial purpose and there are similar losses in the forest quality across the temperate and boreal forests of Canada, Europe, Russia and the US. In 30 years 1960-90 one fifth of all natural tropical forest lost in developing countries. In India 1.3 million hectares of forest are lost every year for commercial interests, dams, mines, urbanisation and fuel. Thailand’s forest cover is now less than 20%, about 50% of this disappeared between 1961 and 1988. As per the WWF report in the Asia Pacific region 88% o the original forest cover has already lost and only 5% of the remaining forests are protected.

 

Tropical forest contains 155000 of the 250000 known plant species. A typical 1000-hectare patch of tropical forest contains - 1500 species of flowering plants, 750 species of trees 400 species of birds, 150 kinds of butterflies, 100 different types of reptiles, 60 species of amphibians and many more insects. Half of the medicines used are derived from wild products. If present trends continue, only 7% of the planet will be forests by the year 2010 and by that time a million species will have vanished.

 

Land: With the rise of the capitalist economic system, land has been regarded as a commodity and treated as an object of speculation and reduced to one more possible source of financial profit. In many areas unchecked market forces have led to the concentration of land in the hands of a minority. For indigenous peoples - the original inhabitants of colonized lands - land is life, for their life is inextricably bound to the land of their ancestors, and their land still plays a central part in their social and religions identity. Expropriation of that land is thus spiritually destructive, and has often in practice led to their extinction. The impact of modern development on the land and soil fertility is threatening.

 

Desertification: More than three billion hectares - almost a quarter of the world’s land surface - are at risk from desertification, salination. Every year 6 million hectares of productive land is lost beyond hope of recovery. An estimated 26 billion tons of topsoil are washed or blown off the cropland each year, while much of the remaining topsoil is de-mineralized through single crop farming.  A single cm top soil can take 1000 years to form and many parts of the world it is being destroyed in less than 5 years.

 

In India 27% and in China 6.4% of soil cover suffer from severe soil erosion. Nearly 7 million hectares of land in India brought under irrigation have gone out of production due to salinity and an additional 6 million hectares are affected by water logging. Some 47% of rain-fed cropland is atleast moderately affected by desertification. Typically, rain-fed crops produce only a kilogram or so of food for every cubic meter of water used. 27 Million hectares of earth’s surface are lost every year.

 

35% of the earth’s land surface (45 Million Sq.Kms) and 19% of its population (850 Million people), out of this 75% of the area and 60% of its population are the victims of modem development governed by dominant development ideology accompanied by heavy capital intensive technologies through industrialisation and modernisation.

 

Occurrence of Frequent Natural Disasters: In 1960, 5.2 million people were affected by floods and nearly three times as many as 15.4 million in 1970s. The area affected by flooding has grown from 25 to 40 million hectares in three decades. Floods now account for 40% of all deaths. More than 95% of them occur in developing countries. Nearly 50 million people were rendered homeless due to natural disasters worldwide, including floods; earthquakes an projects were about 85 million. In 1996, 11.9 million died worldwide. In Asia nearly 9.5 million people died due to natural disasters.  The death rate in India, in the 1980s was 14 times greater than in the 1950s. The frequent occurrence of floods, cyclones and drought worldwide is increasing. In Orissa (India) 1999 was the super cyclone, 2000 was the drought and floods in 2001. It is not only in Orissa but also other States and other countries. The whole planet is under continuous threat of an ecological disaster.

 

Pollution: Industrialisation in the Cities have caused more damages to the nature as well as human beings. An upper class family generates five kilos garbage on an average every day and the poor 0.5 Kilos. Nearly 50% vehicles in India are run in three metros - Delhi, Bombay and Calcutta. 66 thermal power stations discharge 40 million tons of fly ash annually and daily one lakh tons. 1500 pollutants are spewed every day in Calcutta city. 80,000 tons of solid waste is generated in urban centres of India. The estimated annual health damage costs in Bombay due to air pollution alone is estimated Rs. 180 Millions. 30000 people are estimated to die each year in US alone from pollution emitted from vehicle exhaust.

 

The human actions which are environmentally destructive should be stopped; the environment has to be preserved; it cannot be left to the good intentions and pious declarations of Governments but must become part of people’s own concern, an organized concern including agitation and movements to restrain the state and corporate interests from running amok and ruining the life chances of both present and even more of future generations, and indeed of non-human species and plants as well.

 

Conflict over Control of Resources – Community Vs Corporate

 

Natural resource conflicts have risen around issues of human rights, survival, environment and sustainable development. Essentially, these conflicts relate to the conversion of free community resources in commodities whose use is governed by State influenced corporate market criteria. For example, declaring a forest as a reserved forest takes away the traditional right of local communities to the use of forest produce. Incidents such as Bhopal, disaster or the decline in gene diversity as a result of modem agricultural practices, the hazards posed by the nuclear industry and the research on genetics, raise questions about the rights of generations still unborn.

 

The 1972 Conference on Environment and Development at Stockholm set the stage for the entry of the concepts of environment and social movements. Movements sprung on issues confronting the people. Issue based, localised, regional, national movements were only the way to resist the negative impacts of globalisation on human beings and environment. Ecological movements such as Chipko, the Narmada Andolan in India and people’s movements against the commercial destruction of rain forests in Brazil, the women’s movements in the Southern countries and their impact on gender and equity issues are equally significant. The following movements have emerged to question policies, law, and development interventions that directly endanger the life of people and the eco-systems.

 

Forest-based struggles : A proposed forest bill by the Government of India in 1982, which sought to give greater control of forest resources to industry was laid off through agitation by NGOs and the people.

 

Struggle over land : The Land-based struggles have arisen in the context of ownership and control, in the form of movements of landless and poor peasants for tenancy modifications and equitable distribution of land in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Bihar. The struggle against exploitation of mineral resources in the fragile eco-system of the Himalayas, Western and Eastern Ghats and Central India is getting momentum.

 

The struggle against the recently promulgated Wastelands Development Policy which classify village commons - used particularly by poorer people for fuel, fodder, housing materials, etc – a wasteland, and for the state to appropriate them and then put them under plantation of fast- growing tree species both to meet green cover and the needs of industry is questioned and the agitations are on. The change of land related laws in tribal areas to facilitate industrialisation is also under question especially focussing on Land Acquisition Act, 1894, 1984 and 1998.

 

Struggles against big dams: Large multi-purpose dams and river valley schemes have recklessly ripped of the natural and people’s resources. This has become the focus of widespread agitation like the Narmada, in the West, Koel Koro and the Upper Kolab in the East of India.

 

Struggle against over-exploitation of marine resources: For thousands of years, millions of fisher folk have subsisted on their catches from the sea.  The subsistence Fishing economy of millions of people came under direct attack by corporate fishing. Hitherto struggles of fisher folk which were essentially around the problems of credit, money lending and marketing facilities have now been shifted by the Fisher-Folk Federation and a struggle was launched against trawler fishing companies.

 

The challenge before us is to build people’s movements on the issues around, mal development and environmental degradation, ensure community control over natural resources and over the economy. It is this search for democracy in the age of globalisation towards which we must all struggle.

 

Poverty

 

There are many indicators of globalisation that can be identified in the South. The first and most striking is the poverty. According to the World Development Report (1990), the burden of poverty is spread unevenly among the regions of the developing countries, among countries within those regions, and among localities within those countries. South Asia has a total of46.4 percent, East Asia 25 percent, Sub-Saharan Africa 16.1 percent. Latin America and the Caribbean 16.1 percent, while Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa have 5.9 percent of the world are poor (International Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1990, p.2).

 

The link between poverty and globalisation is well founded. To take just one small example – the 358 billionaires singled out by the HDR. These billionaires and their colossal wealth did not spring from the sky. Rather, it is the internationalisation of capital as evinced by the record volume of trans-border capital flows, which is leading to monopolisation on an ever-increasing scale and generating massive imbalances in income and wealth holdings throughout the world.

 

Poverty is not a phenomenon. Poverty in this era of globalisation has assumed new dimensions. Globalisation and marginalisation go hand in hand. What prospects are there for the millions of poor peasants, rural labourers, urban unemployed, slum dwellers, the 23 million refugees, 100 million street children and the millions displaced by “development” projects under the new globalisation regime? In the words of the Human Development Report 1995, “the poorest 20% of world’s people have benefited little from the increased globalisation of economics. In world trade, their share is only 1% and in world commercial lending a scant 0.2%. More than three- fourths of world’s people live in developing countries, but they enjoy only 16% of the word’s income while the richest 20% have 85% of global income”.  The reality is more sharply focused when it is noted that 70 per cent of the 1.4 billion absolute poor (their number has swelled from 1.05 billion in 1985 to 1.4 billion in 1995) as measured by the World Bank using an absolute poverty line of $31 per person per month.

 

Poverty is defined as the minimum level of consumption expenditure which is determined on the basis of calorie nutrition requirement for physical subsistence - “the poverty line”. According to the World Bank, more than a quarter of the world’s population - i.e. between 1.2 and 1.3 thousand million human beings - live in absolute poverty. The clearest index of this is hunger is the sheer lack and access to food. Another is ill health, often due to such elementary needs as clean water (it is estimated that nearly two thousand million people lack safe drinking water).  Absolute poverty is a breach of the most basic human right to the gift of life itself.

 

Similar sources (e.g. Human Development Report, 1990, UN Development Programme) suggest that some 900 million people cannot read or write, that one out of every three children born alive is undernourished, at some time within its first five years, and that at least 14 million of those children die of hunger every year.

 

South Asia houses the most people affected by human poverty and it has the largest number of people in income poverty, i.e. 515 millions. Together, South Asia, East Asia and South-East Asia and the Pacific have more than 950 million of the 1.3 billion people who are income poor. An estimated 1.3 billion people survive on less than the equivalent of $1 a day. There are other needs; nearly a billion people are illiterates, well over a billion lack access to safe water. Some 840 million face food insecurity. Nearly a third of the people in the least development countries - most of which are in Sub-Saharan Africa-are not expected to survive to age 40.

 

Mary Mellor estimates that the North consumes the equivalent of the consumption of 32 billion people whereas the present day population of the world is only 5.6 billion.  Yet it may be interesting to note that 5% of the GDP of the G-7 in 1993 works out to $ 762.2 billion which is very much more than the GDP of India and China put together ($ 651 billion) and only slightly less than the GDP of all low income economics ($ 990 billion). Between 1960 and 1989, the countries with the richest 20% of world population increased their share of the global Gross National Product from 70.2% to 82.7%.

 

The bottom line for poverty and incomes: The share of the poorest 20% of the world’s people in global income now stands at a miserable l -1 %, down from l. 4% in 1991 and 2.3% in 1960. It continues to shrink. And the ratio of the income of the top 20% to that of the poorest 20% rose from 30 to l in 1960, 61 to l in 1991 - and to starting new high of 78 to 1 in 1994 (Human Development Report, 1992, UN Development Programme). These figures conceal the true scale of injustice since they are based on comparisons of the average per capita incomes of rich and poor countries, and there are wide disparities within each country between rich and poor people.

 

As for the South it is estimated (by the Dutch government’s report A World of Difference, 1991) that about one third of the wealthiest 20% of the world’s population live in these countries. At the same time, the poorest 40% of the total world population are all inhabitants of the developing countries of the South. That the population ofG-7 is only 665 million while that of India and China is over 2077 million is adequate to drive home the yawning disparity syndrome.

 

One out of every four humans on the earth is absolutely poor, and lives in a condition of malnutrition, illiteracy, disease, high infant mortality or low life expectancy. More than half are small farmers, and between one-fifth and one quarter are landless labourers. Of these, 80% live in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Their poverty is self-sustaining, self-generating, and the women suffer the most.

 

Rapid expansion of poverty

 

Today in Zambia, the majority of the population cannot produce or purchase sufficient food. 50% of the people of the Philippines live below the poverty line. Between 1980 and 1988, the percentage of Brazil’s population below the poverty line grew sharply from 24% to 39% and today 22% of the people face dally hunger.

 

The total resource consumption of 20 average families in the developing world is even less than the consumption of just an average British family (having two children). An average Northern citizen consumes copper, for example, 17 times more than his counter part in the South. In the case of aluminum, the difference is a factor of 20 against the South.  Therefore, the global challenge is to restructure the Northern economics built on the ideology of capitalist fundamentalism.

 

Case study of India:

 

In India, for example, 1.5 per cent of the population, numbering about 12 million, hold about 65 per cent of the nation’s private wealth.  30 per cent of the population amounting to the total population of all western European countries lives below the poverty line at a meagre Rs. 195.50 per capita per month.

 

To quote a few alarming facts and figures of India - In India, about 250 millions of people at the bottom of the society share about 1.5 to 2% of the national income. Therefore, they are permanently poor, from generation to generation, exploited, starving and insecure; hunger, ill health and ignorance are their constant companions. Another 600 millions of people just above the poorest of the poor, also live in poverty. Perhaps only about 200 millions - not now, but in the future - may have access to means of better life although just today it is only about 10% of the population that seem to be quite comfortable. Leaders of the Church and development agencies are part of this elitist 10%. This has been so, for ages but independence promised all people, equality of opportunity, social justice and security of life and property - still a dream.

 

The effects of globalisation are the same all over, whether it be Africa, Latin America, or Asia. The greatest challenge to the society and to the NGOs is the ever-increasing poverty.

 

Unemployment

 

Global capitalism has promoted a situation of “jobless growth”, a phenomenon well documented by the Human Development Report, 1993. According to ILO’s World Labour Report 1994, at the beginning of 1994, there were at least 120 million registered unemployed world wide, besides about 700 million workers that were under employed or engaged in economic activities that did not permit them to reach a minimum standard of living. An UNCTAD study points out that countries like India and Pakistan have had unemployment rates above 15 percent.

 

Sharp increases in unemployment around the world due to lay-offs of government personnel; the privatization of publicly-owned companies; competition from cheap imports and capital-intensive industry which is wiping out small and traditional enterprise; and policies of high interest rates leading to demand contraction. The ILO projects that unemployment will reach one billion by the year 2000. The lay off of personnel also takes place in church institutions in the name of professionalism, computer technology and cutting down administrative expenses.

 

After one year of the implementation of a SAP in India, 6.6 million additional people were rendered jobless as a result of the privatization of public companies, the application of new technologies and the reversal of state discrimination in favour of backward areas. In Sri Lanka, 40,000 people lost their jobs in the handloom sector alone. Similar trends occurred in countries like Brazil, the Philippines and Indonesia. In Brazil, the real minimum wage plummeted by 40% during the 1980’s and salaries as a share of national income fell from 50% in the late 1970’s to 35% by the early 90’s. By 1990, after three structural adjustment loans, the minimum hourly wage in Jamaica had fallen to $.27, the lowest in the Caribbean region.

 

Globalisation policies are swelling the already massive numbers of the unemployed. Nearly 6.6 million people rendered jobless. During the first year of reforms in 1995, the unemployment rate stood at 13.4% and after five years of economic reforms, in 1995, the unemployment rate increased to 18.7%. Out of every 10 days, men get some kind of job only for four days.

 

Implications on Social Welfare Measures and on society

 

One of the crucial elements of globalisation is to even intervene in the social welfare measures of the democratically elected Governments in the name of structural adjustment and austerity measures as imposed by the World Bank and IMF financial institutions.

 

With increasing liberalisation and the market-oriented growth having been accepted by most of the Asian countries, conditional loans have been advanced to developing countries, including India, by institutions like the IMF and World Bank. A necessary consequence has been the acceptance of a structural adjustment programme (SAP). The reforms mean deregularisation of economy, less subsidy on food, health and education and privatisation of public utilities. With increasing liberalisation and the philosophy of market-oriented growth having been accepted by most of the Asian countries, conditional loans have been advanced to developing countries, including India, by institutions like the IMF and World Bank. A necessary consequence has been the acceptance of a structural adjustment programme (SAP). The reforms mean deregularisation of economy, less subsidy on food, health and education and privatisation of public utilities.

 

Education:  The impact of globalisation is seen in terms of decreasing school enrolment, increasing drop-out rates and rising functional illiteracy due to cuts in public education programs and rising fees and other costs to parents. After a steady decline in illiteracy rates, Jamaica experienced and increases in post - primary school functional illiteracy rates from 28% of children in 1982 to 33% by 1989.

 

The Indian Government, in its 1992-93 budget, cut support for community village schools by 80%, non-formal education programs by 17%, and technical education by 15%. Uniforms, books, and notebooks, as well as school fees, became more expensive, forcing parents to keep children, particularly girls, out of school. About 75 million children (of which 54 million are girls) are not in school. Some 110 million are out of school. 19.4 of world’s adult males and 33.6% adult females are illiterate. More than half the world’s 842 million illiterates are Indians. Adult literacy of 50 per cent are significantly lower than the average for all developing countries.

 

Health: The impact of globalisation as seen from the experiences of other ‘sapped’ countries tell us how falls in nutritional levels coupled with drastic cuts in Government expenditure on health, especially on immunization programmes, have had tragic effects on the health of women and children. General morbidity and infant mortality increased; there was a rise in the levels of communicable diseases. The deterioration of health care Systems around the world and the rapid spread of diseases, include those associated with malnutrition and inadequate water supply Systems.

 

Cuts in Government health budgets have led to the closure of clinics and hospitals, the elimination of immunization programs, inadequate supplies, staff shortages, lack of adequate care, sharp increases in fees for tests and in prices of essential drugs, and the disappearance of some basic drugs from the domestic market effected tragically the health of women and children. The WHO Director General pronounced that the current cholera epidemic in Latin America was due to the impact of globalisation.

 

One of the glaring medical crime in allocation of budget is seen in terms of cut in the budgets on preventable diseases like Malaria, Diarrhea and in reducing infant and maternal mortality but at the same time a lot of money is spent both in the south and the in the north on the disease like AIDS in the name of scientific research, awareness and eradication.

 

Deterioration of health care Systems:

 

Under its new globalisation policy, the Indian Government began withdrawing public support for health care for the poor in 1992, with fees rising of nursing home charges up to five times, and the price of essential drugs rising 50-400%. For every three TB patients worldwide one lives in India. Indian Government spends 1.3% of GDP on Health. 75% of health budget goes towards staff salaries.  The statistics recently released by National Council of Applied Economic Research (NCAER) showed that about 40 per cent of India’s population remains under the poverty line. According to an other survey by the NCAER, 37 per cent of the country’s rural population is land less. This is the poorest section, which cannot grow enough food, cannot find other means to ward off hunger and unable to cope up with health needs. In the 1992-93 Indian Government budget on mother and child - care programs, as well as, Government dispensaries; were cut 5%, 40% was cut for malaria prevention, 15% from tuberculosis prevention, and 11% from vaccination programs, while 40% was also cut from water and sanitation programs. To the contrary, 95 % of worldwide spending on health research is devoted to health problems of the industrialised countries.

 

During the 1980’s, globalisation policy induced cuts in health budgets of 20% - 35% in Ghana, Morocco, Ecuador and Chile led to the closure of clinics and immunization programs, inflicting disease and death on millions. More than 80% of people in developing nations have no sanitation facilities and nearly 200 million people have no access to safe drinking water.

 

Experiences of African countries undergoing SAP points to rising infant and child mortality. In Asia, the strongest evidence against SAPs emerges from Srilanka, the first country to launch this programme in Asia, in 1977. Before liberalisation, the number of those falling below the poverty line in Sri Lanka was 13 per cent. In 1988 it was 46 per cent.

 

Maternal Mortality: Maternal deaths is a immense problem all over the world. The Maternal Mortality Rate is the number of maternal deaths per 100,000 live births. Of the total number of annual maternal deaths worldwide i.e. 500,000, the developing world accounts for 99 per cent. Asia alone is responsible for about a third of a million of such deaths. Africa contributes 153,000, Latin America 34,000 and quite predictably, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh together contribute 230,000 maternal deaths annually. This is nothing less than 46 per cent of the total global maternal mortality and a matter more serious than “defence” any day. In India 100,000 mothers die every year and this constitutes 20 per cent of all maternal deaths in the world. The MMR in India is 340. In Sri Lanka, which also has a higher literacy rate, it is only 60. In Thailand it is 50 and in China 1000. The first World as usual is way ahead with U.K at 9, Singapore at 5 and Norway at merely 2. The staggering incidence of maternal mortality in many parts of the world clearly makes it a human rights issue of the first order (The Pioneer 29 May 1996 - Facts about contemporary India). The prevalence of anemia among pregnant women is 88%.

 

Recent estimates by WHO and the UNICEF place MMR among least developed countries at 1,015 deaths per 100,000 live births. The figure is as high as 929 for Sub-Saharan Africa. On the other hand, in the industrial world, maternal mortality is quite rare with the rate being only 28 deaths per 100,000 live births. The high rates of MMR in the least developed countries point not only to the non-availability of safe delivery services, but more importantly, they reflect a complete neglect of major concerns relating to women’s health.

 

It is not just hunger that is haunting the people but we have all kinds of new and treacherous ailments like AIDS, Drugs, alcoholism; not only physical diseases but we have mental diseases like corruption in all ranks of life - in the Government, in the administration, in politics, in society, in the NGOs  - and indeed in the development resource agencies too!

 

Unethical Drug Trade: Globalisation also lead to nefarious drug trades. From Karachi to Beijing the production and distribution of contaminated medicines has developed into a virtual shadow industry - network as amateurish as the individual con who refills discarded syringes with sugar water, and as professional as the massive chemical factory that labeled barrels containing deadly diethylene glycol, commonly used in lacquer and antifreeze, as harmless glycerin. In 1996, the cough syrup which was thought harmless killed 80 children in Haiti. The WHO statistics show more than 500 fatalities caused by contaminated cough syrup.

 

Last June, for instance, health officials in India’s Maharashtra state raided a warehouse packed with syringes, needles and intravenous - drip bags which had passed their expiration dates; the owner, a small manufacturer who had purchased the material from a North Indian company as waste product, had re-labelled the goods and begun to push them onto the market. China has perhaps the world’s largest producer of substandard medicines.

 

In Indonesia, which imports an estimated 60% of its counterfeit medicine from neighbors like Malaysia and Thailand, two ethnic - Chinese syndicates with roots in the colonial period have reportedly taken over the hugely profitable smuggling trade. Authorities in Asia’s developing countries often lack the resources to track their sprawling pharmaceutical markets accurately (TIME, January 26, 1998). and this is another facet of globalisation.

 

Increase in Suicide Rate: One of the evils of the shift from Communism to capitalist economy in China has aggravated the suicide rate. Everyday, it said, 560 Chinese end their own lives. The number of suicides in China makes up a third of the world’s total.  A 1995 World Mental Health Report put the overall suicide rate in China at 17.1 per 100,000 people, among the highest in the world. World Bank, the World Health Organization and Harvard University put the rate at 30.3 per 100,000, compared with 10.7 for the rest of the world.

 

The Study estimates that China, with 21.5% of the world’s population, accounts for a staggering 43.6% of the 786000 suicides worldwide. 300,000 Chinese kill themselves every year. China is the only country in which more women than men kill themselves, and by a huge margin. About 21% of the world’s females live in China, yet 55.8% of the women who commit suicide worldwide are Chinese. Studies have found that these are due to impulsive acts, often in reaction to family conflicts over money or infidelity which is the result of consumerism and liberalisation of the economy. The World Bank predicts that suicides in China will reach 534,000 a year by 2020(TIME, January 26, 1998).

 

Women: According to the Human Development Report of 1993, women present a dismal picture: female life expectancy at birth is 59.3 years, maternal mortality rate per 100,000 live births is 550, and the literacy rate is 40% in the age group of 15 to 54 years. How do we visualize our women moving towards a better world through SAP-induced conditionalities from this threshold? There has been ever-increasing burden on women and children

 

Women have been forced into the casual labour market for the survival of their families. They earn pitiful wages as little as US 30 cents a day, 25% to 5% less than men earn for same work. It is estimated that all kinds work done by women amounts to more than two thirds of the hours worked overall, though they receive no more than a tiny fraction of the money.

 

Throughout the world women put more time and energy into the bearing and bringing up of children than men, and in almost every culture the women are “naturally” expected to take charge of all that requires doing in the household. In the South current developments such as economic recession and structural adjustment programmes also impose disproportionately heavy burdens on women.

 

Cuts in Government spending on health and education, force women to make the extra time to provide whatever is possible in those respects. Environmental degradation too has a direct impact on already overworked and undervalued women, forcing them to walk further to find water, food and fuel, so that hot meals are served less frequently, nutrition suffers and the level of everyone’s health drops. Poverty has become feminized to a significant degree.

 

A New United nations report, which ranks countries based on “human development” factors, shows continuing disparities between men and women worldwide blocking all human development.  “The continuing exclusion of women from many economic and political opportunities is a continuing indictment of modem progress”. In 1940, 40% of the world’s poor were women.

 

Today, two-thirds of the poor are women. $11 trillion is missing from the global economy each year because of unpaid housework, childcare, agricultural work and other labour performed by women. Similar unpaid labour by men was calculated at the equivalent of only $5 trillion. Women carry on average 53% of the total burden of work in developing countries, and 51% in industrial countries (The Economic Times - 2 September 1995).

 

Women in India: World Development Report 1995 has reported a fall in the percentage share of women in the labour force in India from 30 per cent in 1970 to 25 percent in 1993 (The Economic Times - 18 April 1996). Female literacy is at a poor 38% as compared to male literacy at 66%. Average real wage of a woman in India for every 100 rupees in real wages earned by a man, in Rs is only 51/-.

 

Average number of women raped or killed for dowry every hour in India is 2.  Statistically, the participation of women in the work force has increased, from 8.31% in 1981 to 9.74% in 1991 (Deshpande). In 1981, there were 139 women to 1000 men workers in urban areas, the figure rose to 178 in 1991. Three-fourths of these have insecurity of income and employment.

 

Out of every 10 days that women find employment is only for 3 days. Average number of times women cry every week is 3 times. Number of Russian women killed by their husbands in 1994, were 15,000. Chances that a married women in rural India in the age group 13-16 is already a mother: 1:3

 

Share of women in India’s adult labour force in 1970 was 34 and today it is 31. Number of girls in the age group 0-6 years that are missing from India’s population due to gender discrimination, is 14 lakhs girls.  Average number of hours a week women work in India is 69 hrs. Number out of every 3 female agricultural labourers that are below poverty line is 2. Number out of every 3 female-headed households that constitute rural poor is l. Proportion out of every 10 women lodged in Indian jails that are under trials are 7.

 

150 million women living below the poverty line constitute our female workforce. More than 90% of these women work in the un organised sector. 16% of the rural population earns less than Rs. 3 per day and another 18% less than Rs.5/-60 million children under six years belong to a group whose mothers have to work for their survival (Seminar - 462 February 1998).

 

The numbers of women and babies who die at childbirth, in Harare, Zimbabwe (which has cut it’s health care budget by 30% since 1991) has doubled, while registration for ante-natal health classes has halved - mortality rates for children of non-registering mothers are five times higher.

 

Women produce more than half of all the food grown in less developed countries. African women produce 80% of food for local consumption yet they are not represented in decision-making processes, which have determined that Africa’s agriculture policies should be focused on growing food, and other products for export (Women’s International Network Pg.32-dt.1/12/95-Human Development Report 1995).

 

Children: The increase in child labour in another reality of globalisation. More than 200 million children between the age group 4-14 years old all over the world have to work every day to supplement the families dally bread. According to the report of State of World Children, 1994, UNICEF, 330.8 million were below the age of sixteen and 112.1. Million below the age of five. In India alone, 13.6 Million Child Labour in the age group (0-14 years) were recorded but unofficially it is reported nearly 45 millions. Out of this, 2 million children work in hazardous Industries.

 

Every third household in India has a working child and they all contribute over 20% of GNP of India. India has the world’s largest malnourished children of about 53% of total under fives, exceeding even the Sub Saharan countries at 31%.  50% of children in the age group 5-15 years do not go to school. Child abuse through tourism has victimised thousands of Children in Asia. Fifteen percent out of an estimated 2 million prostitutes in India are children.

 

Despite considerable social progress, children are especially vulnerable - hit by malnutrition and illness just when their brains and bodies are forming. Some 160 million children are moderately or severely malnourished. Nearly 70 million children under five are malnourished.

 

Culture: Culture appears to be an arena in which multinational organisations are particularly active.  It is reminiscent of the Bible preceding trade during the first stage of colonialism. The powerful cultural onslaught the third world countries are experiencing today is an attempt to establish cultural imperialism. Culture as imperialism - as a precursor to an all-embracing domination. Through the imposition of the culture of capitalism, the third world countries are trained to prepare the ground for, an “administered world”, to which corporate capital would have easy access.

 

The cultural imperialism thus provides the groundwork for exploiting the market potential of third world countries. For third world countries like India, globalization does not augur freedom and progress; instead, it would only ensure the necessary climate for domination and hegemonisation by the consortium of world capitalist countries.

 

Onslaught on Adivasis (Tribal) Peoples:

 

Tribals have their own distinct culture, language, political System, religion, territorial affiliation, and are self sufficient as a society. They are often pitched against non tribals for controlling the resources, mainly their ancestor land. Millions of tribals perished in this process. Many more have been absorbed into non-tribal society there by permanently losing their tribal characteristics. Presently the ethnic conflicts, incessant wars, conflict induced famines, development process and land hungry non-tribals are displacing the tribals from their ancestor land. Tribals are not only becoming rootless but also forced to lead a dehumanising existence without a livelihood, identity, community and culture.

 

History of Tribals in India is that of sub-jugation, dispossession, displacement, exploitation and assimilation into mainstream population. But there is history also about their unflinching belief m their culture and value System, It is this pride in their existence led to desert their fertile plains and move into tough terrain like forests and mountains, alienated from lands, and other people.

 

The forces of development have ushered in conflicts and complexities in the hitherto serene life- style of the tribal people. The tribal areas have been opened up for exploitation of their vast natural resources. Commercial activities in the sphere of mining and quarry, forestry, construction of big dams and industrial projects and Defence establishment and infrastructure facilities like roads, electrification, etc., have introduced alien forces, cultures and influences into the traditionally insulated life and culture of the indigenous people. Lure of money have attracted large number of contractors, middlemen, traders and muscle men into the placidity of the tribal setting (Strategy for Development of Tribal Women - Dr. Rajalaximi Rath - Third Concept, April- May 1995).

 

The tribal people were not able to get employment in the newly established industries because of their lack of technical skills they were forced to live around the newly established industrial towns. Alcoholism, prostitution and destitution spread quite fast and many individual families migrated to cities (The Rally, August’96).

 

There are around 300 million tribal people in the world today and nearly one third of them live in India. Often, Governments and businesses in the name of ‘progress’ or ‘development’ justify the violation of their human rights. But scratch the surface and you will find that it is simply a justification for greed and theft.  Deprivation of land and forest are the worst forms of oppression that tribal peoples experience. It has resulted in the breakdown of community life and a steady cultural death. This process is been labelled as ethnocide’. To tribal people, land rights are therefore a prerequisite of human rights.

 

 

Today’s ethnocide or genocide need not be, like the Nazi holocaust. The world’s tribal peoples are facing death au the time. In the forests of Amazon, or the hills of Sudan, Bangladesh, and in India.  They are being massacred in cold blood, or exterminated by a process of attrition, through which their lands are taken away, their rivers poisoned, their cultures undermined and their lives made intolerable.

 

These actions are, of course, illegal. The United Nations defines genocide as ‘a denial of the right to existence of entire human groups’. In 1948, it adopted a Convention on ‘the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide.

 

Tribal peoples see through this racism and hypocrisy. They are organising politically to halt the world’s silent holocausts. Their only real demand is that we recognise them as full human beings with the same rights to land and self-determination as any one else (Survival 34 1995).

 

Impact on Dalits:

 

Dalits mostly live in India are in some parts of Asia.  Dalits are the downtrodden or broken community. As per the Hindu Scripture they are called the untouchables. They do not belong to the social System of Hindu society and treated as outcastes. Nearly 250 million Dalits (l/4^th of the total population of India) are living in India, out of which nearly 90% of them live in rural areas. Dalits were displaced by historical compulsion some thousands of year back from their own land and habitat.

 

Today they also have been victimised by the industrialisation wave. Millions of Dalits who have become land less labourers have been affected by the shift from traditional agricultural Systems to modem agricultural practices. Most of them are constantly under social oppression, economically exploited and politically marginalised. Dalits in general are the victims of the caste System and now they are also subjugated by the powers of formal economy that is controlled by the capitalists’ corporations.

 

Displacement a product of globalisation:

 

Displacement is not a new phenomenon. Since thousands of years the natives have been displaced by settlers, invaders, rulers and now by modem development. All these forces have displaced the very people from their habitat culture, religion, occupation, values, language and the identity.

 

The development models legitimised a systematic displacement and dispossession of the resources, labour and the very means of human existence of the majority - the poor, indigenous communities, women and the children. People were displaced, dispossessed and thrown out of the socio-cultural fabric and eco-systems that have given meaning to their life for thousands of years.

 

The displaced had to take shelter in places alien to them and therefore the entire life is reduced to the level of nomads, misfits - ‘a cultural ethnocide’. Erosion of people’s culture, faith Systems, religion, values, languages and identity began through assimilation, integration and cooption by invading religions colonisation, education and consumerism-the so called mainstream.

 

Industrialization and national control over forests have thrown traditional life-styles into disarray. Increasing displacement and migration are leading to greater urbanization and also to commodification of land in the cities where there is a boom in real estate.

 

The poor are forced to move to the cities for a livelihood and have no choice but to make do with shacks and be considered as illegal dwellers. In India more than 30 million people are directly displaced due to development intervention. The stories of displacement are multiplying.

 

Ninety - three percent of privatized agricultural holdings in Jamaica benefited major corporations, middle level farmers, professionals and politician.

 

Fisher folk in Orissa in the eastern part of India are being forced from their traditional occupations as a major Indian Corporation is developing a capital-intensive export - oriented prawn industry.

 

During the early 1980’s the stabilization program in the Philippines forced the rural poor off the land and into the forests mangroves and fisheries to survive.

 

Displacement of people and disruption of communities in large scale by World Bank development project, such as dam and infrastructure projects failed to protect adequately the rights of such displaced persons. This constitutes violations of many legally protected rights, including rights of livelihood and habitat.  As of today, there is no Government policy on rehabilitation of the displaced; it is all left to individual projects, often decided by the management arbitrarily.

 

Migrant Labour: Another issue is the plight of migrant labourers who are again the product of industrialisation and market economy. Labour migration is the result of an international economic order in which a few countries have been able to industrialise and create productive opportunities, and a host of countries which remain basically agricultural with a high rate of unemployment, and which therefore need to export their labour force.

 

Labour Migrants are the millions of skilled and semi-skilled workers from the third world countries like Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka and Thailand, moving to developed capital rich economics like Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Middle East and Taiwan. They are basically contract workers with contracts varying from six months to one or two years. They give years of their lives in exchange for a wage which they hope will give them and their families economic security. A majority of the workers are in the prime of their working lives, serving economics other than that of their home countries during their most productive years.

 

Human Rights

 

The five hundred largest corporations - i.e-, the Global 500, control some 70% of world trade. According to Frederick Clairmont in the new edition of his classic work, (Rise and Fall of Economic Liberalism: The Making of the Economic Gulag Penang: Southbound and Third World Network, 1996) states that annual revenues of the Global 500 are $10 trillion, around twice the size of the gross domestic product of the United States, the largest economy of the world.

 

In 1994, Global 500 revenues increased by 9 percent and its profits soared by a colossal 62 percent. But not withstanding such huge profits, the Global 500 in the same year (1994) eliminated 262,000 jobs. These pervasive changes in the international arena have had an impact throughout the world on all human rights but especially economic, social, cultural and environmental rights in developing countries. Today, the dominant force of economic development is not aid but trade and investment. Development is defined as “ a comprehensive economic, social, cultural and political process, which aims at the constant improvement of the well-being of the entire population and of all individuals” and “in which all human rights and fundamental freedoms can be fully realized”. The Global 500, have become important in their impact on human rights and the quality of life all around the world to be ignored or given only peripheral attention by those struggling to build a more just and sustainable future for humanity.

 

Crimes Against Humanity

 

The growing dominance of the global political economy by the 500 largest corporations has been accompanied by increasing inequality and rampant poverty. The human community is now confronted with a crisis of epic proportions, which demands a corresponding response. Even the World Bank, one of the principal agents of corporate domination of the globe, acknowledges that “around 800 million people go hungry dally and their number is expected to soar”. If current trends persist, 1.3 billion people are expected to survive on less than a dollar a day by the year 2000, 200 million more than in 1990”. Thus, hundreds of millions of persons are being denied not only their human rights but indeed the most essential of all rights, the “right to be human”. The act defines a “crime against humanity” as meaning:

 

“... murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, persecution or any other inhumane act or omission that is committed against any civilian population or any identifiable persons, whether or not it constitutes a contravention of the law enforced at the time and in the place of its commission, and that, at the time and in that place, constitutes a contravention of customary international law or conventional international law or is criminal according to the general principals of law recognized by the Community of Nations” (emphasis added). It is clear that, under this definition, the Global 500 are guilty of crimes against humanity.

 

The challenge in facing the Globalisation and unsustainable development should be through a elaborate pattern of sustainable development that still meets the interests of the south and its people.  Sustainable development as pursued by the South must first and fore most focus its efforts on meeting the developmental challenges, which are the causes of environmental degradation.  In this connection, the first objective of sustainable development must be to eradicate poverty and work for global justice.

 

 

William Stanley

UELCI – IRDWSI

5 January 2003

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