---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Sun, 11 Jul 1999 21:32:16 -0700 (PDT) From: MichaelP <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "unlikely.suspects": ; Subject: Inequality and globalisation - the UN reports "Among the biggest beneficiaries of globalisation are criminals, who can now exploit worldwide markets for drugs, arms and prostitutes." ======================================= INDEPENDENT (London) July 12 INTERNET HELPS MAKE THE WORLD MORE UNEQUAL THAN IT HAS EVER BEEN BEFORE IT'S MOST UNEQUAL SINCE RECORDS BEGAN GLOBAL INEQUALITY ACCELERATES TO THE WORST LEVELS IN HISTORY ACCESS TO THE NET: THE NEW INDEX OF DEPRIVATION FOR THE WORLD'S POOR ============ AVERAGE INCOME in the world's five richest countries is 74 times the level in the poorest five, the widest the inequality gap has ever been. The tenth anniversary edition of the United Nations Human Development Report, which ranks countries according to their level of economic and social development, describes the growing gap as "grotesque" and calls for urgent action to make the world a fairer place. A special message from Ted Turner, the media mogul who donated $1bn (pounds 602m) to the UN last year, echoes the report's demand for poverty reduction. "It is as if globalisation is in fast forward and the world's ability to react to it is in slow motion," he writes. Other figures show that the world's richest 200 (Mr Turner is 38th) have more than doubled their wealth in the four years to 1998, to more than one trillion dollars (pounds 602bn). The 20 per cent of the world's population that lives in developed countries enjoy 86 per cent of the income. The figures in this year's report show the UK climbing from 14th to 10th in the human development ranking, which incorporates life expectancy, literacy and educational indicators as well as the more conventional GDP per head. The improvement, reflecting figures up to 1997, is due mainly to increasing enrolment in higher education. However, the UK fares worse on indicators of poverty. A high proportion of the population living on less than 50 per cent of median income and a high proportion unable to read and write well enough to function take it to number 15 in the poverty rankings. Canada, Norway and the US top the human development table, as they did in 1998. At the bottom of the table, dominated by sub-Saharan Africa, lie Sierra Leone, Niger and Ethiopia. A chapter on technology highlights the unequal spread of new technologies such as the Internet and biotechnology. Only in the richest countries is Internet access widespread, and even there it is mainly a white, male, upper-income group phenomenon. Basic phone connections are rare outside big cities in the developing world, and can be poor in the rainy season. Thailand has more mobile phones than all of Africa. The Human Development Report is highly critical of the international rules that have allowed western multinationals to corner intellectual property rights and patents. This is allowing corporations to hijack traditional remedies. For example, two researchers at the University of Mississippi were granted a US patent for using turmeric to heal wounds, a practice which had been common knowledge in India for thousands of years. The patent was eventually repealed thanks to evidence provided by an ancient Sanskrit text. The exploitation of traditional knowledge has created a new skill: "bioprospecting". A few firms have agreed to pay royalties to countries on sales of drugs successfully derived from indigenous materials. Some multinationals are praised for their good global citizenship. For example, Mattel, the Disney organisation and Nike are singled out in the document for improving working conditions and pay in their Asian factories. The report, to be formally launched in London today by Clare Short, the Secretary of State for International Development, says such voluntary action will not be enough and pleads for "a rewriting of the rules of globalisation". Its action plan includes controversial proposals for new international organisations such as a global central bank in addition to the IMF and a world investment trust that could redistribute incomes globally. It also urges a "bit tax" on Internet use to generate finance for the spread of new technology. However, Mark Malloch Brown, the administrator of the UN Development Programme, takes issue with the report's findings. In a foreword he emphasises the need to make existing institutions work better and says markets must remain the "central organising principle of global economic life". THE WIDENING GAP: MAIN POINTS OF THE UN REPORT * The three richest people in the world, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Paul Allen, have total assets - $156bn, according to Forbes magazine - greater than the combined GNP of the 43 least developed countries. More than 600 million live in these mainly sub-Saharan African states. * The number of computers connected to the Internet was 36 million in 1998; ten years earlier it was 100,000. * A Bangladeshi would have to save all of his wages for eight years to buy a computer; an American needs only one month's salary. * Of all the patents in the world, 97 per cent are held by industrialised countries. * Organised crime syndicates are estimated to gross 15 trillion dollars (nine trillion pounds) a year. * More than 80 countries have a lower per capita income today than a decade ago. * Of all the new HIV infections, 95 per cent happen in developing nations. World-wide, 16,000 people are infected every day. * Half of the $30bn (pounds 18bn) that was grossed by Hollywood films in 1997 was taken at box offices outside the United States. * Each day one-and-a-half trillion dollars (pounds 900bn) flows through the world's currency markets. * The number of telephones per 100 people in Cambodia is one; in Monaco it is 99. * Tanzania spends nine times more on repaying debts than on health care and four times more than it spends on education. ===================== Guardian (London) Monday July 12, 1999 UN attacks growing gulf between rich and poor Charlotte Denny and Victoria Brittain The combined wealth of the world's three richest families is greater than the annual income of 600m people in the least developed countries, according to a United Nations report out today, and a "grotesque" gap between the rich and poor is widening. Economic globalisation is creating a dangerous polarisation between multi-billionaires like Microsoft's Bill Gates, the Walton family who own the Wal-Mart empire, and the Sultan of Brunei - who have a combined worth of $135bn - and the millions who have been left behind, the UN's annual human development report states. In the report Ted Turner, the billionaire who owns CNN, says: "Globalisation is in fast forward, and the world's ability to understand and react to it is in slow motion." The UN is calling for a rewriting of global economic rules to avoid inequalities between poor countries and wealthy individuals. It also wants a more representative system of global governance to buffer the effects of a "boom and bust" economy. UN figures show that over the last four years, the world's 200 richest people have doubled their wealth to more than $1trillion ($1,000bn). The number of people living on less than a dollar a day has remained unchanged at 1.3bn. "Global inequalities in income and living standards have reached grotesque proportions," the report says. Thirty years ago, the gap between the richest fifth of the world's people and the poorest stood at 30 to 1. By 1990 it had widened to 60 to 1 and today it stands at 74 to 1. In terms of consumption, the richest fifth account for 86% while the bottom fifth account for just 1%. Almost 75% of the world's telephone lines - essential for new technologies like the net - are in the west, yet it has just 17% of the world's population. Canada ranks number one once again for quality of life, according to the UN's index of human development. War- ravaged Sierra Leone stays bottom of the league table. The UK has moved up four places in the table to number ten, beating France into 11th place. Globalisation is now more than just the flow of money and trade, the report says. The world's people are growing ever more interdependent as the amount of space and time available to them decreases. Even a seemingly isolated event, like the devaluation of the Thai baht in July 1997, can spark a global financial panic. The UN estimates that the current global economic difficulties will wipe $2trillion off annual world output between 1998 and 2000. "The world is rushing headlong into greater integration, driven mostly by a philosophy of market profitability and economic efficiency," says the report's main author, Richard Jolly. "We must bring human development and social protection into the equation." Breakthroughs like the internet can offer a fast track to growth, but at present only the rich and educated benefit. Of the net's users, 88% live in the west, says the report, adding: "The literally well connected have an overpowering advantage over the unconnected poor, whose voices and concerns are being left out of the global conversation." Among the biggest beneficiaries of globalisation are criminals, who can now exploit worldwide markets for drugs, arms and prostitutes. Underworld bosses now command organisations with the global reach of multinational companies and six major international crime syndicates are believed to gross $1.5 trillion annually from the proceeds of crime. "They are now developing strategic alliances linked in a global network, reaping the benefits of globalisation," the report warns. To counter the downside of globalisation, the UN makes a number of recommendations, including an international forum of business, trade unions and environmental and development groups to counter the dominance of the G7 in global decision making; a code of conduct for multinationals; and the creation of an international legal centre to help poor countries conduct global trade negotiations. ================================= *** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. 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