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The infant mortality rate in was seventeen per 1, live births; the under-five mortality rate was twenty per 1, Historically, Argentina has been through phases of wealth and stability punctuated by periods of political and economic chaos. The events in the early years of the twenty-first century, however, were extreme in the number and kinds of people who were thrown into poverty, known in the country as the "new poor. In the economy of Argentina fell into a recession.
By November of that year the government, unable to repay its international debts, moved toward freezing citizens' bank accounts throughout the country so that it would have access to enough money to keep it stable through the crisis. The threat of having the accounts frozen threw Argentines into a panic, and they began withdrawing as much of their funds as possible. This temporarily prevented a run on the banks, but not for long. On December 19 four days of sporadic unrest in a few cities—with Argentines surrounding and in some cases storming grocery stores demanding food—erupted into nationwide rioting.
The threat of a total economic collapse quickly caused widespread anxiety and chaos. In response, the government declared a "state of siege," a thirty-day period during which most of Argentina's constitutional guarantees were suspended. Poor, middle- and working-class Argentines who were unemployed resorted to looting and picking through garbage heaps for food. With banks still closed, Argentines were not only unable to access their accounts but were also prevented from cashing checks or using debit services and credit cards. They were effectively rendered penniless indefinitely.
By the time the crisis began to ease in April , at least twenty-seven people had been killed in food riots and millions of Argentines had been reduced, at least temporarily, to poverty. A Poverty Assessment Report No. By contrast, the informal sector—which typically employs more poor people—actually grew by , jobs between to , which implies that more people were forced into less secure, lower-wage jobs. Besides rising prices and unemployment rates, Argentines experienced an overall decrease in income between the late s and the early s, mostly during the crisis period.
Bolivia, in central South America, is a country that has experienced nearly political coups since it won independence from Spain in Although the country is rich in natural resources—including silver, tin, rubber, and natural gas —a history of human rights abuses especially against indigenous Indians , involvement in the drug trade with its coca crops used to produce cocaine , and a series of military dictatorships that mismanaged the economy left Bolivia the poorest country in the Latin American region, with two-thirds of its estimated nine million citizens living in poverty in According to the U.
State Department in Background Note: Bolivia April 14, , http: The economy was temporarily stabilized during the mids under the presidency of Paz Estenssoro. Estenssoro implemented an intensive restructuring program that turned the economy around between and , but not without serious social unrest because the "shock therapy" left tens of thousands of government workers unemployed.
Two more presidents were democratically elected. Violent protests were common under the Lozada administration. The next president, Hugo Banzer, continued with privatization, but less successfully. Economic growth and job creation slowed. Banzer also began a campaign to destroy Bolivia's illegal coca crops, on which most rural indigenous farmers depended for their livelihoods. In February a protest turned violent and thirty people were killed.
More deadly violence erupted in September during protests against privatization of the natural gas industry. A former coca leaf farmer, Morales ran on a platform of antiprivatization as well as social and government reform. Morales's pro-socialist leanings are perceived as a threat by many, including the United States , which has aggressively campaigned against Bolivia's coca growing by physically eradicating crops and objects to Morales's close ties with the socialist regimes of Cuba and Venezuela.
The unsettled political situation has been detrimental to human development in the country. The World Health Organization , http: UNICEF estimated that 18, deaths occurred among children under five years old in , which equaled a rate of sixty-nine per 1, http: UNICEF also noted that approximately 2, unaccompanied children were living on the streets of Bolivian cities in Poverty in Bolivia is more prevalent among indigenous people than among the population overall.
Indigenous Indians in Bolivia averaged between 5. The Central Asian republics—Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan—were all republics of the Soviet Union until they achieved independence in Officially, they are now a part of the Commonwealth of Independent States , which is dominated by Russia and includes all the former Soviet states of the Eurasia region. However, the Central Asian republics, while having a twentieth-century history rooted in the Soviet bloc and still politically tied to Russia, are fundamentally different ethnically, religiously, and economically.
In one sense, the Central Asian republics are transition economies: However, their general adherence to authoritarianism and their high rates of extreme poverty make them far less developed than other former Soviet countries. The Central Asian republics have abundant natural resources and growing economies, but their human development indicators are in general seriously lacking because overall poverty has increased and human security has decreased since independence.
In the ILO adopted for the first time a purely child-oriented treaty: With the Convention on the Rights of the Child of a child-centered approach became popular. In many countries cultural barriers have traditionally served to prohibit smoking by women. Data from Gasparini, Gutierrez, and Tornarolli In contrast with the broad convergence of male and female smoking prevalence across much of Europe and North America , huge disparities in tobacco use by gender remain in many developing countries. This organization has made concerted efforts to stop developing countries from becoming committed to tobacco control, to divide the World Health Organization from other United Nations agencies and restrict its funding, and to create an international consortium to mobilize officials from developing countries to advance pro-tobacco positions Zeltner et al. Insight into the Future , http:
According to some international observers, nearly all the Central Asian republics are in danger of igniting an explosive political situation, putting the human needs even more at risk of not being met. Kazakhstan , http: Between and , though, Kazakhstan rose on the HDI to seventy-eighth place, due largely to its steady economic growth that averaged However, as with other developing regions, a growing economy has not necessarily translated to a decrease in poverty or an increase in the standard of living for ordinary people, especially for those living in rural areas.
As in Russia, poverty in Kazakhstan tends to be shallow, meaning that the greatest number of the poor are concentrated near the poverty line. The UNDP's Millennium Development Goals in Kazakhstan, reports a large gap between urban and rural households in the availability of in-house utilities. Sanitation was also lacking in rural households: This situation in particular seems to be worsening over time. Given that the public expenditure on health has been decreasing since , this is a partial explanation for these worsening conditions.
Eliminate Extreme Poverty and Hunger , http: In rural regions, however, the poverty rate averaged This huge gap indicates uneven development and growth throughout the country. Kazakhstan has already exceeded the MDG of universal primary school education: Insight into the Future , http: However, the country has a high inequality ratio because of the great differences between rural and urban areas, especially in secondary education. Achieve Universal Primary Education , http: Hundreds of Kazakhstan's rural communities have no schools, and even in the areas where schools are present children may have to travel long distances to attend them.
As a result, rural children find it increasingly difficult to attain the skills they will need to succeed. Furthermore, the smaller of Kazakhstan's one hundred or more ethnic groups have problems in school because Kazakh and Russian are the dominant languages used in schools. Overall government spending on education has increased, from 3. The increase has not been uniform across oblasts, or provinces, however.
In some regions, spending has decreased, including in the heavily impoverished Mangystau oblast, where education spending dropped from 2. Life expectancy in Kazakhstan is fairly low: Healthy life expectancy at birth in was Under-five child mortality in was eighty-three per 1, live births for males and sixty-two for females. Different agencies within the country report different numbers for maternal mortality, and there are to date no official statistics.
The Kazakhstan Ministry of Health reports that there were Both groups report a decrease between and , to This indicates an issue with the quality of obstetric care. One of the biggest health challenges confronting Kazakhstan since the dissolution of the Soviet Union is drug use.
Because of its location on the drug trafficking route between the major drug producers of Southwest Asia to major drug-consuming regions such as Russia and Eastern Europe , Kazakhstan has become a major link on the route. Kazakhstan " , Kazakhstan's customs union with Russia, Belarus, and the Ukraine permits the passage of closed containers without inspection across borders, making it especially attractive to smugglers.
Kazakhstan, however, does not just provide a passage through which illicit drugs can easily pass. The country is also becoming a bigger producer of heroin and cannabis for use within its own borders. As in all countries with a high rate of intravenous drug use, HIV infection is on the rise in Kazakhstan. Suicide is a major cause of death among the HIV-positive population of Kazakhstan. Kyrgyzstan is a small, almost entirely mountainous, landlocked country of about five million people. Historically, the people of the region were nomadic, but when it was incorporated into the Soviet Union in , Kyrgyzstan was converted to an agricultural-manufacturing lifestyle and economy.
By the time the Central Asian republics were granted independence in , Kyrgyzstan's manufacturing sector relied almost entirely on the Soviet Union's military-industrial complex. With its collapse, Kyrgyzstan's manufacturing sector also fell apart, which left its economy in ruins. As in much of the rest of the world, poverty in Kyrgyzstan is heavily concentrated in rural regions. The overall rate of extreme poverty in was For those in rural regions the extreme poverty rate dropped between and , from According to the World Health Organization , http: The healthy life expectancy at birth was In the under-five child mortality was seventy-two per 1, live births for boys and sixty-three per 1, for girls.
Like Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan has a growing presence in the international drug trade and, consequently, an increasing number of intravenous drug users and HIV cases. Additionally, Kyrgyzstan has high rates of deaths from circulatory and respiratory diseases, and incidences of tuberculosis, syphilis, and malaria have increased since the s.
After independence in , Tajikistan fell into a civil war that lasted from to The conflict seriously deteriorated conditions throughout the country, which has not entirely recovered as of Food insecurity and malnutrition are key poverty-related problems for Tajiks: Families reported cutting down on food consumption and relying on food given as gifts to get by.
Unbalanced diets that cause a number of nutritional deficiencies are the norm in Tajikistan, especially an over-dependence on bread as a primary source of nutrition. Children are the demographic group most affected by nutritional deficiencies. The most common nutritional problems, other than simply a lack of food, in Tajikistan are deficiencies of iodine, folic acid, vitamin A, and iron. Vitamin A deficiency can cause blindness and increases susceptibility to infectious diseases.
Overall malnutrition and food insecurity increased in Tajikistan between and , according to a March press release from the UNDP's donors agency. Twenty-seven percent of rural Tajik households were either chronically food insecure or at risk of food insecurity. Hunger, food insecurity, and malnutrition were not limited to Tajikistan's poorest households.
Even steadily employed householders reported a lack of adequate food. Low income was not, however, the only reason for such widespread food insecurity. All the former Soviet republics have generally high rates of primary school enrollment and literacy because of the former Soviet Union's compulsory education system.
Even after the Soviets introduced their program of state-run schools into the country, the subject of education was not always welcomed by the native population; Islamic leaders vocally opposed public education, and antieducation violence resulted in school burnings and the murders of teachers.
Nevertheless, in "Country Sheet: Healthy life expectancy at birth was Under-five child mortality was deaths per 1, live births for males and per 1, live births for females in Data on infant mortality vary by source. Existing birth and death records are not considered reliable in Tajikistan. Tajikistan's health ministry chief believed the numbers could actually be three or four times higher.
In fact, if the number of HIV cases continues to increase at its rate, experts say the number could double every thirteen months "Tajikistan: Besides its role in the drug trade, Tajikistan has many citizens who temporarily migrate abroad—mostly to Russia—for work. Increasingly, these migrant workers become infected abroad and bring the disease back to Tajikistan, where they spread HIV. Turkmenistan is considered the most closed society in the former Soviet bloc. In July the last international radio outlet to broadcast in the country—Russia's Mayak radio station—was cut off by Turkmenistan's authoritarian government, leaving the Turkmen people with no access to outside information.
Although exact figures are difficult to obtain because Turkmenistan does not have an established poverty line and what calculations the government does keep are not widely available, poverty is believed to be high and human development indicators low despite the potential for national wealth because of the country's huge oil and natural gas reserves. Turkmen president Saparmurat Niyazov has ruled Turkmenistan since independence in , but in he declared himself "president for life" and adopted the title "Turkmenbashi," which means "father of all Turkmen.
The Turkmen government controls all media and communications and refuses to report health data to the World Health Organization or development information to the United Nations. In March the Turkmen government imposed a ban on the issuance of exit visas to its citizens, preventing them from leaving the country. Threats of trade sanctions from the United States caused the Turkmen regime to abandon the exit visa ban in January , although the government maintains a blacklist of people not allowed to travel.
Because of this atmosphere, the United Nations has been unable to research and publish a human development report on Turkmenistan since the s. As of early the country was on uneasy terms with the World Bank because it refused to report its international debt, so all statistics related to poverty are speculative and based on data that are in most cases ten years old.
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Rechel and McKee note that "there is anecdotal evidence that the economic situation has deteriorated considerably since then. Like all other statistics about the country, information on the health and education status of the Turkmen people is of dubious accuracy; the last time the country reported health data to the World Health Organization was in When they are able to see a doctor, extortion is not uncommon because the medical system is essentially a black market: In Niyazov dismissed 15, health care professionals and replaced them with untrained military conscripts people who have been drafted into the military involuntarily to cut down on government spending.
In he announced that all hospitals outside the capital city of Ashgabat would be closed indefinitely. In the World Health Organization , http: The child mortality rate for those under five years old had risen from ninety-seven per 1, live births in to per 1, in , as reported by UNICEF; an estimated 11, Turkmen children under five years old died in http: In late the Turkmen government began cutting benefits to about , of the country's , people, mostly the elderly, who receive government pensions. Pension Cuts Begin to Bite," February 6, , http: This move was expected to push thousands of older people into almost instant poverty.
Uzbekistan is the most populous of the Central Asian republics, with Poverty in Uzbekistan is not generally as dire as in some of the other Central Asian republics. The country is the fourth-largest producer of cotton in the world and the seventh-largest producer of gold; in addition, it has large reserves of gas and oil. In some regions the prevailing tradition is that children combine work and school, whereas in other regions girls in particular do neither — generally because they are busy with domestic duties. Latin American countries most markedly have children in the former category, Asian countries the latter, with African countries placed in between.
Socioeconomic factors that influence the rate of child labor include economic growth though not always with a decreasing effect on child labor ; the adult labor market for women in particular ; parents' level of education; access to school as well as other community facilities; and household composition. Culturally, it is widely accepted in the developing world that children engage in work. Taking a share in the family income generation or in household duties is not only vital for survival or comfort but also an integral aspect of the child's moral and physical education. Children's health is influenced by their work in many ways.
Statistics in this field are most often poor or lacking, and in macro studies it is not possible to point to clear and unambiguous relationships. Work may have positive effects on children's health in some situations, for the poorest children by contributing to the mere means of subsistence. On the other hand, children are more sensitive to influences of noise, heat, certain chemicals, and toxics, and they are more prone to accidents than adults.
Furthermore, children tend to work in the most unsafe sectors. By far the largest group, over two-thirds, of economically active children is found within primary production, particularly in agriculture. Manufacture, trade, and domestic services are less hazardous but also count a smaller proportion of laboring children, with a total share of one-fourth. Children employed in construction, transportation, and mining are exposed to very high health and safety risks, but the proportion of children in these business sectors is relatively small, below 10 percent.
The unpaid work that most children undertake within the family does not generally appear to be safer or more favorable to their health than paid work. Finally, although long-term effects of child labor cannot be clearly identified, there seems to be a correlation between inferior health standards in adulthood and child labor, particularly for women.
All three organizations assist governments in developing policies and strategies, and they also support implementation programs. Though only a very small share of working children is involved in export businesses, trade mechanisms including sanctions are prominent in the public debates on the issue. In the World Trade Organization WTO , however, binding statutes against trade involving child labor are being strongly opposed, particularly by developing countries that see protectionism as the underlying motive.
There is a broad consensus that trade sanctions are a double-edged instrument that may have adverse effects on children.
Collaborative initiatives between the human rights and business sectors are on the other hand a fast-expanding field. In the UN launched a program, Global Compact, to work directly with companies, with "effective abolition of child labour" as one of the nine goals. The United States has a long tradition of unilaterally applying certain labor standards, encompassing prohibition of child labor, to trade agreements.
In the early s, both the United States and the European Union EU have a so-called General System of Preferences granting trade benefits to countries that live up to certain labor standards. Other measures to combat child labor have been developed by individual companies as well as business sectors, often in cooperation with nongovernmental organizations. These initiatives include the promotion of investment and trade principles, demands on suppliers in developing countries, and the labeling of products.
Despite these efforts, given the many and complex interests embedded in child labor issues, strategies to combat the adverse effects of child labor must operate at many different levels and include all stakeholders, including children themselves. What Worksfor Working Children. The Case of Child Labour. Cunningham, Hugh, and Pier Paolo Viazzo, eds.
Child Labour in Historical Perspective, — Case Studies from Europe , Japan , and Colombia. Grootaert, Christiaan, and Harry Anthony Patrinos, eds. The Policy Analysis of Child Labor: New Global Estimates on Child Labour. Maitra, Pushkar, and Ray Ranjan. Comparative Evidence from Three Continents.
O'Donnell, Owen, Furio C. Rosati, and Eddy van Doorslaer. Child Labour and Health: Evidence and Research Issues. Child Rights Information Network. International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour. Cite this article Pick a style below, and copy the text for your bibliography.