Question

Question 3
a. Discuss the assertion that poverty is multifaceted
b. Why do many African nations such as Ghana with abundant natural resources remain poor?

Answer 1

a.

According to the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), poverty is not a one-dimensional phenomenon (e.g. "only" a lack of money) but a multidimensional issue that requires a wide range of solutions for a wide range of problems.

Poverty is lack of freedom, enslaved by crushing daily burden, by depression and fear of what the future will bring,

This definition is supported by that of the World Bank which recognizes that poverty results from several political, social, and economical processes that interact in ways to make people’s living conditions worse and worse.

The driving force behind this rising popularity is the broad acknowledgment that poverty is about more than just low incomes. Low consumption and inadequate living standards lie at the heart of what most people understand by the word “poverty”, to be sure. But the associations conjured up by that term also include aspects of poor health, a shortened lifespan, limited access to education, knowledge, and information, and powerlessness in various domains. Poor people themselves will often allude to non-income dimensions as crucial to their perception of their own hardships.

Poverty is also a multifaceted phenomenon where different societies have different perceptions of poverty. It varies across countries with different socio-economic norms. It may also change over time even in the same society, with different stages of social and economic development.

b.

It shall be noted that Africa has a large number of oil reserves, natural resources, including diamond, sugar, salt, gold, iron, cobalt, uranium, copper, bauxite, silver, petroleum , cocoa beans, woods, and tropical fruits.

Despite this abundance of natural resources, Africa is poor. This is because of the following reasons:

1) Western nations like the United States, Canada, Australia, France, and the United Kingdom often exploit Africa's natural resources today, causing most of the value and money from the natural resources to go to the West rather than Africa, further causing the poverty in Africa.

2) Rampant corrupt administration does not allow the aids & grants provided to African countries to trickle down to the local population.

3) A large percentage of the money from aids & grants was either invested in weapons (money that was spent back in developed nations, and provided little or no benefit to the native population) or was directly misappropriated by corrupt governments.

4) The money was spent on large projects in African country - Ghana, that turned out to be a waste of resources:

• The Akosombo Dam was built to supply electricity for the extraction of aluminum from bauxite. Unfortunately, Ghanaian ores turned out to be too low grade and the electricity is now used to process ores from other nations.
• Storage silos for the storage of cocoa were built to allow Ghana to take advantage of fluctuations in the commodity prices. Unfortunately, unprocessed cocoa does not react well to even short-term storage and the silos now sit empty

5) Many native groups in Africa believe family relationships are more important than national identity, and people in authority often use nepotism and bribery for the benefit of their extended family group at the expense of their nations.

6) The widespread availability of cheap labor has often perpetuated policies that encourage inefficient agricultural and industrial practices, leaving Africa further impoverished.

7) African nations have a paucity of persons with university degrees, and advanced degrees are rare in most areas. As such, the continent, for the most part, lacks scientists, engineers, and even teachers.

8) The very high mortality rate

9) Political unrest, ethical conflict, religious conflict, and active terrorist activities further harm the chances of development in the regions concerned as they do not only cause economic downturns but also cause severe damage to the often already underdeveloped infrastructure as well as government shutdowns, further worsen the often already tense safety situation and cause large numbers of refugees.

10) Existence of high level of poverty  which in turn increases propensity and severity of disasters and reduces peoples' capacity to recover and reconstruct