Agencies Say Poverty Persists Despite Global Efforts

By Paul Blustein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 23, 2004; Page A24

Major success at reducing poverty in China and India is offset by so much bad news in other countries that an international effort to improve the lot of the world's poor is seriously off track in many respects, according to a report released yesterday by leading aid agencies.

The report said that the poverty declines fueled by rapid economic growth in China and India, the world's two most populous nations, make the achievement of a key United Nations goal very likely: cutting in half the percentage of people living on less than $1 a day between 1990 and 2015. East Asia has already met the goal, according to the report, which predicted that most regions -- sub-Saharan Africa being a major exception -- will "achieve or come close to" it.

But based on current trends, the report said, most developing countries will not meet the "Millennium Development Goals" established in a 2000 U.N. declaration. Those cover aspects of living standards such as education, health and access to clean water. The first goal, to eliminate "preferably by 2005" the disparity between boys' and girls' education at the primary and secondary levels, is unlikely to be achieved by one-third of developing countries even by 2015, the report said.

With a combined population of 2.3 billion, China and India are so big that, statistically, their success at lifting people above the poverty line "can drag the rest of the world along," World Bank President James D. Wolfensohn said at a news conference. "But if you go into the Millennium Goals and look at education, at health, at environment, at the rights of girls to go to school, at those things, you'll find that the progress is at best mixed and that, globally, we are not going to achieve the goals."

The report, which will be presented Sunday to the World Bank's policy-setting development committee in Washington, offers fresh evidence of the need for a drastic increase in aid from rich countries, according to Wolfensohn, who has often made such pleas. He particularly lamented the bank's problems in mobilizing funding for its "Education for All" initiative, aimed at ensuring that all children in poor countries receive a primary education by 2015.

Wolfensohn said the bank is "quite embarrassed with a number of countries that are ready to go on Education for All, do not have the money, but have very good plans that are well-integrated and well-supported, and they say to us, 'Well, now, we have done what you have asked us to do -- where is the money?' " The bank has sought $800 million to $900 million a year from donors to cover program costs for about 10 poor nations, but "every country says, 'We have already given at the office; we have already given help to education,' " he said.

Wolfensohn said the Bush administration deserves credit for increasing U.S. foreign aid by 50 percent. "I think they have actually done quite a lot. But quite a lot is still 0.14 percent of the U.S. [gross domestic product]," he said.

Asked why more aid is the answer when China and India have shown the importance of economic growth in alleviating poverty, Shengman Zhang, a World Bank managing director, said that aid "can provide impetus" for countries that aren't yet growing. "While aid is not everything, it can be very helpful," he said.