DEVELOPMENT

Development implies progress.

In today’s world, this implies progress is being made in technology, production, and socioeconomic welfare (quality of life.)

Geographer’s Perspective of World Economies

• Geographers are interested in the distribution of wealth in the world today.– What are the patterns of wealth worldwide?– Why is wealth distributed in the manner

that it is?– What can be done to improve the wealth of

the poorer countries?

Gdp per capita

population

Keys to development include commercial energy consumption

An important factor in measuring development is PPP (purchasing power parity per capita.)

Monetary measurement which take account of what money actually buys in each country

Measures of development: caloric intake

Measure of development: Percentage of people working in agriculture

Rubenstein textbook splits education level into literacy and education level

Village of 100

Based on what you know, rank the five richest and five poorest countries in the world.

Human development indicatorsHIGH HUMAN DEVELOPMENT - 2009

1 Iceland2 Norway3 Australia4 Canada5 Ireland6 Sweden7 Switzerland8 Japan 0.8619 Netherlands10 France11 Finland12 United States13 Spain14 Denmark15 Austria16 United Kingdom

17 Belgium18 Luxembourg19 New Zealand20 Italy21 Hong Kong, China (SAR)22 Germany .. 23 Israel24 Greece25 Singapore

Based on gdp per capita, literacy, level of education, and life expectancy

160 Guinea161 Rwanda162 Angola163 Benin164 Malawi165 Zambia166 Côte d’Ivoire167 Burundi168 Congo (Democratic Republic of the)169 Ethiopia170 Chad171 Central African Republic172 Mozambique173 Mali174 Niger175 Guinea-Bissau176 Burkina Faso177 Sierra Leone178 South Sudan

Notable Countries:Nigeria – 158Haiti – 146Pakistan – 136India – 128Palestinian “territories” 106Israel - 23Russia 67Mexico 52Brazil – 70China – 81Jamaica - 101

Geography and development

How many former colonies have become developed countries?

Understanding development in context of scale.

A matter of local, regional, and global scale.

Local and regional societies were disrupted by colonialism.

Colonies became a source for resources and a captive market.

The historical pivot of development by today’s standards would be…

The Industrial Revolution and colonialism made colonies dependent on colonizers and brought wealth to colonizers at the expense of colonies.

The poor countries are still experiencing “neo-colonialism” today.

Many economic theories state that economic disparities are built into the world economic system.

Non economic factors of development: sanitation

Lack of clean water retards the ability of many countries to improve their standard of living.

Non-economic aspects of development

Non economic factors of development: health services

Development and IKEA