The United Nations Economic Commission Africa (ECA) has revealed that poverty has increased in Africa by 43% in the last decade from 1987 to 2003 yet the continent has an external debt of close to US$360b.
Statistics show that women make up 70% to 80% of the poorest people in Africa.
This situation is compounded by the highest rate of maternal mortality of 940 deaths for 100,000 births, the unequal distribution of resources between men and women and the spread of HIV/AIDS, especially among women and girls, ECA’s director of the African Centre for Gender and Development Josephine Ouedraogo told journalists yesterday.
In a media briefing at the on-going ECA annual conference for African finance ministers at the Speke Resort Munyonyo, she said the situation was becoming a bigger concern not only to women but also to African leaders who should recognise that rising poverty especially among the women was a systemic problem.
She said the problem should be addressed by policy makers and stakeholders especially those responsible for the management of economic and financial resources.
She said the women provide 70% of the food, basic health, education and caring services to their families in Africa yet they are not taken into account in national economic and social development statistics.
Ouedraogo said the recognition of the household economy as a major part of the national economy would help policy makers rethink the parameters of growth and development. This would also help policy makers design more accurate priority plans for gender equity and poverty reduction, she said.
On Monday, the ECA and the African Development Bank (ADB) will jointly mount a symposium with the theme: The Missing Link in Growth and Sustainable Development: Closing the Gender Gap.
This is the first time in the history of the ECA and the ADB that African finance ministers will focus the theme of their symposium on gender-related issues.
A group of economic experts who have been in discussions for three days to prepare the agenda for the African ministers have cited static trade policies in Africa as being responsible for the continent’s marginalisation in global trade, resulting in poverty.
The experts noted that whereas in 1980, Africa accounted for 6% of world merchandise trade, by 2003, that percentage had fallen to only 2.3% while that of China had increased from 1% to 6% during the same period.
One reason they gave for “this difference in performance is that Asian countries have dynamic trade policies.
