It’s Time to Ask the World’s Poor What They Really Want
This blog post was originally published on Huffington Post Impact. It highlights our new report on the Millennium Development Goals, “What the World Wants.”
The UN-led process for determining the next round of global development goals is officially underway. Politicians, technocrats, and bureaucrats have been effectively deputized to determine what should build upon and replace the existing Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which have a rapidly approaching deadline in 2015. The development community is planning a flurry of conferences, meetings, and consultations in at least 50 developing countries over the next six months. This process will include country and thematic consultations, a high-level panel of eminent persons making formal recommendations, and a web-based platform to solicit views from the general public.
How will the outcomes of the MDGs affect the lives of those living in extreme poverty? A mother, her child and a group of girls in rural Ethiopia.
Simply put, these high-stakes discussions will set the development agenda for a generation and likely influence how hundreds of billions of dollars are spent by both developing country and donor governments.
But something is missing: the views of the world’s poorest citizens.
Six months ago, I proposed a radical, yet simple, idea. Why not ask the world’s ordinary citizens, including the poorest and most marginalized, what they really want out of the new global development goals? Let’s hand the microphone to those who stand to benefit the most from the new development agenda. We should proactively be asking about their concerns, priorities and aspirations. And listening intently to their responses. By giving them a seat at the table, they can speak up for themselves, determine their own futures, and set their own agenda.
That is why groups like ONE are pushing for a What the World Wants Poll, a standardized set of questions that would be answered globally, covering both developing and developed countries. The resulting data would help to ground official discussions in ordinary people’s daily realities and concerns, and give a serious boost of credibility and relevance to the post-2015 framework discussions. Without it, we all run the risk of developing a well-packaged and shiny political product that falls flat with people living in urban slums, rural villages, or somewhere in between.
Although this idea seems obvious, it’s not on the agenda – at least not yet. Collectively, we need to make sure that it happens as soon as possible. If it doesn’t, then the planned consultative sessions may take place in a virtual vacuum or echo chamber that is detached from the developing world’s priorities for the next few decades.
SEE ALSO: Find out how much progress the world has made on the MDGs
To get a sense of what such a poll would discover, ONE completed a comprehensive analysis of existing household surveys in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and East Asia. While the results underscore the need for a much more comprehensive poll, the findings reinforce the wisdom of bringing average citizens into the process.
So, what does the existing data tell us?
Household Income Issues Top the List of Concerns: Roughly one-in-three respondents cite these kinds of issues as their most pressing concerns. Specific demographic groups, such as African urban youth, raise employment- and income-related concerns at a much higher rate. Put differently, so-called kitchen table issues predominate throughout the world – regardless of whether families actually have kitchens or dining room tables. This suggests that people may be clamoring for a post-2015 framework that prioritizes income-related issues as the primary catalyst for securing the freedom and flexibility to address their needs and aspirations.
Agriculture and Food Security Feature Large: Roughly one-in-seven respondents cite this as their top priority, which should not be surprising to anyone who has visited the developing world. Agriculture remains the primary, or major, source of employment and income for the vast majority of people living in developing countries. By illustration, if rural households are able to increase their small farm’s productivity and better access markets, then their means to address the multitude of immediate priorities – such as educating and keeping their children healthy – would be significantly improved.
Collectively, we must be able to look forward without losing sight of the current MDGs, to which we must remain deeply committed. The MDGs have mobilized and channeled unparalleled actions from a broad range of actors, including developing and developed country governments, non-governmental actors, and the private sector. Many developing countries have achieved unparalleled rates of improvement: reducing child mortality, combating HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other infectious diseases, and increasing school enrolment. These robust results illustrate both the power of aspirational global goals and the necessity of continuing to accelerate progress over the next three years.
Despite the immediate need for continued action, we must also ensure that the next batch of global development goals are truly inclusive, representative, and grounded in what the world wants.
Over the next few years, the global community will grapple with profound issues that will have an outsized impact on development-related investments for decades. Clearly, the UN and others are taking this process very seriously and proactively seeking out stakeholder views. If augmented by direct engagement with the world’s poorest people, these laudable efforts will undoubtedly increase the quality of the post-2015 goals and rally greater support for getting them done. At stake is a world where all people, especially the poorest among us, can truly own and chart their own course for the future.
Share your thoughts on this blog post in the comments section below, or tweet Ben Leo at @AfricaOnTheMove.
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About the Blog
The International ONE Blog is a daily log of the anti-poverty movement. The site is operated by ONE staff, with guest contributions from ONE volunteers, members and allies.
The content of each post and each comment represents the views of that author and does not necessarily reflect the views of ONE. ONE does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office, and any post expressing support or opposition for a candidate is not endorsed by ONE.
29/09/2012 at 11:29 am
Asking the poor what they want is a laudable idea. The World Bank did this just over a decade ago, and made much fanfare of what the “Voices of the Poor” were telling them. But the whole exercise raised really big questions about how the kinds of questions that are asked frame the answers that are given, how what people think the question-askers want to hear shape what they say, and how a big and powerful institution can selectively ‘listen’ to whatever it wants the ‘voices’ to be saying – so much so that, as Anne Rademacher and Raj Patel (in Karen Brock and Rosie McGee’s excellent book “Knowing Poverty”) have shown us, they search out quotes that confirm what they want to say and reject those that don’t fit the frame. So any such call needs to be made with the lessons of this exercise in full view and a recognition that those who intermediate the acquisition and translation of voices also have a hand in shaping what they say…
08/10/2012 at 7:37 pm
Capitism causes Poverty not good for the People
Love What yous do massive Respects
One Love
09/10/2012 at 12:38 am
Grow Everything ;o)) Food -Life-Planet
It’s time to build a Future where everyone always has enough to eat
Today in the 21st century ,nearly one billion People worldwide don’t have enough to eat
Not because there is’nt enough food,but because of deep injustices in the way the food system works,& because to many of the ways we grow food today are using & destroying the natural resources on which we all rely.
The system is bust,but together we can make a Positive one.
Together,we can create a very different future, A future where our climate is brought under control. A future where rising food prices don’t through whole families into poverty. A future where poor farmers are given support to thrive,not kicked off their farm land without warning. & A future where more food is grown,more fairly and sustainably .
Together,we can grow better,live better & share better
Welcome to GROW -Oxfam’s new campaign to help build a future where everyonealways has enough to eat.
In the UK, We’ll be focusing on 4 major food systems
Climate change
Because the temperatures rise crop yields will fall and extreme weather events will get worse and happen more often.
Food price spikes
Because when you spend up to 80% of your income on food -as the poor families do- spikes in the food costs are especially destructive.
Land grabs
Because across the globe, secretive land deals are forcing poor farmers from the land they’re living off .
Small scale farming
Because it’s time to unleash the enormous potential of small scale farmers in developing countries
This is ambitious. but that’s because it has to be .And together ,we can turn this ambition into one amazing reality.
Grow Everything ;o)) Food -Life-Planet
Grow is a vision for a brighter future -it starts here & it starts with us all -so join the movement -& help create a world where everyone always has enough to eat
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/grow
Was at the festival yesterday great set up & cool artists ;o))
stalls of natural goods ;o)) Please share ;o)) One Love
16/10/2012 at 2:41 pm
Unfortunately this is not currently the case. A nmebur of key milestones have already been pushed back, most noticeably the date for the roll-out of universal broadband. This has now been moved from 2012 to 2015. And even at this point, the government is only promising access speeds of 2Mbps. The government appears to be pinning most of its hopes on the private sector to move the country forward and they are certainly heading in the right direction. In July, national download speeds rose to 5.2Mbps.But the question of rural connectivity still remains unanswered and it s not yet clear whether the Big Society will be able to make significant inroads, especially when the costs are currently so prohibitive.It will be interesting to see what impact Martha Lane Fox and her digital champions can have here. Thanks,Gareth