Millennium Villages Blog

In sub-Saharan Africa, primary school net enrollment jumped from 53% in 1991 to 70% in 2006

Recent public debates have re-focused public attention on Sub-Saharan Africa’s economic development over the past few decades. Many pundits are driving this with rhetoric suggesting there has been a long-term decline in living standards throughout Africa. But the facts show that this is simply not the case.

In a recent post on the Global Brief blog I describe some of the considerable progress the region has experienced in recent years. For example, between 1999 and 2005, the share of Africans living in extreme poverty dropped 7%, from 58% to 51% - a faster rate of progress than South Asia’s over the same period.

Over the past few decades, the region has also seen tremendous progress in social development. For example:

• Africa’s under-5 child mortality rates declined from 229 per 1,000 births in 1970 to 146 in 2007.
• Measles deaths dropped by 90% in just six years, from roughly 396,000 per year in 2000 to 36,000 per year in 2006.
• AIDS treatment has expanded from reaching roughly 10,000 people in 2001 to more than 2 million in 2008.
• Primary school net enrolments jumped from 53% to 70% between 1991 and 2006.
• Adult literacy increased from approximately 27% in 1970 to 62% in 2007.

These are just a few of the success stories arising from strong local leadership and supportive international partnership. These successes can be replicated and expanded, which is why it is so important to debunk the claims of African regress and to understand how misguided it is when people call for the international community to disengage from supporting Africa.

To read the full blog post, visit http://globalbrief.ca/johnwmcarthur/2009/06/13/how-much-progress-in-africa/

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