Equality and Sustainable Development: A Latin American and Caribbean perspective ALICIA BÁRCENA EXECUTIVE SECRETARY University of Oslo September 3, 2014
What ECLAC proposes: the trilogy of equality Equality is the goal, structural change is the path, and the art of politics and policymaking is the instrument Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Equality with a rights-based approach • Time for Equality (Brasilia, 2010 ): equality and economic growth are not at odds with each other, the key is to pursue equality for growth and growth for equality • Structural Change for Equality (San Salvador, 2012): more productive employment with rights as the master key for equality • Compacts for Equality (Lima, 2014): a new State-market-society equation with medium-term political agreements Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Equality as an ethical principle and ultimate goal of development • Broadening the concept of equality to encompass autonomy, recognition, dignity. • All individuals must be recognized as equal in rights – civil and political- and dignity – equality with rights-based approach • Concept goes beyond distributive fairness in terms of income, assets and resources • Considers other dimensions: capabilities, social protection and access to public goods • New development paradigm: growth for equality and equality as a driver of growth • Requires different public policies and new multi-dimensional measures in order to address these challenges Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Latin America and the Caribbean in brief • Three realities: South America, • Loss of dynamism in Central America, and the Caribbean international trade • Lack of linkages in the production • End of the commodity price structure supercycle • Middle-income trap • Financial volatility • Slowdown of economic growth • High vulnerability to weather • Lower, consumption-dependent events • Defining a new development growth • Insufficient investment agenda with equality as the pivotal element, structural • Plateauing of poverty reduction change with more • Weak natural resource and productivity and innovation, environmental governance and with high quality • Scarcity of quality public goods employment creation • Weak institutions Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Latina America and the Caribbean is at a crossroads • After a period of prosperity, the region is facing a more difficult external context and slower economic growth • Efforts must be redoubled to achieve development with a strategic focus through structural change and investment in human capacities • The State must continue along the path towards more progressive fiscal policy and public spending, with stronger institutions to promote equality in all its forms • Environmental sustainability is an imperative, which requires broad agreements and challenges existing patterns of consumption and production Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
A structural change is necessary Productivity International Environmental Investment Inequality Taxation sustainabiity linkages Closing the Investment, at For the first Move towards Regressive external gap 22.9% of time in recent Risk of sustainable “ reprimarization ” (with the tax systems; GDP, is history there production and of the export technological insufficient for have been weak non- structure, with low consumption frontier) and the development advances in contributory value added and patterns internal gap combating little investment in pillar (between sectors technology inequality and actors) Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
The policies pursued since the 1980s did not produce the rapid, sustained economic growth that was expected LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN: GDP GROWTH COMPARED WITH TOTAL GDP OF DEVELOPING COUNTRIES AND THE WORLD (Annual rates of variation) Source : Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of official figures and World Bank, World Development Indicators [online database]. Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Consumption continues to be the component sustaining this low growth LATIN AMERICA: GDP VARIATION AND CONTRIBUTION TO GROWTH OF AGGREGATE DEMAND COMPONENTS ( Percentages, on the basis of dollars at constant 2005 prices) Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of official figures. a Estimates Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
The investment rate is still too low for development LATIN AMERICA: GROSS FIXED CAPITAL FORMATION, 1950-2010 (Percentages of GDP, in dollars at constant 2005 prices) Source : ECLAC, on the basis of official figures from the countries. Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
The production structure has not changed: it is heterogeneous and a source of inequalities LATIN AMERICA (18 COUNTRIES): STRUCTURAL LATIN AMERICA (18 COUNTRIES): GDP PER WORKER, PPP HETEROGENEITY INDICATORS, AROUND 2009 AROUND 2009 (Percentages) (Thousands of dollars) Source : ECLAC, on the basis of R. Infante, “América Latina en el ‘umbral del desarrollo’ . Un ejercicio de convergencia productiva”, Working Paper , No. 14, Santiago, Chile, June 2011, unpublished. Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Productivity levels are very low in the region GDP PER PERSON EMPLOYED BY REGION, 1990-2012 (Dollars at constant 2005 prices) 75000 30000 Developed economies and European Union 62500 25000 Latin America and the Caribbean World 50000 20000 East Asia 37500 15000 25000 10000 South-East Asia and Pacific 12500 5000 0 0 1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of information from International Labour Organization (ILO). Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
The biggest challenge for Latin America and the Caribbean is transforming and diversifying the exports pattern LATIN AMERICA AND ASIA: CHANGES IN THE PATTERN OF LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN: EXPORT SPECIALIZATION AND IN THE SHARE OF WORLD EXPORTS, STRUCTURE BY TECHNOLOGY INTENSITY, 1981-2010 a 1985-2011 a (Percentages of the total) (En porcentajes) 13% 2 011 12% Participation in world exports (%) 11% 10% 9% 8% 7% 1 985 Latin America 2 011 6% 1 985 Developing Asia 5% 4% 0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% High tech exports in total exports (%) Source : Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL), sobre la base de United Nations Commodity Trade Statistics Database (COMTRADE). Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Dimensions of inequality • Inequality in educational attainment . Wide gaps are seen in the educational attainment of the poorest income quintile compared with the richest, • Inequality in access to information and communication technology : the rate of use among the highest income quintile is five times higher than the lowest income quintile. • Improvements as regards the prevalence of chronic undernutrition , with smaller differences between quintiles, except in the Plurinational State of Bolivia and Peru. • Reproductive inequalities : the percentage of 15-19 year-old women who are mothers is three to four times higher the lowest income quintile than the highest income quintile, • Improvements in achievements in terms of overcrowding and access to durable goods , with greater levels of equality. • Marked residential selectivity among high-income groups. Fall in residential segregation in the 2000s, particularly in the cities in Brazil; the situation in other countries is more varied (although declines also predominate). Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
Substantial poverty reduction, although this has come to a standstill, and high levels of inequality LATIN AMERICA: a POVERTY b AND INDIGENCE, 1980-2013 c LATIN AMERICA AND OTHER WORLD REGIONS: GINI COEFFICIENT, AROUND 2010 (Percentages) 0,60 0,50 0,50 0,45 0,41 0,37 0,40 0,34 0,34 0,33 0,30 0,20 0,10 0,00 Latin Sub- East Asia North South Western OECD America saharan and the Africa and Asia Europe (22) and the Africa Pacific Middle (8) and Caribbean (39) (10) East (9) Central (18) Asia (21) Source: ECLAC, on the basis of special tabulations of data from household surveys. Source: ECLAC, on the basis of special tabulations of data from household surveys in a Estimate for 18 countries of the region plus Haiti. the respective countries. b Total for indigent plus non-indigent poor. c The 2013 figures are projections. Trilogy of equality Alicia Bárcena
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