Strategic planning economic development

The terms economic growth and economic development are often used synonymously. Economic growth refers to the increase in the total goods and services produced in the economy. It is associated with the growth of an economy in terms of increase in income or per capita income. The concept of economic development is in transition. A brief analysis of the economic development strategies adopted by the third world countries may give insights on their developmental thought process and enable us to assess them in the light of the current challenges.

Any discussion, on the economies of developing nations, cannot ignore the social, cultural, economic and traditional loss incurred by these countries due to colonization. This is more so in the case of African nations that had experienced centuries of slavery, depriving them of their men and material. However, the Asian countries, particularly East Asian and the South Asian countries, could overcome these lacunae, by achieving outstanding human resource development. African nations are far off in the race, with daunting challenges like environmental degradation due to long-lasting civil wars, ethnic clashes and not very well developed political and economic institutions. In spite of numerous efforts and initiatives, poverty eradication remains a major challenge for countries across the world. The Sub-Saharan African countries, in particular, face extreme poverty and malnutrition. As such, eradication of poverty and hunger is the topmost priority of the Millennium Declaration.

This goal is further segregated into three targets of:

Bringing down the proportion of population living on less than a dollar a day,

Achieving full and productive employment for women and youth, and

Reducing the proportion of people who do not have access to food.

Economic development, is a much broader concept and includes welfare of the population and the economy. Developing countries are dealing with various challenges, such as poverty, gender inequality, communicable diseases, women empowerment, and environment problems. They are also facing challenges in mobilizing the resources needed to finance sustained development. Various countries adopted various development strategies pursued by countries of different regions and discuss the way globalization has influenced the developing countries. The UN Millennium Development Goals is a great strategy to be achieved by 2015 as per the recommended goals. World Trade Organization (WTO) was instrumental in implementing these strategies. Globalization, among other things, assured the integration of markets, free flow of investment and technological innovation across the globe.

Some of the key features of globalization were:

The Private sector, not the government, emerged as the key player in resource allocation and meeting the consumer demands.

Liberalization of trade marked the end of the protected economy, as well as the state subsidies, and incentives were only based on efficiency.

The concept of globalization assumes that deregulation of money markets promotes competitiveness and free flow of capital ensures the access to capital by equalizing or reducing the interest rates.

Globalization enables the developing nations to have easy access to technology and efficient managerial skills and, in turn, helps them to diversify their investments and returns.

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