Global Variations in Development Flashcards
All 34 cards in this deck
What does LIC stand for, and what does it mean?
Low Income Country - a country with a low level of economic development and low GNI per head.
What is an NEE?
A Newly Emerging Economy - a country whose economy is growing rapidly as it industrialises, moving from low to higher income.
Name the three groups used to classify countries by level of economic development.
LICs (low income countries), NEEs (newly emerging economies) and HICs (high income countries).
True or false? Quality of life and wealth always match, so GNI alone fully classifies a country's development.
False. Quality of life includes health, education, safety and environment, which wealth measures do not show.
What does gross national income (GNI) per head measure?
The total income of a country from home and abroad, divided by its population, usually given in US$.
What is meant by infant mortality rate?
The number of children/babies who die under the age of 1, per 1000 live births per year.
Which measure of development combines income, life expectancy and education levels?
The Human Development Index (HDI).
What does the people per doctor figure tell you about a country?
The number of people for each doctor - a high figure shows poor access to healthcare and lower development.
True or false? A country with a high literacy rate is likely to be more developed than one with a low literacy rate.
True. A high literacy rate shows good access to education, which is linked to higher development.
Why does GNI per head hide inequality within a country?
It is an average per person, so it does not allow for extremes of wealth and poverty: a small, very rich group can raise the average while most people stay poor.
Why are economic measures of limited value in the poorest countries?
Many people are subsistence farmers or work in the informal sector, so they are economically active but do not appear in the figures.
Give one disadvantage of using birth rates as a measure of development.
Birth rates may be affected by government policies, so more or fewer babies are born if incentives or disincentives are offered.
True or false? Comparing countries using measures given in US$ is always fair.
False. US$ figures do not allow for the relative spending power of different currencies.
What is the Demographic Transition Model (DTM)?
A model showing how birth rate, death rate and total population change as a country develops, through five stages.
What happens to birth and death rates in Stage 2 of the DTM, and what level of development does this suggest?
Death rate falls sharply while birth rate stays high, so population grows fast - typical of an LIC.
What happens to birth and death rates in Stage 3 of the DTM, and what level of development does this suggest?
Birth rate falls rapidly while death rate continues to fall slowly, so population growth slows - typical of an NEE.
Give one economic benefit of the falling birth rate in Stage 3 of the DTM.
Less money is needed for maternity services and schools, so more can be spent on developing industry.
True or false? Countries in Stage 4 of the DTM have low birth rates and low death rates.
True. Both rates are low and population is high but steady, typical of an HIC.
Give one physical cause of uneven development linked to a country's location.
Being landlocked - without ports it is hard to trade goods easily, and many landlocked countries are LICs/NEEs.
How do natural hazards cause uneven development?
They damage infrastructure, so money must be spent on rebuilding rather than on new development.
Give one historical cause of uneven development.
Colonialism - colonies' raw materials were taken by European powers, leaving them with weak, undiversified economies at independence.
True or false? LICs can usually add value to their raw materials before export.
False. Processing usually takes place in HICs, e.g. cocoa beans are often exported raw and made into chocolate abroad.
What is an economic migrant?
Someone who moves to another country voluntarily for better paid work and a higher quality of life.
How does uneven development cause international migration?
People move from lower-income to higher-income countries for better pay, medical care and education.
Give one consequence of uneven development for health.
People in poorer countries have lower life expectancy and higher infant mortality because of poor healthcare, diet and water supply.
What effect does international migration have on the net migration of lower- and higher-income countries?
Lower-income countries have net emigration and higher-income countries have net immigration.
What is life expectancy, and how does it change as a country develops?
The average number of years a person born in a country can expect to live. It rises as a country develops, because healthcare, diet and sanitation improve.
What do the birth rate and the death rate measure?
The birth rate is the number of live births, and the death rate the number of deaths, per 1000 people in a country per year.
On what scale is the Human Development Index (HDI) given, and what does a higher score mean?
From 0 to 1. The closer a country's score is to 1, the more developed it is.
What are birth and death rates like in Stage 1 of the DTM, and what happens to the population?
Both rates are high and fluctuate, so the total population stays low and fairly steady. No country is in Stage 1 today; only a few isolated communities still fit it.
What happens to the population in Stage 5 of the DTM, and why?
It slowly falls (natural decrease), because the birth rate drops below the death rate and the population becomes increasingly elderly.
How does dependence on exporting primary products cause uneven development?
Raw materials earn little and their prices go up and down, so a country relying on one or two of them has a low, insecure income to invest in development.
Give two ways a difficult climate can hold back a country's development.
Low or unreliable rainfall makes farming and water supply difficult, and hot, wet conditions spread diseases and pests that stop people working.
What is meant by a disparity in wealth as a consequence of uneven development?
A large gap in income between richer and poorer countries (and between groups within a country), so people in poorer places have less to spend on food, housing and services.