Foreign Aid to Slow a Growing Population Marianne Marchant December 9th 2011

Earlier this year the world reached seven billion people. Only thirteen years ag o the population was at six billion people, and in the blink of an eye the popul ation would have already exceeded eight billion people [Ford]. If corrective actions are not taken soon to slow down the population s growt h, the world will be forced to face new bigger problems that we may not have muc h experience in. Some of the most likely outcomes of a population growing too fa st would include a much more rapid depletion of life sustaining recourses. Other problems would include the increased number of border skirmishes to obtain extr a resources and space for the growing population. Although, there are many means to go about reducing the population size. For example laws, natural pressure, immigration, and importing resources the on e that appears most feasible at the moment also happens to be the option with th e least drawbacks that force people to live through the loss of privacy, family, friends, your home or your morals. The best preventative method to stabilize th e exponential population growth would be for developed countries to provide aid to less developed countries in the sectors of industrialization. Due to the more recent population crisis it has become the responsibilit y and duty of the wealthy developed countries and world institutes to provide ai d and the recourses less developed countries need to move in the direction of in dustrializing. It is expected that after the less developed countries industrial ize the birth rates will drop in direct correlation. During Europe s population cris is just at the start of the Industrial Revolution the average woman would have f ive children. Shortly into the Industrial Revolution women averaged six children for a very short period which afterwards the birth rate steadily decreased to t wo children per woman [Clark], [Wrigley]. Although, most foreign aid is received with open arms developed countrie s should not waste recourses on providing aid that does not give the less develo ped countries positive long-term impacts. Throughout all less developed countrie s differ in their own ways, however, in general most developing countries would agree that there a few recourses that are more important than others. For exampl e most developing countries need large improvements in their education systems. The education of the youth is a long-term impact that can drive countries to dev elop faster. The second biggest foreign aid a developed country can give to a de veloping country is by improving the basic standards of living within the countr y through infrastructure projects and creating job opportunities. When a country is in need there is no such thing as unwanted help. Howev er, bearing that in mind there are some foreign aid programs that although are g reat in the short-term, provide very few, if not negative long-term effects on d eveloping countries. The first misconstrued aid is the provision of foods. You c an give a man a fish and he will eat for a day, but you teach a man to fish and he will never go hungry again [Chinese Proverb]. The second form of foreign aid

does not always do the job it is supposed to due to the lack of certainty betwee n the governments of the developed and developing countries. This would be aid g iven from one government or world organization to the government of a developing country in order for them to develop their country. With very little guidelines and regulations you never know where the money settles. As the rapid population growth continues it is important to solve the pr oblem before it becomes a crisis. Therefore, the obligation falls on the develop ed countries shoulders to aid the developing countries industrialize and reach t heir full potential, and eventually stabilize the population growth. At the start of the Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries the world population had reached record highs. Population experts started analy zing different scenarios of potential outcomes to analyze their significance. On e of those experts in modern population study was Tomas Robert Malthus [Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia]. Malthus described, in his most famous essay Principle of Population, that poverty and distress are unavoidable. Malthus further attem pts to prove this theory by rationalizing that population increases by a geometr ic ratio, and recourses in contrast increase by an arithmetical ratio and, there fore, the two would never be in harmony. The gap where the population was larger than the recourses, Malthus called the population gap. Depending on how large t his gap was indicated how bad of a state the world was in [Columbia Electronic E ncyclopedia]. Malthus had many dooms day outcomes stemming from over population, howev er, luckily for at the time there was a boom in agriculture technology as well a s a surge in immigration. Today on the other hand we have expended most of our f ertile land, and have overcrowded the world so much immigration would barely imp act the over-sized communities. It is important to understand where Malthus is coming from in order to g rasp the potential disaster over population could bring if not taken care of. Ma lthus envisioned a world deprived of vital recourses and constant war for the li ttle recourse available. This scenario, according to Malthus, plays out until en ough people have died to restore balance to the recourses and population ratios theory turns out to be nothing, the world is not what I [Malthus]. Even if Malthus would put up for gamble. The population growth needs to get dealt with immediate ly. As the population continues to grow it is the responsibility of the deve loped countries to aid the less developed countries industrialize and decrease t heir birth rates. Developed countries can help the developing countries in an in finite number of ways; the struggle comes when you have to put all or nothing on one option. The most important and long lasting aid developed countries can provide to developing countries is a proper education system. Developed countries can do this by building bigger schools, and investing in recourses the children of the specific country need. It is not wise to interfere too much to the point that t he developing country changes the developing country s education system all together . However to improve the birth rates and population growth, it is important to i mplement a contraception awareness as well as keep the standard education levels on par with the rest of the world. Another recourse that would come in handy fo r the improvement of overall education would be to form a marketing strategy wit h target segments for aimed at the parents who, in most cases would be illiterat e, as well as separate target segments for boys and girls. It is very important to educate the women, since research shows that there is a direct relationship w ith a woman s education, and the amount of offspring she will have. Women who are mo re educated are less likely to have many kids [Kurtzleben]. Higher education not only hits one of the key issues developing countries face o n a daily basis, high birth rates, but it also hits the other, industrialization . The better educated a population is the more likely it is they will come up wi th innovations to improve their situation, and pull themselves out of the hole. The second most important form of aid provided to developing countries is the im provement for the vast majority s standard of living. This section of aid can be fur ther broken down into many different projects. However, the two main categories

that most developing countries still need help attaining are clean water sources and reliable energy, since many developing countries still do not have running water or electricity everywhere [Brame]. Clean water is vital to living. Polluted water in developing countries does not only effect the people living there, it effects everyone they ship produce to as well. Through the production of a water treatment plant, sturdy piping connecti ng the water source to people everywhere, and irrigation systems developing coun tries will not only have safe water but it will also boost the economy. During t he construction of the plant there will be many jobs available, as well when the plant is complete it is possible to form a career as one of the many people nee ded to run a water treatment plant. The other infrastructure aid developing countries need in order to industrialize is reliable energy. How can a major business run if every few hours the electri city is faltering? It seems like the easiest and most logical answer to donate t he technology from old electricity mills found in developed countries. However, it would be more beneficial to start the developing countries off ahead of the m arket. Sustainable energy is a growing market today, and although oil does not l ook like it will be disappearing any time soon it would be advantageous for deve loping countries to be given a head start on sustainable energy. Developing coun tries could potentially have the competitive advantage over sustainable energy i f guided in the right direction and given the right recourses. Although it is ag ainst human nature to give up such a precious commodity, it s a fast way to industri alize the less developed countries, and overall lower the birthrate. This projec t also would provide plenty of work while the mills are being built as well as m aintaining them constantly. Powell recently released a study indicating the larg e economic growth derived from sustainable recourses, which would in no time off set the startup costs [Powell]. Although investing in projects like clean water and sustainable energy are very expensive and risky, they boost the economy, infrastructure, standard of living, and provide good services. In the end, when faced with a crisis like the popula tion growth we are experiencing now no recourse becomes too much to sacrifice, i t just depends where the priorities lie. Even though, when people give aid it is supposed to be a peaceful sign, some for ms of aid only weaken the economies of developing countries more. Although there are many ways aid can harm a country, two prevalent ones are the donation of fo od and financial handouts to the governments. Food might satisfy a developing country for a short while, but when it comes to the long run, there is more damage done than good. Article 25 of the Universal D eclaration of Human Rights states that everyone has the right to adequate food a nd decent standard of living [UDHR]. However, providing a population with food t emporarily does not give them motivation to develop. If it takes more effort to farm a crop than it does to pick up food handouts, people will stop farming, and when there is a food shortage everyone will be devastated in famine. The money spent donating food could easier be spent improving agriculture and getting deve loping countries to stand up on their own. The second commonly misunderstood gift is a monetary hand out. It is impossible to know where the money goes when it is handed to some government officials, how ever, if developing countries just wanted to hand out checks it would be much mo re beneficial for them to hand the checks directly out to the organizations and funds in need this way you know what will become of the money [Balde]. Although foreign aid has many drawbacks including the high costs and not knowing what your contribution will do in the long run, it has fallen to the shoulders of developed countries to aid developing nations industrialize, with the long te rm goal of decreasing their birth rates. The only thing possible is to try fix t he problem before it turns into a Malthusian nightmare and all of our recourses are gone.

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