... But severe poverty afflicts a quarter of the world.

• Position: 1997 Report on the World Social Situation

Two years after a ground-breaking United Nations summit meeting drew international attention to the growing dangers of poverty, unemployment and social disintegration, the Department for Economic and Social Information and Policy Analysis (DESIPA) has prepared the 1997 Report on the World Social Situation, which finds that, despite marked progress in raising levels of income, almost one quarter of the world's population live in a state of severe poverty. The overwhelming majority of the poor live in south Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, China, east Asia and the Pacific.

According to the Report, the recent world economic performance is characterized by an annual growth rate of 2.5 per cent (1994-1996), a rate which is still lower than the average rate of the 1980s, because of the weakness of the economic recovery in developed economies. The current pattern of global economic strengthening reflects a broad-based expansion among countries, mostly among transition and developing economies, which have improved their competitiveness and exports due to reduced trade barriers, earlier stabilization measures and structural adjustment efforts.

Continued strong international financial flows since the early 1990s have supplemented domestic resources of recipient countries. But many developing countries remain severely indebted, and current per capita income levels remain below those of 1980 in much of Africa, Latin America and west Asia. The economic recovery of developed economies exhibits modest growth, virtual stagnation of real wages and high levels of unemployment.

The Report focuses on three aspects of the global health situation: the decline of life expectancy (particularly in Africa and the transition economies), the burden of ill health and the emergence of new infectious diseases. For instance, it points out that malnutrition, poor water supply, sanitation and hygiene are responsible for 30 per cent of the disease burden in developing countries. Incurable diseases that have emerged in addition to AIDS are drug-resistant malaria, tuberculosis and cholera. Attention is also drawn to the fact that the two largest risk factors in both the developed and transition economies are tobacco and alcohol.The total number of undernourished in the developing world exceeds the total population of the developed world.

In its assessment of education, the Report concludes that enrolment in primary and secondary schools has risen since 1960 from an estimated 250...