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GISdevelopment > Proceedings > Map Asia 2002 > Keynote Session
It is well known that a per capita income of $ 440 in South Asia represents a higher purchasing power than the same income in the US. To account for these differences, a methodology has been developed to convert US dollars into "international" or "purchasing power parity" dollars (ppp$), which would then represent the same purchasing power in all countries of the world. These "purchasing power parity" conversion factors are country-specific and are reviewed periodically. For example, for India, the GNI/cap is $ 450, whereas the pppGNI/cap is ppp$ 2340, that is, a factor 5.2 higher. At the same time, the per caita GNI ranking does not change very much, from 159 (GNI/cap) to 153 (pppGNI/cap), as what applies to India, also applies to other countries in the region and worldwide. On the other hand, there are some noticeable differences: For the South Asia region, the per capita GNI is $ 440, whereas the pppGNI/cap is ppp$ 2240, that is, a factor 5.1 higher. In contrast, for Sub-Sahara Africa, the GNI/cap is $ 470 whereas the pppGNI/cap is ppp$ 1044, that is, only a factor 2.2 higher. This reflects, among others, that in South Asia many products are produced or manufactured locally and that the prices of these items are relatively low. In Sub-Sahara Africa, many products are imported (including processed food items, drugs, textiles) and thus their prices are relatively high, which reduces the purchasing power of the dollar in relative terms. Finally, it may be noted that many of the investments required to improve the knowledge and IT infrastructures (e.g., computer hard- and software) are in US dollars and cost practically the same in South or East Asia as they cost in the US.
The ability of a country to develop the economy while improving environmental quality depends, among others, on the government finances and the funds available for rural development programs. It follows from Table 3 that government revenues, expressed as % of GDP, are relatively low in South and East Asia, well below the world average. In addition, many countries in South Asia are faced with high interest payments on current debts (of the order of 32% of current revenues), which further limits funds available for rural and other development programs. In addition, political tension and violence in the region results in high military expenditures in South and, in particular, East Asia, well above the world average. For example, assuming that government expenditure roughly equals current government revenue, a country like Pakistan would spend some 43% of its central government expenditure on interest payments and some 28% on military items, leaving some 29% for all other central government expenditure. Even though this calculation may need to be refined, it illustrates that interest payments and military expenditure can be a significant burden on central government budgets in the South and East Asian regions. TABLE 3 : Government finances, military expenditures and aid (World Bank, 2002b, Tables 4.11, 5.7 and 6.10). Current revenue (curr rev) includes all revenue from taxes, fines, fees, recoveries, and income from property or sales, expressed as a percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) in 1990 and 1999. Debt is the entire stock of direct government, fixed term contractual obligations to others, outstanding on a particular date. Total debt (tot debt) includes domestic debt and foreign debt, and is not reduced by the amount of government claims against others, and is expressed as a percentage of GDP in 1999. Interest payments (int pay) include interest payments on government debt - including long-term bonds, loans and other debt instruments - to both domestic and foreign residents, and are expressed as a percentage of current revenue (%cr) in 1999. Military expenses (mil exp) cover military-related expenditures of the defense ministry and other ministries, and are expressed as a percentage of central government expenditure in 1992 and 1999. Net official development assistance (ODA) consists of disbursements of loans made on concessional terms and grants by official agencies of countries or multilateral institutions to promote economic development and welfare in developing countries, expressed as a percentage of GNI (%GNI) in 1995 and 2000. The 2001 Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) measures perceived corruption in government and public administration on a scale of 10 (lowest level of perceived corruption) to 0 (highest level of perceived corruption) and is published annually by Transparency International (www.transparency.org).
Official development assistance (ODA) is significant in terms of % of GNI in some countries, e.g., Mongolia, Lao PDR and Cambodia (22.8-12.6 % of GNI), and in Nepal (6.9%) and Vietnam (5.4%), but is rather insignificant in countries such as India or China (0.2-0.3% of GNI). Hence, the larger countries in South and East Asia are pretty much on their own as far as combining economic development with sustainable environmental management is concerned. It may further be noted that after the end of the cold war ODA has declined steadily: during the 5-year period from 1995 to 2000 it declined from 68 to 58 billion $, that is, declined by 14.5%. Other Sections Application | Books | Business Info | Career | Companies | Country Page | Downloads | Education | Events | GIS@development Magazine | Glossary | History | Interviews | News | Publications | Subscribe | Technology | Tenders | Thesis | Tutorials | Updates | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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