One of the problems that people in so called "developed countries" have is that they still see the world in an us vs them kind of way. Us being the developed countries and them being the developing countries. People think that the populations of developed countries are rich, have long life spans, and have fewer children. People in developing countries on the other hand are thought to be poor, have shorter life spans, and have more children. What people fail to recognize is that more and more developing countries are becoming wealthier. If we think of the countries in the world in terms of socioeconomic status, most of the world is actually middle class. Another thing that people fail to recognize is that most developing countries have implemented family planning in some way to reduce the number of children people are having.
Bangladesh used the Grameen Bank to empower women. These women who were able to take out small loans from the bank were able to work and earn money and thus decided to have less children. In Thailand in the 1980s there was a massive population problem. Most women were having 6+ children and the population was growing at a staggering 3% a year. That means that if Thailand had not implemented family planning, the country's population would have doubled in 23.3 years. Thailand was also facing an AIDS and HIV epidemic at the time. So Mechai Viravaidya, affectionately known as "Mr. Condom" launched a nationwide campaign in support of safe sex. They got nurses, midwifes, taxi drivers, and restaurant owners to distribute condoms. They got teachers to teach about safe sex and since Thailand is mostly Buddhist, they got monks to bless the condoms. The result? The total fertility rate of Thailand went from 6+ to about 3 and the number of HIV/AIDS infections has steadily declined.
People seem to not realize that developing countries are indeed improving. Many developing countries have started to realize that better health seems to precede money. Healthcare in many places has gotten better and people are living longer. Even having gone through war, Vietnam's life expectancy is 75.61 years. I would also life to applaud India on it's healthcare system. Since India has a large population and is about one-third of the size of the United States, the government builds hospitals in places with high population densities and then subsidizes them. The result is that much more people have access to good and affordable healthcare.
Look at the picture above. That's a picture of a highway in Lagos, Nigeria. Pretty developed looking right? Most cities in developing countries look like the cities we live in, however, because of what we are shown in the media, people think of Africa as people living in straw huts.
This is what Kigali, Rwanda looks like today. When people think of Rwanda, they think of the 1994 Rwandan Genocide in which 500 thousand to 1.3 million Tutsi and moderate Hutu were killed. Since then, Rwanda has recovered immensely. Rwanda is the 55th cleanest country in the world, and the fifth cleanest in Sub-Saharan Africa and about 74% of the population has access to clean drinking water, and the country is considered to be very safe.
One of the reasons why people may perceive developing countries to be worse off than they are is because they think very pessimistically. People tend to think that things have gotten worse when they have actually improved. The media also has a large role in dictating the way we think. We only ever hear news about the worst things in the worst places. That isn't to say that these problems aren't important, they certainly are, but people tend to generalize when they shouldn't. Yes there are places in the world where many people still go hungry. East Africa is in the middle of a great famine caused by a drought, which could be due to climate change. This is definitely an important crisis, but it would be wrong to say that there is no food in Africa at all. People will tell you that there are the same number of starving people today than there were in the 1960s. However there were only 3 billion people in the 1960s. So there were 1 billion starving people in the 1960s when there were only 3 billion people and today there are also 1 billion starving people, but there are 7 billion people in the world. It's a great improvement. That isn't to say that more improvement isn't necessary as 1 in 7 people still go hungry in the world, which is quite a lot. I'm merely trying to say that things have gotten better despite all the wars and the natural disasters. Another example id that girls and boys now go to school for about the same amount of time. The average boy goes to school for 8 years and the average girl goes to school for 7 years. Now, again, this isn't to say there cannot be improvement. 8 years of schooling is equivalent to someone graduating from middle school, ideally this will increase to 12 years in the upcoming future.
Now here are some great videos you should watch
"How Mr. Condom Made Thailand a Better Place"
"The Best Stats You've Ever Seen" - Hans Rosling on how the world has changed
"How Not to Be Ignorant" - Hans Rosling and his son, Ola Rosling will show you how little you may actually know about the world.
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