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ATTAINMENT OF BASIC NEEDS CENTRAL TO HUMAN DEVELOPMENT AND THE EMPOWERMENT OF PEOPLE July 2007 Human development and empowerment are strongly connected and mutually reinforce each other, says the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection (JCTR) in its monthly reflections based on Basic Needs Basket for a family of six in Lusaka. We consider this particularly important at the time of the 81st Agricultural and Commercial Show of Zambia (ACSZ). According to the JCTR, human development, understood as a movement of people from less human conditions to more human conditions, implies among other things, progressive access to and availability of both tangible and intangible things such as food, shelter, health, education, moral uprightness, practice of good societal “virtues”, etc. In turn, empowerment of the people implies that people are able to engage in actions or processes of producing and reproducing the constitutive elements –having access to shelter, education, health, agricultural production -- of human development. As the JCTR observed before, “that is what epitomizes true human development and empowerment of people beyond abstract notions and which must always be reflected in Zambia’s policy directions.” Simply put but significant in implication, it is one of the major reasons behind JCTR’s formulation of the Basic Needs Basket. The Basic Needs Basket through its monthly estimation of cost of living clearly shows whether people are moving towards more human conditions of existence and therefore becoming active participants in creating empowering conditions, or are stagnant in their conditions, or are moving backwards. The Lusaka Basic Needs Basket survey for the month of July revealed a minor increase of K2,600 recorded in the cost of food. The source for this increase was an upward adjustment in the price of meat which went up by K800 for kg, onion up by K100 for 1kg and cooking oil by K300. Other food items including essential non-food items -- charcoal, wash and bath soap, etc., remained the same in cost as in the month of June. The total cost of basic food for a family of six stood at K496,100 and that of essential non-food items K1,023,600. The overall cost of the Basic Needs Basket, that is, the sum of the cost of food and non-food essential items amounted to K1,519,700. From the above figures and the preceding observations, one important question arises: “How would human development and empowerment be perceived in the Zambian context in light of these figures? Certainly, to make worthwhile discussions of a nation’s development, human development and empowerment must remain central. The JCTR strongly believes that empowerment of the people is what will lead to the creation and reinforcement of human development. This obviously means formulating and/or translating into concrete action policy positions on social protection, the Citizen’s Economic Empowerment Programme, promoting corporate social responsibility and its sub-themes such as just wages and environmental protection, in addition to paying attention to agriculture, education, health, etc. |
Related Links July 2007 BNB @ K1,519,700 |
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