Tech. progress reduces poverty level - Report

Accra, Jan. 10, GNA - Rapid technological progress in developing countries has helped to raise incomes and reduce the share of people living in absolute poverty from 29 percent in 1990 to 18 percent in 2004.

Despite these gains, the technology gap between rich and poor countries remained enormous, and the capacity of developing economies to adopt new technology remained weak. This was contained in the Global Economic Prospects 2008 report of the World Bank made available to the Ghana News Agency on Thursday. According to Andrew Burns, Lead Economist and main author of the report, "Technological progress increased 40 to 60 percent faster in developing countries than in rich countries between the early 1990s and early 2000,"

"Nevertheless, developing countries have a long way to go, given that the level of technology that they use is only one quarter of that employed in high-income countries," he said. Subtitled: "Technology Diffusion in the Developing World," the World Bank report noted that recent progress reflected increased exposure to foreign technologies. As a share of GDP, high-tech imports and foreign direct investment levels had doubled since the early 1990s. According to the report, improving capacity to absorb foreign technology was critical in low-income countries, as well as in those middle-income countries that had exploited low-wage comparative advantages rather than strengthened domestic competencies. It said most developing countries participated minimally at the global technological frontier. Their rapid economic progress had been achieved by adapting and adopting already-existing technologies.

"Technology now spreads much more quickly between countries. In the early 1900s, new technology took over 50 years to reach most countries; today it takes about 16 years.

"Technology tends to spread slowly within countries. Main cities and leading sectors use more sophisticated technologies than the rest of the economy. For example, the IT-enabled services sector in urban India employs world-class technologies, but less than 10 percent of the country's rural households had telephone access in 2007," added. It therefore urged Governments to strengthen domestic technology dissemination channels as a high priority.

These, it said, should include transport infrastructure and the capacity of applied R&D agencies to orient themselves to markets through improved outreach, testing, and marketing. "Weak basic infrastructure systems limit the range of technologies that can be employed in many countries. Policies should ensure that critical enabling services such as roads and electricity are widely available, whether delivered by the private or public sector. In Sub-Saharan Africa, just eight percent of the rural population has access to electricity. "Ineffective or uneven access to quality education also restricts countries' ability to exploit technologies. Even simple technologies can have big impacts. For example, relatively simple skills are needed to build rainwater collection systems, which improve access to clean drinking water and reduce infant mortality by lowering the incidence of diarrhoea", it added. 10 Jan. 08