SHAPING THE FUTURE HOW CHANGING DEMOGRAPHICS CAN POWER HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

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sustainable, reaching everyone while ensuring that natural resources are not exhausted and planetary boundaries surpassed. The implications are increasingly urgent in light of the recently agreed Agenda 2030, which maps an ambitious global vision for sustainable development that must be translated into action in each country (Box 1.1). Countries will need to marshal all available resources, consider the most strategic mix of public investments, and explore all possible avenues—including those opened by demographic changes—to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Most past work on demographic changes has addressed specific issues such as youth or ageing, working populations or urbanization. Less attention has been paid to taking an integrated approach and capturing the interplay between demography and human development. Even the United Nations, which for decades has led the world in chronicling demographic changes and championing accelerated human development, has not sufficiently advocated the importance of making connections between the two. But today, Asia-Pacific countries cannot afford to overlook the links. The age structures of their populations are rapidly shifting, and they are on the cusp of a transition with potentially profound impacts on labour markets, economic growth, savings and investment, education, health, social protection and the provision of public services—all with implications for human development. This Asia-Pacific Human Development Report takes up these issues. It considers the major demographic changes in the region today and in the near future, and major channels that link these to human development. It assesses whether or not countries have adequate and appropriate mechanisms to manage different elements of demographic changes, such as to absorb potentially huge gains from a large working-age population, or to strengthen old-age support systems for growing numbers of elderly people. It probes the issues of historically rapid urbanization and migration, both of which result from and also influence demographic changes. 18
<strong>HUMAN</strong> <strong>DEVELOPMENT</strong> IMPROVES RAPIDLY, BUT UNEVENLY, ACROSS ASIA-PACIFIC Human Development Index (HDI) values— which reflect achievements in income, education and health—have steadily risen in all regions in the world. Globally, between 1990 and 2014, more than 2 billion people rose above low levels of human development; more than a billion escaped extreme poverty. 3 Most live in Asia-Pacific, although the current state of human development in the region as a whole presents a mixed picture. Among developing regions worldwide, South Asia has made the fastest human development progress with an average annual growth rate in HDI values of 1.4 percent compared to the world average of 0.7 percent in the last 25 years. It is followed by East Asia and the Pacific with a rate of 1.3 percent. 4 Despite such impressive progress, however, both subregions still lag behind Latin America and the Caribbean, and Europe and Central Asia. South Asia is also behind the Arab States (Figure 1.1). Among 36 Asia-Pacific countries and territories with available data, 5 18 have high or very high HDI values, 12 countries have medium values, and 6 countries have low values. 6 In recent decades, many least developed countries in Asia-Pacific—Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Nepal—have made the most rapid progress on human development, albeit from a lower base. Between 2009 and 2014, 20 Asia-Pacific countries witnessed an improvement BOX 1.1: Major global agreements link population and development In 1994, the International Conference on Population and Development, held in Cairo, explicitly drew attention—for the first time—to the dynamic relationship between population and development. Its Programme of Action advocated “appropriate policies to meet the needs of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (UNFPA 2014b, paragraph 3.1). It called for investing in individual human rights, capabilities and dignity throughout the human lifetime. More recently, at the 2012 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, governments globally committed to “seize the opportunities and address the challenges associated with demographic change” (United Nations 2012c, paragraph 144). In 2014, at the 20-year review of the Cairo conference, they overwhelmingly supported an action plan “safeguarding the rights of young people and investing in their quality education, decent employment opportunities, effective livelihood skills and access to sexual and reproductive health” (UNFPA 2014c, executive summary). The international community in 2015 affirmed, in Agenda 2030, a set of Sustainable Development Goals and targets that incorporate population elements. The SDGs come at a time when Asia-Pacific countries are experiencing powerful population shifts, including continued population growth, youth bulges, ageing and significant changes associated with migration, urbanization and family dynamics. These issues have many implications for the achievement of the SDGs by their agreed 2030 endpoint. Demographic patterns affect almost all of the priorities in the goals, including economic growth, labour markets, income distribution, poverty, social protection, pensions, health, education, gender equality, food security, energy, environmental protection, and climate change mitigation and adaptation. Demographic changes played an important role in the success of East Asia’s ‘tiger’ economies. Other Asia-Pacific countries now have a similar historic opportunity to leverage demographics for human development, and to guide development to exert positive impacts on demographics. By anticipating and planning for the changes ahead, all countries can address challenges and harness opportunities to realize greater human well-being and contribute to a more sustainable world. South Asia has made the fastest recent human development progress, but lags behind many regions of the world Sources: UNFPA 2014b, United Nations 2015a, United Nations 2012c, UNFPA 2014c. 19
Page 1 and 2: ASIA-PACIFIC HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPO
Page 3 and 4: ASIA-PACIFIC HUMAN DEVELOPMENT REPO
Page 5 and 6: FOREWORD We live in times of great
Page 7 and 8: ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The Asia-Pacific H
Page 9 and 10: Table of Contents Foreword iii Pref
Page 11 and 12: 1.15 Population age-composition is
Page 13 and 14: Acronyms ADB Asian Development Bank
Page 15 and 16: Overview SHAPING THE FUTURE: HOW CH
Page 17 and 18: HUMAN DEVELOPMENT IN ASIA-PACIFIC:
Page 19 and 20: FIGURE 2: Wealthier countries tend
Page 21 and 22: a strong emphasis on protecting wor
Page 23 and 24: could provide job matching assistan
Page 25 and 26: Asia-Pacific leave the workforce at
Page 27 and 28: WHAT’S AHEAD IN THIS REPORT This
Page 29: Chapter 1 HOW CHANGING DEMOGRAPHICS
Page 34 and 35: FIGURE 1.1: The Human Development I
Page 36 and 37: TABLE 1.1: Asia-Pacific still has l
Page 38 and 39: married couples to have children, a
Page 40 and 41: FIGURE 1.5: Population pyramids in
Page 42 and 43: FIGURE 1.8: The median age is high
Page 44 and 45: FIGURE 1.10: Disparities in fertili
Page 46 and 47: Improved overall human development
Page 48 and 49: TABLE 1.5: Countries in Asia-Pacifi
Page 50 and 51: “When relatively large generation
Page 52 and 53: 38 Having fewer dependents on worki
Page 54 and 55: 40 In developed Asia- Pacific, the
Page 56 and 57: TABLE 1.6: Demographic dividends fl
Page 58 and 59: 44
Page 61 and 62: 2. MORE PEOPLE AT WORK: THE FOUNDAT
Page 63 and 64: encouraged labour-intensive industr
Page 65 and 66: FIGURE 2.3: Peaks within subregions
Page 67 and 68: A DEMOGRAPHIC RETURN FOR HUMAN DEVE
Page 69 and 70: BOX 2.1: Women bear a larger burden
Page 71 and 72: FIGURE 2.8: Growth in labour produc
Page 73 and 74: WHAT’S BEEN LEARNED IN CHINA, JAP
Page 75 and 76: FIGURE 2.13: Japan is past its work
Page 77 and 78: FIGURE 2.15: Thailand still has tim
Page 79 and 80: make this a key aim of national dev
Page 81 and 82: investment climate, as well as enco
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TABLE 2.4: Shares of workers in the
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Even before leaving home, migrant w
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Promote health and safety at work:
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BOX 2.8: Malaysia transforms an ind
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of resilient infrastructure are joi
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Chapter 3 NURTURING CHILDREN, UNLOC
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Asia-Pacific is home to 1.7 billion
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Commendable progress in education m
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Quality primary education mitigates
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In most Asia-Pacific countries, sec
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Strong tertiary education is a buil
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FIGURE 3.3: Access to tertiary educ
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94 TABLE 3.9: Youth illiteracy has
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TABLE 3.11: Child mortality rates b
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BOX 3.7: Malnutrition and disabilit
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Despite social and economic progres
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FIGURE 3.8: The share of youth who
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104 Young migrants are highly vulne
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as an important challenge. But they
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TABLE 3.15: Some countries with lar
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Immunization saves children’s liv
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BOX 3.10: Germany’s vocational tr
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BOX 3.12: Partnering with youth in
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116
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4. AGEING SOCIETIES: NEW OPPORTUNIT
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FIGURE 4.1: Asia-Pacific is one of
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TABLE 4.1: East Asia is the oldest
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BOX 4.2: Responses to poverty among
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BOX 4.3: A plan of action for older
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FIGURE 4.9: Per capita health-care
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BOX 4.5: China moves towards univer
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TABLE 4.3: Social pensions are an i
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FIGURE 4.12: Pension replacement ra
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BOX 4.7: Increasing links between p
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cupy space in some public buildings
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ment bodies, encourage regular inte
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BOX 4.9: Ageing countries begin enc
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help coordinate the work of other g
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for older people. Many advanced cou
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action. Free public transport, and
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Chapter 5 TAPPING THE HUMAN DYNAMIS
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In the last 30 years, Asia-Pacific
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FIGURE 5.3: Even countries with few
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FIGURE 5.6: Most people will contin
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160 Social, cultural and economic i
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The benefits of urbanization have n
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BOX 5.2: Pioneering urban poverty r
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vehicles on the road. Beijing issue
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Municipal governments in Asia-Pacif
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TABLE 5.4: Revenue mobilization opt
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172 City governments need to have t
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Investing in essential infrastructu
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176 in East Asian cities, and occur
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BOX 5.9: The Republic of Korea emba
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180
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6. AN AGENDA FOR ACTION: SHAPING TH
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Development Report argues, decent w
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with ministries overseeing youth, e
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This is an urgent priority in a reg
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SUSTAINING HUMAN DEVELOPMENT ACROSS
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plan automatically enrols people in
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BOX 6.3: Developing Delhi’s metro
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End Notes CHAPTER 1 1. UNFPA 2014b.
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63. WHO 2014b. 64. UNFPA 2012. 65.
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produces 40 percent of total econom
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206 The Asia Foundation. 2013. “T
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208 CODI (Community Organizations D
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210 Global Migration Group. 2014.
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212 Janwani. 2010. “Annual Report
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214 ———. 2012a. OECD Employme
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216 ———. 2011. “Follow-up t
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218 York. [www.unfpa.org/sites/defa
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———. 2012c. Malaysia Economic
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tables include the Caribbean countr
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224
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TABLE 2: Trends in the Human Develo
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TABLE 4: Gender Inequality Index 22
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TABLE 6: Trends in income poverty,
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TABLE 8: Fertility rate and crude d
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TABLE 10: Trends and share of child
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TABLE 12: Trends and share of young
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TABLE 14: Trends and share of older
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TABLE 16: Education indicators and
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TABLE 17: Health indicators 242
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TABLE 18: Employment and unemployme
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TABLE 19: International trade, fina
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ABOUT ASIA-PACIFIC HUMAN DEVELOPMEN
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