leading economies—Brazil, China and India—is about equal to the combined GDP of the long-standing industrial powers of the North—Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States.7 This represents a dramatic rebalancing of global economic power. In 1950, Brazil, China and India together accounted for only 10% of the world economy, while the six traditional economic leaders of the North accounted for roughly half. According to projections in this Report, by 2050 Brazil China and India will together account for 40% of global output (figure 3), far surpassing the projected combined production of today’s Group of Seven bloc.8 Today, the South as a whole produces about half of world economic output, up from about a third in 1990. The combined GDP of eight major developing countries alone—Argentina, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, South Africa and Turkey—now equals the GDP of the United States, still by far the world’s biggest national economy.9 As recently as 2005, the combined economic weight of those eight
countries was barely half that of the United States. This major increase in share of economic output would not mean much in human development terms, however, if it had not been accompanied by an unprecedented reduction in deprivation and expansion of human capabilities. The first Millennium Development Goal of halving the proportion of people living on less than $1.25 a day relative to 1990 has been met three years before the target date. This is primarily because of the success of some of the most populous countries in eradicating extreme poverty: Brazil, China and India have all dramatically reduced the proportion of their people who are income poor—Brazil from 17.2% of the population in 1990 to 6.1% in 2009, China from 60.2% in 1990 to 13.1% in 2008 and India from 49.4% in 1990 to 32.7% in 2010.10 Broader development challenges, however, have not diminished. An estimated 1.57 billion people, or more than 30% of the population of the 104 countries studied for this Report, live in multidimensional poverty,11 a measure of both
Today, the South as a whole produces about half of world economic output, up from about a third in 1990
FIGURE 3 Brazil, China and India combined are projected to account for 40% of global output by 2050, up from 10% in 1950 Share of global output (%)
60 PROJECTION
50
40
30
20
10
0 1820
1860
1900 Brazil, China and India
1940
1980
2010
2050
Canada, France, Germany, Italy, the United Kingdom and the United States
Note: Output is measured in 1990 purchasing power parity dollars. Source: HDRO interpolation of historical data from Maddison (2010) and projections based on Pardee Center for International Futures (2013).
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