Korea, a model of development

By Korea.net Honorary Reporter Nnenna Ukandu

Photo = Korea.net Flickr

From a war torn country to innovative leadership. Korea was one of the world’s poorest countries after the Korean War (1950-1953), with a gross domestic product per capita of only USD 79. Today the country belongs to the club of rich countries, the OECD, and is a member of the development assistance committee (DAC). Korea benefited from big injections of foreign aid, first from the U.S., then from Japan.

In the same period, the total amount of aid provided by the U.S. to the entire African continent was only USD 68.9 billion. Korea indisputably used its aid well.

Aid was injected into Korea’s planning and budget process, and the regime of Park Chung-hee didn’t squander the aid it received. Rather, it provided pointers on how development should be done.

Korea has become a symbol of a country that has achieved rapid economic growth in a short period of time. 

This brings me to the New Community Movement, or Saemaul Undong. It's a set of agricultural development policies implemented in Korea in the 1970s and 1980s. I wish the Nigeria government and non-governmental agencies here would adopt a similar set of policies to help with rural development, especially in the northeastern parts of Nigeria, which are huge challenges to the country due to the insurgency there. The slogan for this collection of Korean agricultural development policies is, "Diligence, self-help and collaboration." It follows that this encourages community members to participate in the development process. This focus on improving the basic living conditions of the people and their environment is at the early stages of the New Community Movement.

In spite of rapid urbanization in most parts of the world over the past few decades, rural development remains a major challenge for developing countries like Nigeria. According to the World Bank, "Seventy-five percent of the world’s poor and low-income earners live in rural areas, and most are involved in farming”.

National governments and non-governmental agencies are placing emphasis on rural agricultural development as a critical factor in helping to reduce poverty and in achieving the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. If today’s programs are to achieve their objectives, they must learn lessons from the many rural development initiatives pursed over the past decades in other countries, like the New Community Movement initiated by President Park Chung-hee in Korea in the early 1970s.

Nigeria and other developing countries should borrow a leaf from the pages of this movement because of the success it achieved in Korea in a relatively short period time, helping to raise incomes and to improving living standards in rural areas, thereby narrowing the urban-rural divide.   

wisdom117@korea.kr

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