Who says gaps are closing?

I just wrote about the distribution of wealth in the world. Below you can see the development of agriculture value added per worker. As you can see the gap between the rich countries and the poor countries is increasing a lot. Not even China has kept pace in agriculture productivity with the OECD countries. It has indeed increased value added per worker three times in thirty years, but France increased it 5.5 times in the same period. In Africa it was more or less constant for thirty years.



The development is perhaps better visible in a logarithmic diagram:


Apart from debunking the myth that "business-as-usual" will help the poor, it also puts into question who is benefiting from the increased global competition in agriculture commodities.


Agriculture value added per worker is a measure of agricultural productivity. Value added in agriculture measures the output of the agricultural sector (ISIC divisions 1-5) less the value of intermediate inputs. Agriculture comprises value added from forestry, hunting, and fishing as well as cultivation of crops and livestock production. Data are in constant 2000 U.S. dollars.

Looking at yield per hectare the picture is not as straight-forward. But then again, yield per hectare has never been a strong indicator of development, even if some agronomists are obsessed by it. 
Check here how it looks at Gapminder 

Read also: 

Stop pretending there are only winners in the global market

Agriculture: How cheap energy (and capitalism) increased the gaps between rich and poor

 

Military spending up 50% in ten years, US spends 43% of the world total

I knew it was bad, but I didn't know it was that bad!
The USA should simply be ashamed....

• World military expenditure in 2010 is estimated to have reached $1.62 trillion in current dollars;
• This represents a 1.3 per cent increase in real terms since 2009 and a 50 per cent increase since 2001;
• This corresponds to 2.6 per cent of world gross domestic product (GDP), or approximately $236 for each person in the world;
• The USA with its massive spending budget, is the principal determinant of the current world trend, and its military expenditure now accounts for just under half of the world total, at 43% of the world total;

"United States military spending remains exceptional worldwide, accounting for nearly 43 per cent of the global total. The US has also led the global surge in world military spending since 2001, increasing by 81 per cent compared to 32.5 per cent for the total for the 'rest of the world'. At an estimated 4.8% of GDP in 2010, US military spending represents the highest 'military burden' of all counties for whom SIPRI has data outside the Middle East."

Data from SIPRI