Overview: Avoiding Marginalisation

Sub-Saharan Africa was the only region in the world where the population ended the 1980s worse off than at the beginning of the decade. Per capita income had fallen and the region was producing less food to feed its population, which continued to grow rapidly. SSA’s economic slide, which has largely continued into the 1990s, is in marked contrast to continued economic progress in South-East and South Asia as well as in Latin America. At the same time, the newly emerging democracies of Eastern Europe have attracted considerable world attention. Thus, global interest and concern have shifted away from Africa, and it is more and more referred to as the ‘marginalised continent’.