Linkage Between National Security, Human Security and Resource Scarcity: An Analysis of the Role of the UN and the NGOs

The paper offers theoretical perspectives on global security in the 21st century. Traditional notion of security has changed dramatically. Today's global flows of goods, services, finance and people highlight the many interlinkages in the security of all states and people. Economic liberalization and globalization in recent decades have created a new breed of threats to national and human security in the form of terrorist attacks, ethnic violence, epidemics and economic downturns. There is also a fear that existing institutions and policies are not able to cope with the weakening multilateralism, disregard for human rights, eroding commitment to eradicate poverty and deprivation, growing educated unemployment and the tendency to neglect global responsibilities in an increasingly integrated world. People throughout the world live under varied conditions of insecurity. There is the need for integrated global policies that focus on people's survival, livelihood and dignity.

Introduction
The year 1989 ushered in the most profound change in international relations since the end of World War I. For more than a century, international politics has been driven by the split between authoritarianism and democracy that was institutionalized at the Congress of Vienna in 1815. In 1990, the Cold War that divided the world into two ideological blocs ended, and there appeared to be an overwhelming consensus that the authoritarian alternative, in its traditional economic and political configuration, could not compete with flexible, pluralist political economic systems.

But human and civil rights were not everywhere triumphant. The collapse of communism resulted in resurgent ethnic nationalism. In Western Europe, the European Community experienced a severe setback in its progress towards economic and political unity. In West Asia, the power vacuum revived regional power rivalries.

Clearly, the end of the Cold War did not usher in a period of peace and stability, in which all nations could focus on the important issues-issues like saving the global environment, or developing appropriate industrial technologies and practices to promote sustainable development. In the 21st century, global politics can best be described as 'schizophrenic'. The world order based on sovereign nation-states since the Treaty of Westphalia (1648) has been fatally undermined as Rosenau and others have termed the present state of prolonged insecurity and instability as "global chaos."¹

There are global environmental problems. At the regional level, these include deforestation, desertification, air and water pollution, radiation pollution, and shortages of fresh water. Equally important are the problems of the global commons, such as pollution of the marine environment, air pollution, and global warming. There is the linkage between environmental problems and such socioeconomic problems as population and industrial growth. These critical issues will remain for the indefinite future.

Natural resources have always been a casus belli. In today's uncertain world, fight over natural resources can escalate into a regional or global confrontation. The Gulf War is one obvious example. There are looming water resource conflicts in West Asia, famines have induced civil wars in Africa. Also, worrisome is the destabilizing impact of population growth on civil governance of developing countries as in India or in China. The cycle of poverty and environmental degradation offers little prospect for stable government. Environmental degradation has historically undermined civil order and contributed to violence.

Under the current conditions of global chaos, the capacity of the majority of governments to tackle problems of human and ecological security is highly limited as these problems are transboundary in their effects. These include disputes over water use and sharing, and flooding due to upstream deforestation and soil erosion. One fifth of all human beings are now threatened by desertification and soil erosion especially in Africa and India.

Another serious problem is transboundary air pollution, a cause of major tensions in the relation between the US and Canada. In addition, there is the problem of transboundary radiation, and the subsoil movement of radioactive particles across frontiers (such as that occurred after the accidents at Chernobyl and Fukushima). There are also growing problems of maritime transport of hazardous nuclear materials, such as plutonium and transboundary waste disposal.

In the developing world, most of the governments' ability to cope with the above- mentioned problems is impaired because of lack of funds, skills and technology. In Africa and Latin America, governments are unstable.

Worldwide instability thus contributes to the worsening of problems of global security because governments can do nothing and a failure to take action hastens further deterioration. Also, national security and human security are inseparable. There is the interrelationship between national and individual security, and global stability.

Many analysts believe that the progress towards survival on this planet will not be possible without a radical shift in values and thinking from what Dennis Pirages and Paul Ehrlinch call the 'industrial paradigm' embracing the work ethic and a belief in material progress to the 'ecological paradigm' which stresses the harmoniousness of human interaction with the natural world.²

Global Initiative: Role of the UN and NGOs
The key to human security is that basic rights and freedom of the people must be upheld. This requires concerted efforts to develop national and international norms, processes and institutions. The emergence of a vibrant and a vigorous civil society at the global level assisted by NGOs and popular social movements in recent years indicate their evolving role in good, global governance. They have injected their voices in the international and national forums about the numerous problems faced by humanity. Human rights activists, gender activists, developmentalists have become active in the public arena at the national and international levels. The UN system provides "a convenient, accessible vantage point to observe some of the most active, persuasive NGOs in the world."³

Operational Development Activities
Nowadays, operational activities are officially defined as encompassing all development cooperation with or in assistance to developing countries through the World Bank Group, IFAD, UNFPA, UNICEF, etc., and also humanitarian emergency activities.⁴

Poverty does not obligingly slice itself into neat sectors called agriculture, health, children, energy, population, etc. Of all the enemies of human society, poverty is the most highly complex. It is widely agreed that the UN system has performed vital services to developing countries (Childers and Urquhart, 1994, p. 1).

G-192
The United Nations convened a three-day summit of the world leaders from June 24-26, 2009 at its New York Headquarters to assess the worst global economic downturn since the Great Depression. The UN Conference on the World Financial and Economic Crisis and its Impact on Development aimed to identify the vulnerable populations and initiate a needed dialog on the transformation of the international financial architecture, taking into account the needs and concerns of all Member States.⁵

The Summit was mandated at the Follow-up International Conference on Financing for Development held in December 2008 in Doha, Qatar. Member States requested the General Assembly President Miguel D'Escoto Brockmann to organize the meeting "at the highest level."

The conference consisted of plenary sessions and four interactive roundtable exchanges among the world leaders and representatives of the United Nations system, including the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, as well as civil society organizations and the private sector. The summit produced an outcome document.⁶

The four Roundtables for examining and overcoming the world financial and economic crisis and its impact on development addressed the issues of:

• The impact of the crisis on employment, trade, investment and development, including the achievement of the internationally agreed development goals and the Millennium Development Goals.
• Actions and appropriate measures to mitigate the impact of the crisis on development.
• The role of the United Nations and its Member States in the ongoing international discussions on reforming and strengthening the international financial and economic system and architecture.
• Contributions of the United Nations development system in response to the crisis.⁷

The Conference brought to bear the full authority of the General Assembly, the only universal body of sovereign states. It is not a countermeasure or alternative channel to existing international forum on economic cooperation and financial regulations.

A Commission of Experts established by the General Assembly President submitted in March 2009 a score of preliminary recommendations on immediate and long-term measures vis-a-vis the workings of the global financial system. Comprising economists and finance officials from all regions and chaired by Nobel laureate Joseph Stieglitz, the Commission of Experts on Reforms of the International Monetary and Financial System highlighted a range of practical proposals for improving the international financial architecture. These and other inputs serve as the basis for the drafting of a conference outcome document.⁸

2010 World Economic Situation and Prospects
The global economy is slowly rebounding from the worst of the recession but the recovery remains too anemic to create enough jobs to replace those lost so far, according to a new United Nations report.

The updated 2010 World Economic Situation and Prospects, released by the UN Department for Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) on May 26, 2010, finds that the world's gross product started to grow again in the early months of the year after it contracted by 2% the previous year amid the most severe international recession since World War II.

The report predicted that the global economy will grow by 3% in 2010 and then by another 3.1%, thanks in part to fiscal stimulus packages and expansionary monetary policies introduced by governments worldwide.

Household consumption and business investment are both showing tentative signs of revival and international trade is also on the increase again, although still below its pre-crisis peak.⁹

But the pace of the recovery remains subdued and "far from sufficient to recuperate the job losses and close the output gap created" during the recession, according to the report's authors.¹⁰

The report noted that the global economy still contained important weaknesses, with credit flows to non-financial sectors remaining relatively weak, especially in some wealthier industrialized nations. The public finances of some developed countries, such as Greece, Portugal, Spain and Ireland, have also deteriorated.¹¹

"Facing elevated unemployment rates, soaring public debt, and limited credit flows, growth prospects for most developed economies remain lackluster, unable to provide sufficient impetus to the global economy," the report stated.

The world's developed economies were expected to collectively grow by only 1.9% in 2010 and 2.1% in 2011, with countries in the so-called Eurozone struggling most of all.

The report added that "while developing Asia, particularly China and India, is leading the way among developing countries, the recovery is much more subdued in many economies in Africa and Latin America."¹²

China and India are forecast to grow in 2011 by 9.2% and 7.9% respectively, for example, whereas the economy of sub-Saharan Africa is expected to enlarge by 4.7% and the Caribbean region by only 2.1%.

Unemployment rates, already at historic highs in many countries, are unlikely to budge. The number of jobless people worldwide rose by at least 34 million in 2010, and the number of working poor soared by 215 million as many people took lower-paid jobs.¹³

Weather Insurance
A new study by two UN agencies has highlighted weather insurance as an important tool to protect poor farmers, emphasizing that issuing such insurance before the planting season can be more effective than providing emergency aid after a calamity has wiped out the crops.¹⁴

"Weather insurance can reduce the need for costly emergency operations by preparing for the disaster, rather than reacting to the aftermath," said Carlo Scaramella, Climate Change and Disaster Risk Reduction Coordinator for the World Food Program (WFP). "Not only can it help poor rural households reduce their risk in the face of weather shocks, it can also unlock other opportunities, such as access to credit, helping people invest in a better future," she added.

The study released by WFP and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) at the Global Risk Forum in Davos, identified key principles to help promote the wider use of weather index-based insurance, and outlined how donors and governments can support the effort. Weather index-based insurance sets out objective parameters, such as levels of rainfall, at specific locations, during an agreed period.¹⁵

The terms of the contract correlate as closely as possible with the loss of agricultural production suffered by the farmer. All policyholders within the same area receive payouts based on rainfall measurements at the weather station close to their farms, eliminating the need for expensive, time-consuming loss assessments in the field.¹⁶

"Weather insurance is mutually beneficial as it supports small farmers to better address risk in their agricultural activities, and encourages additional private-sector investment in rural areas, something IFAD believes can further support small farmers and their communities," said the agency's Associate Vice-President Kevin Cleaver.

The study released was conducted by the IFAD-WEP Weather Risk Management Facility, and supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.¹⁷

Pollution, deforestation and rising sea levels threaten development in Asia and the Pacific, while South Asia must overcome acute poverty and internal inequalities to maintain current rates of progress, warns the 2011 Global Human Development Report, released by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

The 2011 Report-"Sustainability and Equity: A Better Future for All"-argues that environmental sustainability can be most effectively achieved by simultaneously addressing health, education, income and gender disparities within and among countries.

Releasing the Report in New Delhi on November 2, 2011, Jairam Ramesh, the then Minister of Rural Development, Government of India, said, "We need to understand the strong linkages between lifestyles of the rich and livelihoods of the poor both within and between countries. This Report makes an important contribution in highlighting the fact that environmental deterioration negatively and disproportionately impacts the poor. In reality, environmental issues are not elite pastimes, but are fundamental to securing livelihoods and improving the human development status of the poor."

Environmental challenges fueled largely by rapid industrial development and deforestation sharpen inequalities. According to Caitlin Wiesen, Country Director, UNDP India, "India has made significant progress on human development and the country's HDI value has increased 59% between 1980 and 2011. However, this trajectory of human development gains may be threatened by environmental risks and inequality."

The 2011 Global Human Development Index (HDI) that ranked countries on their progress on the three key dimensions of human development-education, health and income-included 187 nations and territories, the most comprehensive coverage since UNDP began publishing the Human Development Report in 1990.

Between 1980 and 2011, India's HDI value increased from 0.344 to 0.547, an increase of 59.0% or average annual increase of about 1.5%. India is ranked 134 out of 187 countries and UN-recognized territories.

In the 2011 Report's Gender Inequality Index (GII), South Asian women are shown to lag significantly behind men in education, parliamentary representation and labor force participation. India is ranked 129 out of 146 nations in the GII (Nigel Price et al., 2013).

As in 2010, the 2011 Report also included the Inequality-adjusted HDI (IHDI), which takes into account inequality in all three dimensions of the HDI. When adjusted for inequality, India's HDI falls to 0.392, that is, a loss of 28.3% due to inequality. This is slightly lower than the average for South Asia (28.4%).¹⁸

The Report's authors warned that deteriorating environmental conditions and increasingly extreme weather conditions could undermine economic progress in many countries in the region.

Despite human development progress of recent years, income distribution has worsened, grave gender imbalances still persist, and accelerating environmental destruction puts a "double burden of deprivation" on the poorest households and communities, the Report says. The poor are the most vulnerable to environmental challenges.

This is borne out by the fact that by 2050, the average HDI could drop by 12% in South Asia due to the effects of global warming on agricultural production, access to clean water, and pollution.

The fourth UN Conference on the Least Developed Countries was convened in Istanbul, Turkey from May 9-13, 2011. The strengthening of productive capacities, trade as the engine of growth, and the green revolution were the priorities of the conference. It was the first major meeting on development of the new challenge in the global fight against poverty. Resolution 64/213 of 2009 of the General Assembly designated the office of the High Representative for the LDCs, Landlocked Developing Countries and small Island Developing State as the focal point for the Conference. A new Program of Action for LDC development emerged at the Conference.¹⁹

Humanitarian Emergency
Economic stagnation, absolute poverty, over-population, environmental degradation, use of military force, and human rights violations crowd the list of factors that trigger humanitarian crises. Additional measures for respect and protection of human rights are necessary to ensure human security. Jan Eliasson, Under Secretary General proposed UN Humanitarian Security to protect the UN and NGO emergency personnel in his address to the Consultation of the International Negotiation Network, the Carter Centre, Atlanta, February 17, 1993.²⁰

UN Millennium Goals' Campaign
The Commission on Human Security was established in response to former UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan's call at the Millennium Summit in September 2000 to achieve the twin goals of 'freedom from fear' and 'freedom from want.' The Millennium Declaration adopted a new human security framework to address the conditions and threats people will face in the 21st century. The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) placed the fight against poverty among the top priorities of the international community.²¹

There were less than two years left for the world to achieve MDGs and take steps to protect the earth's environment by 2015, which coincided with the Government of India's 12th Five-Year Plan (1012-2017). The UN Millennium Campaign, an inter-agency initiative of the United Nations, is mandated to support people and citizens across the world to take action and forge creative partnerships for the achievement of eight MDGs.:

1. Eradicate Extreme Poverty and Hunger
2. Achieve Universal Primary Education
3. Promote Gender Equality and Empower Women
4. Reduce Child Mortality
5. Improve Maternal Health
6. Combat HIV/AIDS, Malaria and Other Diseases
7. Ensure Environmental Sustainability
8. Global Partnerships for Development

According to Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, the Indian government's "negative approach to the food security legislation, insisting on targeting the provision of subsidized food to a group specified by these irrational poverty lines, does not give rise to much optimism."²² The word 'hunger' does not appear in the 12th Plan approach paper. The equity, efficiency, and sustainability of the current approach are questionable. Major food-related programs, such as the Public Distribution System (PDS) and Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS) are plagued by corruption. A recent evaluation of ICDS in Gorakhpur, Uttar Pradesh, by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) showed that 63% of food and funds are misappropriated. India requires a significant increase of targeted investments in nutrition programs, clinics, disease control, irrigation, rural electrification, rural roads and sanitation, accompanied by systemic reforms. This requires improving governance, productivity and accountability of government machinery.²³

Is the 12th Plan Sustainable?
According to Ashish Kothari, a member of Kalpavriksh-Environmental Action Group, "The Indian government has repeatedly talked of the need for 'sustainable development', in which environmental and human development concerns are integrated. Does the draft 12th Plan Approach Paper move India closer to this goal? Certainly, one's hopes are raised when one reads its title. 'Faster, more inclusive, sustainable growth'."

At a first glance, there is much in the draft to make environmentalists feel optimistic. Ecological problems like water and soil degradation are described in no uncertain terms."²⁴

The UPA has gone a certain direction in making available the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme for some kinds of land and water regeneration, but this could have been taken much further.

Yet another area of work crying out for attention is policies that create perverse incentives. Subsidies to chemical fertilizers that end up destroying the soil are briefly mentioned, but there are many others, such as sops for industrializing 'backward areas' which are invariably rich in natural ecosystems and often inhabited by culturally-sensitive people, who need different models of development. How these could be converted to positive incentives for ecologically-secure livelihoods, needs urgent articulation.²⁵

ASHA (Accredited Social Health Activists)
During one of her visits to see the mother and infant, Debaki Pradhan, a health activist observed that despite all efforts, the baby with low birth weight was just not able to suckle the mother's milk properly and as a result, was getting malnourished. She swung into action. She sent the mother and the baby to the nearby Nutritional Rehabilitation Centre (NRC) at Angul Hospital. With specialized care, the condition of the low birth weight baby improved and she was able to have her mother's milk. In due course, she gained strength and is growing up as a normal happy healthy baby.²⁶

ASHA is a female community health volunteer who acts as an intermediary between the community and healthcare facilities. She combines the multiple roles of community mobilizer, activist and provider of first contact of care at the community level.

At the national level, there are a total of 8.8 lakh ASHAs supported by the National Rural Health Mission or the NRHM. There is thus an ASHA for every 1,000 rural inhabitants in almost every part of the country. ASHA is selected by the Gram Sabha and is entitled for a performance-based compensation package.²⁷

Governance Reforms for Human Development?
Embedded within the wider context of neoliberal reforms, Public Private Partnership (PPP) is fast emerging as the strategy for development in the hard infrastructure sector of the economy or in the softer social sector in India. However, there are serious concerns about the equity and public accountability dimension of the PPP. According to Richa Singh, the Executive Director of Centre for Democracy and Social Action (CDSA), New Delhi, the experience with PPP in India does not suggest a happy ending, particularly for poor communities. The State has abandoned its distributive role and has embraced big business to achieve its near-exclusive obsession with 'high growth'.²⁸

Essential services such as water, sanitation, education and healthcare are vital for human development, to reduce poverty, and after all a matter of life and death for many.

How can better governance contribute to more efficient and accountable delivery of basic services to the poor? The approach paper to the 12th Five-Year Plan suggests significant measures like professionalization of public service delivery, adoption of Total Quality Management (TQM) concepts, innovative use of Information Technology and other technologies, social mobilization and capacity building in order to improve the quality of human life.

What has been achieved so far with respect to e-infrastructure, according to C K Ramchandran, an expert on governance, institutional reform and rural livelihood, "is impressive, but there has not been commensurate progress in addressing issues of government processes which are the crucial bottlenecks in delivering services to the common people."²⁹

The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) and India have signed a partnership agreement to boost development progression on March 14, 2012. The first-ever Indian Human Development Awards 'Manav Vikas' were announced for excellence in the quality of human development. These awards have been instituted by the Planning Commission and UNDP.³⁰

Human Rights and Development
Over the past years, the voice of ordinary people has been raised across the globe and they want human beings at the center of economic and political systems and a meaningful participation in public affairs, a dignified life and freedom from fear and want. The Arab Springs in Egypt, Yemen, Tunisia and Algeria have sparked a wave of protests against autocratic rulers. The violations of human rights is widespread. Human Rights are purported to be morally universal rights. The United Nations has a record of considerable achievement in the field of human rights even if it has too often been marred by double standards and the influence of power politics. The increase in emergencies involving threats to or active violations of human rights on a large scale has, however, put the UN's machinery under heavy strain. In developing countries, human rights occur under situations arising from a mixture of several forces (Childers and Urquhart, 1994, p. 1).

Serious issues have been raised regarding the involvement of international financial institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in development and monetary practices infringing or categorically violating human rights in the developing countries.

Jim Young Kim, President of the World Bank, has set out on an ambitious goal. He is looking to remake the world in his own image that will surely appear utopian to many. What Kim wants is to have a sustainable world where all households have access to clean energy. A world where everyone has enough to eat. A world where no one dies from preventable diseases. That looks like a tall order but the World Bank has a plan of its own. It is to eradicate extreme poverty by 2030. At a time, when the world is yet to recover from a full-blown recession and where more than one-fifth of the population still languishes in dire poverty, Kim's chances of fulfilling his dreams may look improbable, if not impossible.

However, this bleak economic picture is not deterring the World Bank from pursuing its lofty goals. Its stated mission "to end extreme poverty within a generation" has not been compromised. The target itself is an update of the Bank's Millennium Development Goals (MDG) set in 2000. It was born out of the Bank's desire to end the misery of 1.3 billion people living on less than $1.25 a day. The MDG goals, according to the World Bank, are reasonably supported by the organization's data, which showed a drop in absolute poverty from 43% in 1990 to 21% in 2010. Still, MDG is "Carrier of hope for millions of people and Kim's enthusiasm will give it the necessary push and thrust."³¹

IMF Chief, Christine Lagarde presented a plan to prevent reckless banks from ruining the world economy which appears to be a tough task.³²

Myanmar: United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon welcomed moves by Myanmar's leadership to address the violence taking place in the southeast Asian country's Rakhine state as "steps in the right direction."

The spokesperson noted that the UN chief received a letter that day from the President of Myanmar, U Thein Sein, in which he condemned the 'criminal acts' of elements inside his country that caused the 'senseless violence' that resulted in widespread loss of life, destruction of property and displacement of families in Rakhine state, located in western Myanmar.

The north of Rakhine state has been the site of inter-communal violence, with clashes between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims, which eventually led the government to declare a state of emergency there.

The violence reportedly left at least a dozen civilians dead and hundreds of homes destroyed, while internally displacing some 75,000 people.

Since then, at least 89 people have been killed and 35,000 displaced in the wake of a renewed upsurge in violence, which also left more than 5,300 houses and religious buildings destroyed, according to UN estimates.³³

A United Nations senior official expressed serious concern about reports of "human rights violations committed by security forces in Myanmar's Rakhine state, after clashes between its Buddhist and Muslim communities reportedly killed at least 78 people and displaced thousands alleging discriminatory and arbitrary responses by the security forces, and even their instigation of and involvement in clashes," the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, said in a news release.

According to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the violence between ethnic Rakhine Buddhists and Rohingya Muslims in the state, located in the country's west, was triggered when an ethnic Rakhine woman was raped and murdered. This was followed by the killing of 10 Muslims by an unidentified mob.

Meanwhile, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) delivered aid to the more than 30,000 people that were affected by the violence.

According to UNHCR, an estimated 80,000 people are displaced in and around the towns of Sittwe and Maungdaw, with most of them living in camps or with host families in surrounding villages.

Serious disturbances in Rakhine state, located in western Myanmar, led to the country's government declaring a state of emergency.

Syria: President Bashar-al-Assad's regime remains 'vicious and tyrannical'. The extremists hijacked the peaceful protests in 2011. The United Nations estimated that security forces have suffered 15,000 fatalities and that 45,000 civilians have died in the last two years fighting. According to the US Department of Justice, most of the Free Syrian Army (FSA) adhere to Al Qaeda's ideology. The United Nations and the League of Arab States sent a joint observer mission to Syria to end the crisis and to prevent attacks against civilians in the city of Homs. The UN agencies estimated that some 2.5 million Syrians are in urgent need of humanitarian assistance.³⁴

Protecting human rights during times of conflict is one of the greatest challenges that the international community faces today as evidenced by the crises in Syria and other parts of the world.³⁵

In India, there is the issue of extrajudicial executions. Christof Heyns, UN Special Rapporteur, was mandated by the Human Rights Council to submit a report on Extra Judicial Summary or Arbitrary Executions. Heyns visited the states of Gujarat, Kerala, Jammu and Kashmir, Assam, West Bengal and Delhi and called on the Government of India to take measures to fight impunity in cases of extrajudicial executions, and communal and traditional killings. Evidence gathered confirmed the use of 'fake encounters' in certain parts of India.³⁶ In the North Eastern states and Jammu and Kashmir, the armed forces have wide powers to employ lethal force. Other areas of concern relate to the prevalence of communal violence, and in some areas, there are dowry and 'honor' killings and the plight of dalits and adivasis.

Farmers are committing suicides. One Indian farmer kills himself every 37 minutes. According to the National Crime Records Bureau, more than 2,70,000 farmers have taken their lives between 1995-2011. About 14,000 did so only in 2011. Many reports explain that the farming sector's decline in India began in the 1970s. By the end of the 1980s, the government sought credit from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank which was granted in exchange for applying the usual "plans for structural adjustment; the privatization of public institutions involved in farming, cutting back state funding, deregulation of prices and removal of protective laws on the sector and custom tariffs. This allowed for free flow of foreign farming products to India's domestic market. The removal of tariffs and cutback of state funding spell doom for small farmers."³⁷

A landmark report on breaches of international law and human rights violations in Nepal released by the UN High Commissioner for Rights, Navi Pillay noted that 2006 Comprehensive Peace Agreement between the Nepali Government and the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) highlighted human rights violations. Perpetrators of serious violations on both sides have not been held accountable. Accompanying the 233 page Report, known as the Transitional Justice Reference Archive recorded 9,000 serious violations of international human rights law that had been committed during the decade-long conflict.³⁸

Conclusion
The preceding analysis has provided the role of the UN and NGOs and the internationally agreed Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and expedite the realization of these goals and measures to be taken to eradicate poverty, to undertake concrete actions to protect human rights to promote the integration of the three components of sustainable development-economic development, social development and environmental protection. Poverty eradication, changing unsustainable patterns of production and consumption and protecting and managing the natural resource base of economic and social development are essential requirements for sustainable development.

Globalization offers opportunities and challenges for development. Globalization and interdependence have offered new opportunities for trade, investment and capital flows and advances in technology, including information technology and the improvement of living standards around the world. At the same time, there remain serious challenges, including serious financial crisis, insecurity, poverty, exclusion and inequality within and among societies.

The United Nations Millennium Campaign, an inter-agency initiative of the UN, is mandated to support people across the world to take action and forge creative partnership for the achievements of the MDGs.

Sadly, lack of official awareness is evident in all sorts of recent policy measures, for example, in the cynicism of increasing oil prices with cascading effects, even when inflation has already imposed huge burdens on living conditions of people, especially the poor.

India appears to be well poised "to meet the MDG target of 50% reduction of poverty between 1990 and 2015."³⁹,⁴⁰The United Nations convened a summit of the world leaders from June 24-26, 2009 to assess the worst global economic downturn since the Great Depression. The Summit was mandated at the Follow-up International Conference on Financing for Development, held in December 2008 in Doha, Qatar. A Commission of Experts was established by the General Assembly to make recommendations on immediate and long-term measures vis-a-vis the workings of the global financial system.

In 2010, the UN Department for Economic and Social Affairs in its report found that the world gross product grew again amid the most severe international recession since World War II. But the pace of recovery remained subdued, according to the report. The report stressed the need for greater international policy coordination to ensure a more sustained global economic recovery.

The World Future Energy Summit was held on January 18, 2012, in Abu Dhabi and 2012 was launched as the International Year of Sustainable Energy for all on January 9, 2012 at the Auto Expo in New Delhi.

In February 2012, priorities were outlined for Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development. The Development Cooperation Forum has been setup. Member States agreed for the creation of a framework to advance green economies and to include poverty eradication and green jobs, energy, water, food security, urbanization, disasters, oceans and seas, as well as climate change and biodiversity.⁴¹

The Rio+20 outcome document emphasized to strengthen South-South cooperation. Rio+20 was an opportunity for reinvigorating development cooperation.

Today, there are much greater disparities between societies. The level of technological development, public education and general wellbeing among populations varies extensively. Africa, South Asia, Latin America and a few other regions demonstrate all the characteristics of widespread poverty, insufficient calorie and protein intake to maintain health and normal growth. Population growth rates remain high. The land available for cultivation is shrinking due to desertification, soil erosion, deforestation, and pollution. Mass migration to the cities has created immense housing problems, slums, and unemployment. Finally, wealth distribution is highly uneven.

The lack of resources makes many developing countries weak in all dimensions. To survive, they need frequent dose of humanitarian assistance to cope with natural disasters such as droughts and floods, military aid to maintain even rudimentary armed forces which are often used more for maintaining the regime against its internal critics and secessionist movements.

There are a number of non-state actors that have a great deal more influence in promoting issues on the international agenda. These include (1) territorial non-state actors, such as national liberation movements; (2) non-territorial and transnational organizations, such as Multinational Corporations (MNCs) which reflect the increasing globalization of the world economy.

The international community has to enhance the integration of development goals and enhance the partnerships between governmental and economic non-governmental actors. Good economic governance at the international level is fundamental for achieving human development. Asia and the Pacific region faced slowing growth in 2012 as per the Economic and Social Survey of Asia and the Pacific 2012. But Asia-Pacific region will remain growth pole of the world economy.⁴²

India and 178 other member states at the 1994 Cairo International Conference on Population and Development had reaffirmed that individuals have the right to voluntary family planning. Many women in India and numerous developing countries do not take advantage of family planning for various reasons, such as cultural or social obstacles-violence by their partner or stigma by the community, if they try to use contraception in the opinion of Dr. Osotimehin, Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of the UN Population Fund.⁴³

According to UNCTAD annual report, weak demand and fiscal tightening has impeded recovery in developed economies. Developing countries have sustained their strong growth according to the report "Post-crisis Policy Challenges in the World Economy" 2011. East, South and South-East Asia continued to record the highest GDP growth rates. However, Japan faced a moderate slowdown due to tighter monetary conditions and weak demand in some major export markets.

According to the findings of a UN Survey, water-related risks and the competition for water resources are perceived by a majority of countries that has increased over the past 20 years. Progress on water supply efficiency is lagging behind. In the view of UN Under-Secretary General and UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner, "sustainable management and use of water is vital in food security, energy or supporting valuable ecosystem services-underpins the transition to a low-carbon, resource-efficient green economy."⁴⁴

Gender inequality is a major cause of hunger and poverty. According to World Food Program (WFP), globally 60% of chronically hungry people are women and girls and there is the need of reducing gender disparities to reduce hunger. Emphasis on capacity building and empowerment has been achieved through the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) initiative in Jharkhand and Odisha in India. Climate change poses a difficult challenge in the overall efforts to achieve food security.

In India, maternal health, reproductive health and family planning must be integrated into the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) and the Janani Suraksha Yojna (JSY). Despite the overall progress so far wide disparities and inequities in women's access to healthcare continue to persist.^45,46

To sum up, the linkage between national security, human security, resource scarcity is one of the great challenges faced by the UN system in the 21st century. The challenges are related to the growing interdependence of national economies and increased non-military threats to global security. People want peace, human rights, democracy and social equity. The responsibility for the various segments of human security is lodged in different organs of the UN and related specialized agencies. Thus, there is the need to strengthen the international institutional framework and a concrete program of action to address the pervasive threats to global security.

1. James N Rosenau (1990), Turbulence in World Politics: A Theory of Change and Continuity, Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey.
2. See Dennis Pirages and Paul Ehrlich (1989), Global Technopolitics: The International Politics of Technology and International Resources, Brooks Cole.
3. Farced Lakoria (2006), "Calling on India," Hindustan Times, February 26, New Delhi.
4. A Study of the Capacity of the United Nations Development System", Vol. I, pp. 2-3, UN Doc. DP/5, 1969.
5. www.un.org/ga/econcrisissummit/
6. http://www.un.org/ga/econcrisissummit/docs/Backgrounder_ ENG_27May.pdf
7. Ibid.
8. http://www.un.org/ga/president/63/interactive/uneconference: shtml
9. http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/policy/un-finds-pace.html
10. http://www.un.org/esa/policy/wess/wesp2010files/wesp10update.pdf
11. http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/policy/un-finds-pace.html
12. http://www.un.org/esa/policy/wess/wesp2010files/wesp10update.pdf
13. http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/news/policy/un-finds-pace.html
14. https://news.un.org/en/story/2010/06/340602-weather-insurance-offers-protection-poor-farmers-stresses-new-un-report
15. Ibid.
16. https://www.wfp.org/news/news-release/weather-insurance-policies-offer-lifeline-farmers-developing-countries
17. http:www.ifad.org/ruralfinance/pub/weather.pdf
18. http//hdr.undp.org
19. News, May 2011, p. 2.
20. Erskine Childers and Brian Urquhart (1994), "Renewing the United National System", p. 118 and pp. 204-205, Dag Hammarskjold Foundation, Uppsala, Sweden.
21. UN: Strengthening of the United Nations: An Agenda for Further Change", Report of the Secretary- General, UN-Doc. A/57/387, 2002.
22. U News MDG Supplement, p. 3.
23. Ibid.
24. U News MDG Supplement, p. 13.
25. Ibid.
26. http://www.pressreader.com/india/hindustan-times-jalandhar/20130517/281509338708715
27. Report Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, Government of India, Hindustan Times, New Delhi, May 17, 2013, p. 3.
28. Ibid., p. 18.
29. Ibid., p. 19.
30. U News, April 2012, pp. 9-10.
31. Amir Hossain (2013), "World Bank: Ambitions Agenda: The End of Poverty", The Sunday Indian, May 12, p. 21.
32. Vivienne Walt (2013), "Can this Woman Fix Europe?", Time, April 8, p. 18019.
33. www.un.org/apps/news//printnewsAr.asp?nid=43483
34. U News, November 2012, p. 2.
35. www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=43370
36. Ribal al-Assad (2013), "Syria's Hijacked Struggle", The Sunday Indian, May 12, p. 22.
37. Human Rights Watch: U News, April 2012, Vol. 8, No. 4, p. 2.
38. Fernando Molina Cortes (2013), "Harvest of Suicide," Hindustan Times, p. 9, April 17, New Delhi.
39. U News, October 2012, p. 10.
40. U News, MDG Supplement, p. 2.
41. http://www.un.org/esa/poling/wess/wesp2010files/wesp10update.pdf
42. U News, February 2012, p. 5.
43. U News, May 2012, p. 20.
44. U News, May 2012, p. 19.
45. U News, May 2012, p. 30.
46. Poonam Muttreja (2013), "Saving Our Mothers", Hindustan Times, p. 12, May 22, New Delhi.

References

1. Childers Erskine and Urquhart Brian (1994), "Renewing the United Nations System, Development Dialogue", p. 1, Dag Hammarsk Jold Foundation, Uppsala, Sweden.
2. Nigel Price, Michael Wells, Nicholas Fellows and Anjali Tyagi (2013), "Cambridge IGCSE India Studies", Human Development, Chapter 2, p. 75, Cambridge University Press, New Delhi, India.

Reference # 55J-2018-04-04-01