Basic needs approach
Also called: Minimum needs approach · Topic: Human Development: Concept, Approaches and Measurement · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 3 "Human Development"
Meaning
The basic needs approach, which NCERT also calls the minimum needs approach, was first proposed by the International Labour Organisation (ILO). It says development should first provide six basic needs: health, education, food, water supply, sanitation and housing. The plan is to deliver these to chosen sections of the population, such as the poor. Its main weakness is that it ignores human choice. People are treated as targets of provision, not as people who decide for themselves.
Example
The ILO's World Employment Conference in 1976 launched the basic needs agenda worldwide. In India, the Minimum Needs Programme of the Fifth Five Year Plan (1974-79) followed the same idea. Today the public distribution system (PDS), which supplies cheap food grains, and government housing schemes also reflect it.
Don't confuse with
- Welfare approach: the welfare approach asks for more government spending on welfare in general. The basic needs approach names six specific needs for defined groups.