Fighting Poverty - Shoulder to Shoulder with the Poor!

Poverty is a lot of things ranging from lack of education or medical attention to hunger and lack of shelter. It has many faces, changing from place to place and across time.

Poverty can be defined in many different ways. The United Nations defines extreme poverty as those living on less than one dollar a day and poverty as those living on less than two dollars a day. These figures are known as PPP or Purchasing Power Parity, so that for the one dollar per day, what can be purchased is the equivalent to what can be purchased in the USA for one dollar regardless whether than person is living in Malawi, India or Bolivia. This is a good and useful definition but in some ways it masks the day-to-day reality of living a life of poverty.

A deeper definition of poverty is this; as the total absence of opportunities, accompanied by high levels of undernourishment, hunger, illiteracy, lack of education, physical and mental ailments, emotional and social instability, unhappiness, sorrow and hopelessness for the future.

Poverty is also characterized by a chronic shortage of economic, social and political participation, relegating individuals to exclusion as social beings, preventing access to the benefits of economic and social development and thereby limiting their cultural development. This describes the day-today reality of living in poverty.

It can be concluded then that poverty is caused by limited access to resources, knowledge and benefits to fulfill our basic human needs.

The United Nations has concluded that there are two conditions that limit access to resources, knowledge and benefits, social and individual.

The social condition is completely tied up with the political and economic power structures, as it is these power structures who regulate the distribution of resources and services in ways the generate and maintain inequalities, in areas such as land distribution, infrastructure, capital, markets, credit, education and information. It is these same power structures that decide upon war or not. While war brings untold wealth to the few it brings untold poverty and misery to the many.

The individual condition whereby the individual lacks the will, courage and self-confidence is a result of the social conditioning. However through education, micro credit, support and encouragement it is possible for each and every individual to change their condition, to break out of the cycle of poverty and to get onto the bottom rung of the ladder of wealth.

The poor do not need to be helped in the paternal way but rather they need help to access the resources they require to get out of poverty, primarily education and micro credit. It has been shown time and time again that when the poor manage to get onto the lowest ring of the ladder of wealth then they themselves mange to climb up the ladder and help their children to climb even higher. What they are unable to do is to climb onto that first rung.

For those who want to help the poor fight against their condition and climb onto that first rung, it is these two things that we can really help with - education and micro credit. This can manifest itself in many forms, from the traditional education of reading and writing to the education of implementing new crops varieties with higher yields, from teaching people new skills to introducing completely new crops or animals, from making micro credit loans to start small businesses to starting larger scale commercial ventures that employ people.

The poor just need that first help to get started after that they will be able to look after themselves, feed themselves and educate their children which is why it is vitally important to help the poorest and most desperate onto the first rung of the ladder.     

If you have a bank account

If you have some small change in your pocket

If you keep your food in a refrigerator

 If you have clothes in a closet

 If you have a roof over your head

 If you have a bed to sleep in,

 Then you are richer than 75% of the world’s population

So poverty is a call to action -- for the poor and the wealthy alike -- a call to change the world so that many more may have enough to eat, adequate shelter, access to education and health, protection from violence, and a voice in what happens in their own communities.