CLASS 9 POVERTY AS A CHALLENGE (ECONOMICS - 3)

POVERTY AS A CHALLENGE

INTRODUCTION

Poverty is a weapon of mass destruction.

Poverty is a situation in which certain sections of society are not capable of meeting basic needs of food, shelter and clothing.

 Poverty is about not having enough money to meet basic needs including food, clothing and shelter. 

The World Bank describes poverty as:

   “Poverty is hunger. Poverty is lack of shelter. Poverty is being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job, is fear for the future, living one day at a time.”

According to Social scientists, poverty is determined by illiteracy level, no access to health care, no job opportunities, no access to clean drinking water, sanitation etc.

TWO TYPES OF POVERTY

Relative Poverty

•      Under Relative poverty the economic conditions of different regions or countries is compared. The capita income and the national income are the two indicators of relative poverty. According to the UNO those countries are treated poor whose per capita income is less than US $725 per annum.

•      R.P. is measured by taking the income levels of the top 5 to 10% of the population and comparing it with the bottom 5-10%.

Absolute Poverty

•      Absolute poverty refers to the measure of poverty, keeping in view the per capita intake of calories and minimum level of consumption.

•      Per capita income : National income / Population

•      A.P. is refers to a situation where the quantities of cereals, pulses, milk etc. are not met with in money terms.

MEASUREMENT OF POVERTY

Expenditure Method

•      Under this the minimum food requirements for survival is estimated.

•      The food value is converted into calories. (Accepted Avg. 2400 in rural & 2100 in urban areas /day)

•      The caloric value of food is then converted into the money value i.e. in rupees. (In 2000, Rs.328 /month in rural & Rs.454 in urban was fixed)

•      The total equivalent amount is considered as the poverty line.

Income Method

•      This method is used by the government while distributing food through PDS at the local level.

•      Under this a poverty line is fixed by the government.

•      All the families whose total income is less than the poverty line fixed by the government are  considered as BPL. (In 2000, < Rs.1640 in rural & Rs.2270/month in urban as BPL.)

•      The income was fixed at Rs.859.6  per capital income per month, and in urban areas it was Rs.672.8 in 2010-11.

WHAT IS POVERTY LINE?

•      Poverty line is the line which indicates the level of purchasing power required to satisfy the minimum needs of a person. It represents the capacity to satisfy the minimum level of human needs. The line divides the people into 2 groups :

     1. Above poverty line (APL)    2. Below poverty line (BPL)

VULNERABLE GROUPS

Poverty and occupation both are co-related. Most of the poor people include agricultural and casual labourers, the SCs , STs and  the Physically challenged.

CAUSES OF POVERTY

•      BRITISH RULE

•      RURAL ECONOMY

•      HEAVY PRESSURE OF POPULATION

•      CHRONIC UNEMPLOYMENT AND UNDEREMPLOYMENT

•      LACK OF PROPER INDUSTRIALISATION

•      SOCIAL FACTORS

•      INDIA’S ECONOMIC POLICY

•      Neo-liberal policies and their effects

POVERTY IN INDIAN STATES

STATES	No. Of People BPL	% of People BPL
BIHAR	425.64	42.60
MADHYA PRADESH	298.54	37.43
MAHARASHTRA	227.99	25.03
ORISSA	169.09	47.15
TAMIL NADU	130.48	21.12
UTTAR PRADESH	529.89	31.15
WEST BENGAL	213.49	27.02
GOA	0.70	4.40
GUJARAT	67.89	14.07
HARYANA	17.34	8.74
HIMACHAL PRADESH	5.12	7.63
JAMMU & KASHMIR	3.46	3.48
KERALA	41.04	12.72
PUNJAB	14.49	6.16

POVERTY ALLIVIATION PROGRAMMES

•      Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY)

•      Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojana (SGRY)

•      Prime Minister’s Rozgar Yojana (PMRY)

•      Swarnajayanti Shahari Rozgar Yojana  (SSRY)

•      Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yojana (PMGY)

•      National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA)

SGSY

•      It was launched in 1999.

•      This programme aims of bringing the rural poor families above the poverty line.

•      To achieve this goal, it organises them into Self Help Groups(SHGs) through a mix of bank credit and government subsidy.

PMRY

•      It was launched in 1993.

•      The aim of the programme is to create self employment opportunities for educated unemployed youth in rural areas and small towns.

PMGY

•      It was launched in 2000.

•      Additional central assistance is given to states for basic services such as primary health, primary education, rural shelter, rural drinking water and rural electrification.

MGNREGA (MAHATMA GANDHI NATIONAL RURAL EMPLOYMENT GUARANTEE ACT)

•      It was passed in Sep, 2005.

•      The act provides 100 days assured employment every year to every rural household in 200 districts.

•      Later the scheme will be extended to 600 districts.

•      One-third of the proposed jobs would be reserved for women.

•      Under the programme, if an applicant is not provided employment within fifteen days, he/she will be entitled to a daily unemployment allowance.

NEWP (NATIONAL FOOD FOR WORK PROGRAM)

•      It was launched in 2004 in 150 most backward districts of the country. The programme is open to all rural poor, who are in need of wage employment, and desire to do manual unskilled work. It is implemented as a 100 per cent centrally sponsored scheme, and food grains are provided free of cost to the states. Once the NREGA is in force, the NFWP will be subsumed within this programme.

GLOB AL POVERTY TRENDS

•      Fall in global poverty: The World Bank defines poverty as living on less than $1 per day. There has been a substantial reduction in global poverty. It has fallen from 28% in 1990 to 21% in 2001.

•      Regional variations: Though the global poverty is reducing but with vast regional variations. Poverty has declined substantially in China and Southeast Asian countries due to rapid economic growth and massive investments in human resource development. But the pace of reduction of poverty in South Asian countries is very slow.

•      Poverty in India: Poverty in India has also declined, but the pace of reduction is very slow. According to World Bank’s definition, 35.3% of the total population is still living below the poverty line.

•      Poverty in Sub-Sahara Africa: Sub-Sahara includes Algeria, Libya, Niger, Chadet. The poverty in the Sub-Sahara has increased from 41% in 1986 to 46% in 2001.

•      Poverty in South America: The ratio of poverty in South America has not changed in the last two decades.

•      Poverty in Russia: The poverty has resurfaced in some of the former socialist countries like Russia, where officially, it was non-existent earlier.

POVERTY IN INDIA

•      Despite the growth and development of the Indian economy during the last couple of decades, poverty is, parallel, increasing in absolute terms.

•      The bare fact is that nearly 27.5 % of India’s population still lives below the poverty line, and 75 % of this, lives in rural areas.

•      A recent report laments that 77 % of Indians live on a daily income of Rs.20 only.

RURAL

•      About two thirds of India’s more than 1 billion people live in rural areas, and almost 170 million of them are poor.

•      Although many rural people are migrating to cities, 3 out of 4 of India’s poor people live in the vast rural parts of the country.

•      Poverty is deepest among scheduled castes and tribes in the country’s rural areas. India’s poorest people include 50 % of members of scheduled tribes and 40 % of people in scheduled castes. 

•      On the map of poverty in rural India, the poorest areas lie in parts of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Orissa and West Bengal. 

•      In these areas shortages of water and recurrent droughts impede the transformation of agriculture that the Green Revolution has achieved elsewhere.

CAUSES OF RURAL POVERTY

Rapid Population Growth

•      With 1,210,000,000 (1.21 billion) people, India is currently the world's second largest country.

•      From the total population of India 68.84% people live in rural area of India and are growing very fast if we see the statistics of past few decades.

Lack of Capital

•      People basically depend on farming and agriculture in the rural areas but due to lack of sufficient capital they are not able to do their farming activities and earn, so they become poor and go below poverty line.

Lack of literacy

•      Many children living in rural areas receive a level of education which is very poor. Overall enrollment in primary and middle schools are very low.

•      50 % of children living in these areas leave school before the fifth grade.

•      These children leave school for variety of reasons: some leave because of lack of interest; most leave so that they can work in the fields, where the hours are long and the pay is low.

•      A large percent of the dropouts are females. Forced by their parents, most girls perform chores and tend the family at home.

•      These are some of the reasons why 60% of all females in India are illiterate, a figure much higher than those of males. As these children grow into adults, many are still illiterate by the age of forty

Large Families

•      Generally in rural areas there is large number of people living in one family. This happens because of two reasons.

•      First there is a lack of proper family planning in the rural areas among the villagers, which increases the population.

•      Secondly the people in the rural areas believe in living in one single families rather than living in nuclear families. This increases the burden of number of people to be fed in the house and also increases the expenses.

Lack of Alternate Employment Opportunities Other than Agriculture

•      The villagers in the rural areas have no alternative solutions to earn their livelihood accept farming as very few job opportunities are there in the villages and even if there are any job opportunities except farming the money available is not good.

GOVERNMENT’S INITIATIVES

For Employment

•      Jawahar Gram Samriddhi Yojana (JGSY) (Formerly known as Jawahar Rozgar Yojana)

•      Training rural youth for self-employment  TRYSEM Scheme

•      Sampurna Gramin Rozgar Yojana

•      National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme

For Family Planning

•      Family Planning / Welfare Program for Population Control

For Farmers Insurance

•      Group Life Insurance Scheme for Rural Areas

•      Agriculture Income Insurance Scheme

For Housing

•      Rural Housing Program

For Development

•      Small Farmer Development Program (SFDP)

•      Drought  Prone Area Development

•      Pradhan Mantri Gramodaya Yojana (PMGY)

•      Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana

•      Integrated Rural Development Program

URBAN

•      As per the latest NSSO survey reports there are over 80 million poor people living in the cities and towns of India. The Slum population is also increasing and as per TCPO estimates 2001; over 61.80 million people were living in slums.

•      The bulk of the urban poor are living in extremely deprived conditions with insufficient physical amenities like :

–     Low-cost water supply,

–     Improper sanitation,

–     Bad Sewerage and drainage system,

–     Very less social services relating to health care, nutrition, pre-school and non-formal education.

•      With over 575 million people, India will have 41% of its population living in cities and towns by 2030 of its nearly 1 billion inhabitants, an estimated 260.3 million are below the poverty line, of which 193.2 million are in the rural areas and 67.1 million are in urban areas.

•      The poverty level is below 10% in states like Delhi, Goa, and Punjab etc whereas it is below 50% in Bihar (43) and Orissa (47). It is between 30-40% in Northeastern states of Assam, Tripura, and Mehgalaya and in Southern states of Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh.

CAUSES OF URBAN POVERTY

Slow job growth

•      Increasing Urban population (currently around 38 crore)

•      Severe competition.

•      Those who use to get jobs or promotions easily now have to struggle more due to the population hike in the cities.

Migration of Rural Youth towards Cities

•      Majority of rural area depends on agriculture (which is highly dependent on rain patterns)

•      Inadequate rain fall and improper irrigation facilities these days.

•      Low or no production of crops which leads to severe poverty among rural population.

•      Urban poverty also increases due to migration of people from rural areas to cities

Voicelessness And  Powerlessness

•      Many times it is seen that people are not able to raise their voice against the ill social practices prevalent in the cities and town.

•      The local “Mafias” take “Hafta” from the street hawkers, leaving very less amount of money for their living.

•      Even voice is not raised against wrong political activities and elements.

Lack of Housing Facilities

•      There is a limited asset base for individuals, households or communities (including both material assets such as housing and capital goods, and non-material assets such as social and family networks and ‘safety nets’.

Public Distribution System (PDS)

•      The Public Distribution System (PDS) continues to absorb substantial public resources at almost 1% of GDP.

•      While it covers up to 25% of the households, its benefits for the poor have been limited.

•      Leakage and diversion of grains from the PDS are high.

•      Only 41% of the grains released by the government reach households, according to 2004-2005 NSS, with some states doing much worse.

GOVERNMENT’S INITIATIVES

For Employment

•      Nehru Rozgar Yojana (NRY)

•      Self – Employment Program for the Urban Poor (SEPUP)

•      Prime Minister’s Rozgar Yojana (Also implemented in rural areas)

•      Swarna Jayanti Shahri Rozgar Yojana

•      Self – Employment to the Educated Urban Youth (SEEUY) Program

For Housing

•      Financial assistance for Constructing Houses

Other Programmes

•      Urban Basic Services for the Poor (UBSP) Program

•      Prime Minister’s Integrated Urban Poverty Eradication Program (PMIUPEP)

ROLE OF NGO’s

In helping the poor to climb out of poverty, NGOs use two approaches:

Supply-side/ Micro-tasks

•         From the supply-side or micro-tasks approach, NGOs provide various basic public services to the poor.

•         It is argued that especially in countries where government lack public services, NGOs play a significant role in the direct provision of social and economic services.

•         In general, NGOs emerge and play the roles as service providers.

Demand-side/ Macro-tasks

•         The demand-side NGOs play indirect roles. The demand-side role of NGOs can be seen as being an articulator of the people’s ‘voice’.

•         NGOs mobilize and clarify the demand for services, from both the government and the market, so that the people are able to achieve its development goals.

•      In line of these approach, NGOs have developed various strategies to influence the process of public policy making and to control the implementation of development programs or projects.

Few NGOs in Ahmedabad

–     Jyoti Sangh

–     Apang Manav Mandal

–     VidhyaNagar Sewa Sameeti

–     Shivbaba Shraddha Kalyan Association

–     Shree Manglay Seva Kelavani Mandal

SOCIAL MARKETING FOR POVERTY

Developing a Social Marketing Plan

•      Step 1: Background, Purpose, and Focus

•      Step 2: Situation Analysis

•      Step 3: Target Audience Profile

•      Step 4: Marketing Objectives and Goals

•      Step 5: Factors Influencing Adoption of the Behavior

•      Step 6: Positioning Statement

•      Step 7: Marketing Mix Strategies

•      Step 8: Plan for Monitoring and Evaluation

•      Step 9: Budget

•      Step 10: Plan for Implementation and Campaign Management

WHAT CAN WE DO?

In our own small way,

let us not waste resources,

the fruit of hard earned tax payer’s money,

which might better be used to eradicate the misery of others.

Let us show that we do care and

realize the dream of seeing a poverty free India.

HOW TO ELIMINATE POVERTY?

•      Widening the concept of employment

•      Ensuring financial services even to the poorest person

•      Recognizing every single human being as a potential entrepreneur

•      Recognizing social entrepreneurs as potential agents for creating a world of peace, harmony, and progress

•      Recognizing the role of globalization and information technology in reducing poverty.

RECOMMENDATIONS

•      Launch large-scale infrastructure construction.

•      Establishing agriculture-technology extension service network basically covering the whole country.

•      Setting up national rural cooperative credit system and their efficient functioning.

•      Pushing forward rapid development of rural as well as urban fundamental education and basic medical care.

•      Preliminary setting up rural as well as urban social security system with focus on community’s developmental system and assistance to extremely poor people.

CONCLUSION

•      Though India shows a high economic growth, it is shameful that there is still large scale poverty in India.

•      India has the world's largest number of poor people living in a single country.

•      Poverty in India can be defined as a situation when a certain section of people are unable to fulfill their basic needs.

•      Hunger, malnutrition and susceptibility of poor to natural disasters make them take up anti national and anti-social activities

•      It is the duty of the governments in particular and all citizens in general to try their best to alleviate poverty to establish harmony and peace in the societies and in the world.

HELP THE POOR - BE A HUMAN