We must end poverty

POVERTY has been a scourge since time immemorial. It is a continuing affront to our sensibilities, our moral principles, and our very humanity. 

But it doesn’t have to be that way anymore. We live in an age of promise and opportunity, where technological advances, successful development experience and political will can be summoned to eliminate poverty – and in par- ticular to end extreme poverty. 

Today, we can end poverty and free future generations from its devastating, tenacious grip. This is not to say that we have not already seen promising results in the fight against poverty. 

We should never forget that extreme poverty is not just about living on less than N500 per day. It is about much more than being hungry, ill housed, and unable to properly care for and educate the next generation. 

Poverty is one of the forces militating against the social and economic development of Nigeria. The level of poverty in Nigeria is astronomically high and politically embarrassing considering the enormous human and mineral resources the country is endowed with and despite the huge resources successive government have committed to alleviate and or eradicate poverty, it seems no success has been achieved There have been strategies that have been adopted by the various governments to alleviate poverty in Nigeria. 

These include: Operation Feed the Nation, Green Revolution, Better Life for Rural Women, Family Economic Advancement Programme. All the poverty alleviation programmes have not been successful due to inadequate funding, lack of proper co-ordination and commitments, poor design and evaluation of programmes etc. 

I recommend that government should ensure that programmes of poverty eradication are well designed, evaluated and coordinated before they are carried out; fraudulent officials should be prosecuted to serve as deterrence to others handling poverty eradication. 

Poverty is also about vulnerability, humiliation, discrimination, exclusion and inequity. I have enduring images in my mind of the human face of poverty. 

Economic growth is associated with reducing poverty. Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen has described economic growth as a crucial means for expanding the substantive freedoms that people value. 

These freedoms are strongly associated with improvements in general living standards such as greater opportunities for people to become healthier, eat better and live longer. Growth generates virtuous circles of prosperity and opportunity. 

To ensure that no one is denied universal human rights and basic economic opportunities, any new development agenda should focus on ensuring inclusive economic growth and reducing inequalities. Future growth will need to be based on an increasingly globalised world that offers new opportunities but also new challenges. 

Future growth will also need to be environmentally sustainable. Poverty is the significant lack of money. Precise definitions of poverty are controversial; according to one definition, poverty is having so little money that one cannot pay for basic necessities, such as food and shelter. Sociologists study the effects of poverty. 

There are various ways to eradicate these issues: more employment opportunities, social security programs, uplift of rural masses, spread of education, social and political atmosphere. Participating in all these aspects would reduce the rate of poverty and hunger in the country and the world at large.

Adesokan Omolola 

adesokanomolola92@gmail.com