Women & Extreme Poverty – Statistics Bring Little Comfort if You are Struggling to Survive – Poverty Has a Woman’s Face

Women & Extreme Poverty – Statistics Bring Little Comfort if You Are Struggling to Survive – Poverty Has a Woman’s Face

If you are a woman in extreme poverty, does it seem such an improvement to you to move from a $1.25 per day poverty designation by World Bank, to $1.90. You may be a single mother, a caretaker of others, isolated in a rural area, hiding in a conflict zone, or living under a canvas in a slum, possibly disabled, ill, older. For every starving child, there is a mother, hopefully alive, also hungry, likely extremely poor, and in deep despair that she cannot provide her child/children/family with adequate food and nutrition, safe water, decent housing, for safety and survival. WUNRN

__________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

POVERTY IS NOT A RESULT OF SCARCITY, BUT OF INEQUALITY, ESPECIALLY GENDER INEQUALTIY

Inequality is a result of power relations that favor certain sectors of society, and is driven by the policies and actions of the state, corporations and other powerful actors.

Inequality is an issue of social justice, gender justice.

It is very important to address women’s extreme poverty from a human rights and intersectional dimension.

WUNRN

 Extremely poor widows in an ashram in Vrindavan, India. Some had even come as poor child widows and remained for a lifetime. WUNRN Photo

https://beijing20.unwomen.org/en/in-focus/poverty

UN Women – When women are poor, their rights are not protected. They face obstacles that may be extraordinarily difficult to overcome. This results in deprivation in their own lives and losses for the broader society and economy, as women’s productivity is well known as one of the greatest generators of economic dynamism.

70% of People Living in Poverty Are Women

Women around the world are more likely to live in poverty – just because they are women. They have less access to land, education, income and decision-making – all of which keeps them poor

Action Aid

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-34440567

World Bank: Extreme Poverty ‘to Fall below 10%’ – Little Comfort if You are a Woman in Extreme Poverty

5 October 2015 – The World Bank has said that for the first time less than 10% of the world’s population will be living in extreme poverty by the end of 2015.

The bank said it was using a new income figure of $1.90 per day to define extreme poverty, up from $1.25.

It forecasts that the proportion of the world’s population in this category will fall from 12.8% in 2012 to 9.6%.

Reducing poverty in the East Asia and Pacific region was highlighted as being key to global progress.

In the region, 82.6 million are projected to be living in extreme poverty by the end of this year, representing a fall from 7.2% of the population in 2012 to 4.1%.

In 1990, 60% of the area’s population (999.2 million) lived in extreme poverty.

In numbers: the decline of global extreme poverty

1990: 1,959 billion = 37.1% of world’s population.

1999: 1,747 billion = 29% of world’s population.

2012: 902 million = 12.8% of world’s population.

2015: 702 million = 9.6% of world’s population.

However, the report’s authors said the “growing concentration of global poverty in sub-Saharan Africa is of great concern”.

Extreme poverty in that region is seen as falling from 46.2% in 2012 to 35.2% at the end of 2015.

But sub-Saharan Africa is projected to have about half the world’s extreme poor by then, and the report’s authors say they are concerned that poverty is falling too slowly there.

South Asia was also flagged as an area where extreme poverty was concentrated, despite major gains in reducing poverty.

A success story

The World Bank says the downward trend is due to strong growth rates in developing countries and investments in education, health, and social safety nets.

“We are the first generation in human history that can end extreme poverty,” World Bank President Jim Yong Kim said.

But he warned that continuing the progress would be “extraordinarily hard, especially in a period of slower global growth, volatile financial markets, conflicts, high youth unemployment, and the growing impact of climate change”.

And the bank warned that poverty is “becoming deeper and more entrenched in countries that are either conflict ridden or overly dependent on commodity exports”.

The United Nations recently announced its aim to end extreme poverty by 2030. It is one of 17 Global Goals unveiled at the UN General Assembly last week.

The UN currently uses the World Bank’s previous $1.25 a day income measure to define poverty.

The report’s authors say that action is needed to make this goal and that “business as usual policies are unlikely to be sufficient”.