The struggle to live a day without dying and even struggle harder to see their loved ones live too. Every day, poverty kills 30,000 children in Africa alone. Over half a million women die each year (that's one every 60 seconds). Close to eight million people die every year because of poverty. Every 3.6 seconds another person dies of starvation and the large majority is children under the age of 5. The world was never so poor, world was never so illiterate, world was never so ill and world was never so hungry. The solution for poverty does not lie in any Economic theory or any Political thinking but lies in co-operative effort and will to support this cause of eradication.
World was never so rich before, World was never so technically superior before & World never saw such a soaring life expectancy, we the people of world feel conceited of our achievements and sleep every day with a thought of a better day. But are we living in the same world where one sixth (over 1 billion people) of the population doesn't have even basic amenities of life and live on less than a dollar a day, two third of the world lives in poverty. Every night they sleep, with a hope to live the next day, more than 800 million people go to bed hungry every day. Their survival is their agony and death excruciating. The struggle to live a day without dying and even struggle harder to see their loved ones live too. Every day, poverty kills 30,000 children in Africa alone. Over half a million women die each year (that's one every 60 seconds). Close to eight million people die every year because of poverty. Every 3.6 seconds another person dies of starvation and the large majority is children under the age of 5. The world was never so poor, world was never so illiterate, world was never so ill and world was never so hungry.
We the people of world face the biggest challenge of the history- The Poverty. Two centuries ago with Industrial revolution, Economist thought it will help in eradicating the poverty, it has to an extant by improving the global domestic product and per capita income on Marco Economic scale. But on social economic scale the gap between the have and have not has amplified radically. Other characteristic of poverty is regional concentration. ASEA (Africa, South and East Asia) contribute to this menace and these three regions are habitat of more than 90% of underprivileged (better connotation for poor). If poverty is intricately analyzed, close to 80% of global underprivileged live in rural areas or villages. People living in villages are poor because their living is primarily a function of agricultural production. Other critical contributor is the per capita land availability for irrigation and related opportunities. The world population was 230 million in starting of the millennium (1 AD) grew upto 270 million in 1000 AD, 900 million in 1800 AD and close to 6000 million in 2000 AD. Last two centuries has added 5 times more people than it was in 1800, out of which majority of the population lives in ASEA. This burgeoning population has indeed contributed to reduction in per capita availability of Land. Thus throwing this section of global civilization into vicious cycle of poverty.
The challenge is mammoth but has a very humble solution. It lies with Integrated Development Program for Poverty Eradication. The solution lies in developing a sustainable economic and social development model. This model endeavor to create Sarvoday Gram (ideal village) through private and public participation. This model will have three charters at the grass root level:
Sustainable Economic Development
Social Development
Model Governance
Sustainable economic development model will facilitate the rural employment opportunities through developing entrepreneurial units. These units will facilitate local market through production of basic products for daily consumption. With limited market distribution and low cost of logistics, these products can be priced at affordable rates than products sold by national players. The latest book by Prof. CK Prahalad- Fortune at Bottom of Pyramid indicates the potential of this market segment. Prahalad points out that 4 billion out of 6 billion people in this world are at Bottom of the Global Socioeconomic Power Pyramid and none are served by global corporations as market because of higher cost of sales and lower return. But village level entrepreneurial units can pilot the rural developmental engine by tapping this huge segment. The traits of this model will be following:
Self Sustainable economic model
Micro Finance facilities
Small Industries
Strong Local Distribution
Employment
The success of this model will depend upon as specified public- private participation. Micro finance is indeed a very important tool to synergize rural economic engine. Bangladesh's Grameen Bank is a successful case study for rural economic empowerment through affordable finance facilities at village level. Other critical factor for rural economic model is in creating strong viable local distribution mechanism for rural produce. I will write a different article on this subject later as it's very comprehensive in its nature.
The by product of poverty is illiteracy, lack of medical & sanitation facility and safe drinking water. Social development pertains to helping villages in providing education, medicine and safe drinking water. UN Millennium reports indicates more than 2.6 billion people-over 40 per cent of the world's population-do not have basic sanitation, and more than one billion people still use unsafe sources of drinking water, four out of every ten people in the world don't have access even to a simple latrine & five million people, mostly children, die each year from water-borne diseases. There is an urgent need for creating village based communities with the help of NGOs to develop a system of filtration and storage of water along with supply to common points in village or group of villages. Government of India has been successful in providing water hand pumps at village level; this model should be taken to next level of village water management model (the skeleton of the model is discussed above). Medical and Educational facilities needs active support from the respective national & local authorities. Adult education at village level is equally critical and important as child education. International bodies and NGOs are working on this project since long and have come up with strategies to provide education at village level. We have seen significant improvement in literacy rate in many countries over a decade. I won't touch this point but would put my emphasis to medical facilities, each year; approximately 300 to 500 million people are infected with malaria. Approximately three million people die as a result of poor medical facilities. I think information technology can help us in supporting villages with best of class medical facility. Tele- Medicine project can help in taking specialists to the remotest of village through video conferencing or other IT & communication mode. In rural India, for example, there is one doctor on average for every 15,500 people. Specialists are only found in the metropolitan areas that are not accessible for the majority of the rural population, so this technology also enables rural doctors to consult with their urban peers in the process of a surgery or complicated procedure. These Projects hopes to reach out to even more of the under-served population by eliminating the need for the on-site doctor. Other Important facet of development is providing alternative source of energy. Village communities should work on the lines of Water management model to develop & manage alternative source of energy. Unconventional source like Solar & Wind energy can help in facilitating it. Other sources like cow dung gas, bio -diesel & energy from agricultural and industrial waste are other cost effective alternative sources of energy. Public and Private participation should encourage and fund the Water and Energy management model till the time it becomes self sustainable. The framework of these models should be based on the self sustainability. These models should be transferred to local village communities after a period of time through proper training and transition plan. Other important aspect relates to empowering women and diminishing the social divides in rural communities.
The last tenet of the integrated development program for Poverty eradication is creating model governance system at village level. This will entail creating village level clusters (group of few villages) that could represent the village problems to local administration. This model will also help in monitoring and managing the developmental programs. The committee should have participation from Local Administration, NGO working for developmental programs, villagers and democratically elected political representative. The role of these clusters should be:
Village level Clustering
Management of economic & social development programs
Managing awareness programs
eGovernance is the tool which support in creation of these clusters and helps in providing the prime tool to bridge the digital divide in the rural areas and use Information Technology for providing access to various citizen-to-government and citizen-to-citizen services through web enabled rural kiosks established in the villages. Some programs like eSeva has been successfully implemented in few districts of south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. This body will be the backbone of development program for eradicating poverty.
The solution for poverty does not lie in any Economic theory or any Political thinking but lies in co-operative effort and will to support this cause of eradication. One political advice to these nations is to strategically create a joint forum like G8, NATO or EU to work jointly for common cause of economic and social development. An idea of Organization of Underprivileged Nations (OUN) being represented by some of ASEA (African, south & East Asia) courtiers with a charter of joint programs and management of Aid programs sponsored by developed nations and other international organizations will surely help the world in eradicating this menace of Poverty.
Let us work together to bring smile on the face of a small child by feeding him, bringing tears of happiness to a mother by providing medical aid to her dying child, tears of pride to a parent of educated child and giving the world an opportunity to live in shadow of happiness and joy. You and me can bring a difference if we get up and show the world how much we care. Let us unite to bring that smile back on the face swallowed by poverty and hunger. Let the dawn of this millennium be dedicated to this mission. 800 million people who go to bed hungry every day are calling for our support and love.
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