Poverty Alleviation and Social Welfare

OUTLINE:

Contention:

 Every country is striving for the poverty elevation for meeting up its social welfare targets.

Expansion:

 Social welfare – a multifaceted concept with poverty alleviation on front

Global and regional Perspective:

 25 Years of progress in poverty eradication – Slow but not steady

 Regional poverty alleviation- Shifting Paradigm
 Narrower view- Countries with most critical condition
 Poverty Destitution- Constant Challenge for an unceasing Issue

National outlook:

 Poor Child Nutritional Outcomes – disturbing the poverty growth

 Urban Rural Gap- one of the main hindrances in social welfare
 Government plans – must reflect efficient Public Service delivery
 Ehsaas Programme- Four Pillared Policy of the federal government
1. Addressing Elite Capture and Making the Government System Work for Equality
2. Safety Nets
3. Human Capital Development
4. Jobs and Livelihoods

From Now to 2030:

 A journey of Social Welfare from today towards future.

Conclusion:

 Policies made for the social welfare of the nation should be multidimensional likewise and
should address each aspect to counter the poverty.
Introduction:
The world scenario regarding poverty alleviation shows that situation of scarce resources
and high rate of population growth, is causing almost every country to work on the poverty
alleviation to ensure the social welfare of people. As the definition of Poverty includes several
essentials - such as low income, minimal access to food and non-food resources, few chances to
participate in economic or political activities etc. - its alleviation also needs to be multi-
dimensional. The dimensions may be cultural, political, institutional and demographical. The
policy makers should address every aspect positively to reach the high targets of social welfare
and development of people.

The poverty issue has been severed to the level that every one in 10 people of the world
are living in extreme poverty. The report of World Bank shows that this rate was higher in the
previous years since 1990. It means that the world showed progress in poverty reduction. This
fact cannot be considered as the best outcome because this decline in ratio didn’t remain
consistent during these 25 years. The rate of decline in the poverty of the world is not even as it
went to 2.5 pc as well as it is observed to be only 1.2 pc in recent years. Another achievement
which this route gained is the people who are below the poverty line are also not as poor as they
were 25 years before. The purchasing power parity is improved in case of even those people who
are below the poverty line.

While looking at the narrower level, in early 1990s almost 80 percent poor people of the
world belonged to East Asia and Pacific and South Asia. Now with passage of these 2.5 decades
East Asia with major development in China has shown impressive decline in poverty rate as well
as number of the poor. This massive change has shifted the major contributors of poverty to South
Asia and Sub Saharan Africa. Although South Asia has shown decline in both of the indicators but
due to comparatively high increase in population it is still higher inhabitant to poor people of the
world.

When it comes to the question of countries with high rate of poverty it includes many
countries. There are 05 countries which have highest number of people living in extreme poverty.
These five countries are Bangladesh, India, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia and Nigeria.
One of the reasons of being their consistently poor is their high rate of population. Likewise, India
being on top of the list in having largest poor people in the world, it shares 170 million people
which is alarming because of being among the most populous countries in the world. Although
the country is growing economically but still poverty ratio has not shown any positive picture.

Coming towards the local level, Pakistan has shown progress in poverty alleviation as
PSLM (Pakistan Social and Living Standard) data shows that poverty has been declined from 34.4
percent to 22.3 percent during 2001 to 2006, further decline is also being observed after 2006
and onwards. It is an appreciable move that poverty is declining despite of slow growth in
economy, consistent price hike in energy and food items, low employment opportunities and war
on terror. There is not only decline in the rate of poverty but the well-being of the households has
also shown considerable improvement.

To only use of GDP growth and financial incentives cannot put the poverty aside. There
are many barriers in the route towards poverty free state. In modern age details show the
tendency of addressing the issue from every aspect has been increased. The facts show that
headcount poverty fell down by 35 percent in recent years. KP holds the credit of the highest rate
of decrease in poverty headcount. These facts are the result of addressing the different faces of
social welfare like budget allocation to nonfood items, food consumption patterns, improved food
diversity and betterment in Water Supply and Sanitation Hygiene. Despite of this growth, it is the
dilemma of the country that rate of stunted children is still at alarming level of 45 percent which
is 12 percent higher than the average stunting rate in lower-middle-income states. This terrifying
state of stunting has put adverse impact on the positive situation of poverty decline as well.

Pakistan, since 1960s has formulized and implemented many policies in view of poverty
alleviation and social welfare but it couldn’t fill the rural-urban gap. This is cause as well as the
effect of the poverty in different situations. Whatever the dimension we look into rural citizens,
they are deprived and left behind in many ways. It might be the case of literacy where enrollment
at the basic primary education level in rural areas is 13 points lower than that in the urban areas.
While in the situation of immunization rural children are 8.5 percent less that the urban children
to have immunization at the age of three. Collectively, urban rural gap in KP and Punjab was 13
percent and 15 percent points. Balochistan is has the highest rural poverty rate which makes it
the poorest province of the State. This gap is rooted actually in the districts. A very sharp line
exists between the rural and urban areas of the districts which becomes broader and causes the
people to be deprived at the one side of the line and enriched on the other one.
After a sequel of 5 years plan for social welfare, the current government has made a four
pillared policy for the purpose which has further 115 Policy actions to eradicate the poverty. This
programme is one of its kind because of being so detailed and extensive. As mentioned in the
earlier paragraphs, this target needed a multidimensional policy which can address all political,
social, geographical, economic, cultural and demographic areas of action effectively. EHSAAS
program fulfills the requirement of reaching to every approach of the problem.
The first and foremost tool the new government has made in form of constitutional
amendment in article 38 (b). The first pillar of the EHSAAS program is “Addressing elite capture
and making government system work for equality” which through its 25 action plans actually
refills the government loopholes which become the reason of poor to be poorer and rich to be
richer every day, it has established new ministry, new programs, Tehseel committees, information
providing and decision making guidelines and all other of this type initiatives to fill in the gap
between poor and rich class.
In the next support, government has made policies specially for the welfare of women,
widows, labor, workers working abroad through Kifalat, Tahafuz, socioeconomic registry 2019 etc.
These Safety nets cover housing, financing and safeguarding the rights of the majority in
financially deprived classes of the nation. This pillar of the EHSAAS programme actually addresses
the need of shelter and finance security of these classes through different means.
The third pole built up to cover health, nutrition and literacy of the people who have poor
less or no access to these necessities to get rid of poverty. It consists of 23 action plans which all
revolve around these three very important areas of social welfare services. Among these three
areas the most of the focus has been on the education, having a major attention over the girls’
education and language development. As facts show a very vulnerable condition in these areas.
The policy makers chose the name of the pillar as “Human Capital Development”, as it completely
focuses on the development of human capital at individual and ground level.
The last but not the least pillar addresses the economic steps towards the poverty
alleviation. Education, good health, suitable political conditions and low gap between poor and
rich is of no use to eradicate the poverty if these healthy and educated people don’t get the
sufficient and good opportunities to earn their bread and reach the purchasing power parity to
cross the line. SO this program has also addressed the need of proper working opportunities in
order to serve the nation with employment opportunities.
EHSAAS program, though gives the more detailed policy making in order to alleviate
poverty from the country, but is dependent to its right and timely implementation and needful
resource management like every previous program. It can be expected as the grey line that the
implementation would be seen but perfection needs a massive investment and private sector
cooperation to reach its required level.

An incisive glance on the envisaged programme reveals that it is not only designed to help
the poorer sections of the society and the needy but is also meant to elevate the people above
cash payments and enable them to acquire skills and sources of incomes for themselves. The
government envisages the enhancing of the allocation for the programme from Rs60 billion to
Rs120 billion by the year 2020.

The world has once considered the GDP, PPP, and PCI as the only indicators of the
affluence or the poverty but now the understanding has been developed that other areas like
human development, literacy, health and hygiene etc are also important in this regard. New
policies of the world handlers and national level policy makers don’t ignore the role of these key
player for the social welfare of the people and poverty alleviation. This change in plans can give
the hope of better human beings, developed countries and integrated and civilized world.