English 110
28th October, 2014
Deprivation of Human Needs
Poverty is the general scarcity of the state of one who lacks a certain amount of material possessions or money. Absolute poverty is the deprivation of basic human needs, such as water, food, clothing, shelter, sanitation, health care, and education. I believe that Poverty is the biggest problem in the world. The World Food Programme says, “The poor are hungry and their hunger traps them in poverty.” Hunger is the number 1 cause of death in the world, killing more than HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined.
Governments should give greater focus to public efforts to eradicate absolute poverty and to reduce overall poverty substantially by promoting sustained economic growth. In the context of sustainable development and social progress, requiring that growth be broadly based offering equal opportunities to all people. All countries should recognize their common but different responsibilities.
The developed countries acknowledge the responsibility they bear in the internal pursuit of sustainable development, and should continue to improve their efforts to promote sustained economic growth and to narrow imbalances in a manner that can benefit all developing countries. Rural Hunger Project partners have access to income-generating workshops, empowering their self-reliance.
Currently, absolute poverty refers to earning below the international poverty line ($1.25/day). In 2005, ninety-six percent of people reside in Sub-Saharan Africa, east and south Asia, and the pacific; and nearly half of which were in China and India alone. In 2012, the USDA estimated that 14.5% (or 17.6 million) of US households were food insecure—meaning that they had difficulty at some time during the year providing enough food for all their members due to a lack of resources.
Poverty occurs in all countries: loss of livelihoods as a result of economic recession, sudden poverty as a result of a disaster or conflict, low wage workers or people who are not in family support systems. Some women bear a disproportionate burden of poverty, and some children growing up in poverty at a permanent disadvantage.
Poverty in its various forms represent a barrier in communication and access to services, as well as a major health risk, and people living in poverty are vulnerable to the consequences of disasters and conflicts. It’s not rare for people living in poverty to experience gender disparities, especially women maintained households. With increasing population, number of youth living in poverty will increase significantly. Therefore, specific measures are needed to address the juvenilization and feminization of poverty.
People living in poverty and their organizations should be empowered by involving them fully in the setting of targets and in the design and assessment of national strategies and programs for poverty eradication and community-based development ensuring that such programs reflect their priorities.
And what makes me feel like writing about poverty is the unwillingness of our society to deal with this preventable problem and how politicians who rule the country pretend that poverty is simply a given human existence - a force of nature - unstoppable and eternal.