Around 7.21 crore people came out of extreme poverty in 2010 from the level of 1981, while 40 crore children are still trapped in abysmal condition of curse of poverty, said World Bank President Jim Yong Kim on Thursday. Jim made this comment at a press briefing at the headquarters of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) ahead of the WB-IMF Annual General Meeting, slated for October 11 to 13 in Washington DC.
‘We have witnessed an historic movement of people lifting themselves out of poverty over the past three decades, but the number of children living in poverty alone should leave no doubt that there remains much work to do,’ said WB Group President Jim Yong Kim at the conference.
‘We can reach our goals of ending poverty and boosting shared prosperity, including sharing that prosperity with future generations, but only if we work together with new urgency.’
‘Children should not be cruelly condemned to a life without hope, without good education, and without access to quality health care. We must do better for them.’
Bangladesh finance minister AMA Muhith will attend the meeting with a five-member delegation.
Kaushik Basu, WB Chief Economist, said it was disturbing that 40 crore children in the world are still in poverty traps.
Jim underscored the need for ending extreme poverty by 2030 and promoting shared prosperity by fostering income growth of the bottom 40 per cent of the population in developing countries.
The World Bank chief, citing a report of the bank on poverty, said it was difficult to reach the goal of ending poverty by 2030 as envisioned earlier by the multi-lateral lending agency.
‘But the WB’s analysis released today underscored the difficulty of reaching the goal to end poverty by 2030, finding that while the reduction in poverty moved significantly in middle-income countries such as China and India, low income countries showed much slower progress,’ Jim said.
While extreme rates have declined in all regions, the world’s 35 low income countries—26 of which are in Africa—registered 10 crore more extremely poor people today than three decades ago, said the WB report on poverty released on Thursday.
‘In 2010, 33 per cent of the extreme poor lived in low-income countries, compared to 13 per cent in 1981.’
Furthermore, the report said the poor in 2010 were as bad off as they were in 1981 with the exception of India and China. The average poor person in a low income country lived on 78 cents a day in 2010, compared to 74 cents a day in 1981.
The report calculated the amount of money to be needed every year to lift more than a billion people out of extreme poverty would be $169 billion.
The WB report focusing further on poverty, said more than three quarters, or 78 per cent, of those living in extreme poverty lived in rural areas, with nearly two thirds of the extreme poor deriving their livelihoods from agriculture.
The top WB policymakers at the briefing underscored the need for acting urgently to get out of poverty trap.
-With New Age input
