8th June, 2015
By Michael Oputeh
It is a as a result of the harsh reality of the danger of poverty, if allowed to flourish, that poverty eradication has become one of the essential aspects of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Presently, from all available indexes, there are apparent signs of extreme poverty across the world. According to Senior Vice President and Chief Economist, World Bank Group, Kaushik Basu, “it is shocking to have a poverty line as low as $1.25 per day, it is even more shocking that 1/7th of the world’s population lives below this line. The levels of inequality and poverty that prevail in the world today are totally unacceptable”. Conflicts and crisis being experienced at various parts of the world are partly a reflection of the extreme global poverty status. The pathetic global poverty situation, therefore, calls for urgent actions by all stakeholders.
In 2013, the World Bank, in view of the frightening world poverty condition, set two major goals as a springboard through which poverty could be confronted. The first is to basically stop acute poverty, by reducing the share of people living on less than $1.25 a day to less than 3 percent of the global population by 2030. The other is to encourage shared prosperity by improving the living standards of the bottom 40 percent of the population in every country. In-spite of genuine efforts from World Bank, governments and other development partners, the task of poverty eradication remains a daunting one. The pace of poverty reduction across the world has been largely slow and grossly insignificant. In numerous societies, the poverty level remains unimaginably towering, particularly in developing countries.
In Africa, the reality of poverty is pretty scary as most Africans live on less than a dollar income per day. Perhaps more niggling is that, with 34 out of a total of 49, African countries account for a greater proportion of the Least Developed Countries, LDCs, in the world. This, perhaps, explains why poverty indicators such as extreme hunger, malnourishment, homelessness, diseases, high crime rate, slums, lack of opportunities, low productivity and illiteracy abound in larger quantity in the continent.
Despite being the sixth Oil producing nation in the world, and also blessed with other natural, human and agricultural resources, the United Nations Development (UNDP) rate Nigeria as the 26th poorest nation in the world. With average Nigerian living less than $1 a day, and poverty rate is 54.4%, when the average primary rate in Sub-Saharan Africa is around 50%. According to World Bank President, Jim Yong Kim, Nigeria is one of the top five countries with the leading amount of poor people. Nigeria ranked third in the world while India ranked number one with 33 per cent of the world poor. China is ranked second with 13 per cent of the world’s poor, followed by Nigeria where seven per cent of the world poor live in.
The poverty trend in Nigeria, therefore, calls for urgent attention by all stakeholders. Being the window through which the world views Nigeria, the present government in Lagos State is actually leading in the fight to eradicate poverty and create wealth for the people. Emphasis is being particularly placed on wealth creation because there is not, in theory, a limited supply of wealth to go around; it is created by entrepreneurs and grown. Any wealth creation initiative therefore must increase the productivity of the individual and family in the society. It must boost the human capital elements such as knowledge, skills and health, which increase the total productivity of the individual and the human development index of the society.
Wealth creation is about teaching the people how to fish by inculcating requisite income generating skills in them. It is about showing the people the way out of poverty and making available the necessary tools required for a more prosperous life. It is about creating opportunities for as many people as possible, who will in return create more opportunities for numerous others. With this, a circle and chain of prosperity, which might be difficult to break, is created. This is what makes prosperous societies of the world thick. And this is the new direction that Lagos is trying to focus on.
To properly coordinate this new development strategy, the State Governor, Mr. Akinwunmi Ambode, has created the Ministry of Wealth Creation and Employment in the State. The creation of this new Ministry sufficiently underscores the importance the governor attaches to wealth creation and human capital development. That he announced the creation of the Ministry during his inaugural speech is indicative of his utmost desire to open new doors of prosperity for the people. He was motivated by the necessity to solve escalating unemployment dilemma in Lagos State and, indeed, Nigeria.
It is particularly heartwarming that the youth are going to benefit immensely from this new development. The youth represents the most vibrant and adventurous group in any society. Sadly, the high unemployment situation in the country, coupled with the not too impressive state of the economy, naturally make the youth vulnerable to manipulation from scheming political actors and other anti-social elements within the polity. Recent data shows that 60 per cent of the country’s population is youth while youth unemployment rate is estimated to be over 50 percent. Similarly Figures from the National Bureau of Statistics indicate that an average of 1.8 million youths find themselves in the labour market annually, out of which 250, 000 to 300, 000 are graduates. Additionally, the unemployment rate in the country is given to be about 23.9 per cent.
The State Government recognizes the significant role the youth in national development. Consequently, it is putting measures in place to pursue dynamic various youth growth policies and programmes to allow the youth to become more creative in entrepreneurship. The goal is to promote and social change and reduce social vices such as fraud, sexual violence and harassment, unemployment, illicit drug use, armed robbery, cultism amongst others through character reforming programmes, discovering, nurturing and grooming innate talents and potentials of the Youth to make them useful to themselves and the society as a whole.
With the renewed emphasis on wealth creation and employment, the State government is also reiterating commitment to the 13-year Development Plan of the State which is anchored on social development and security, infrastructural development, economic development, and sustainable environment. None of these could be effectively realised if emphasis is not focused on wealth and job creation. Given the abundant human and natural resource endowments of the State, renewed emphasis on wealth creation is, indeed, not a misplaced priority. This is because the issue of poverty and its eliminating strategies is one of the toughest development challenges facing the world today.
Promisingly, the Ambode led administration in Lagos State has begun the process, which will give all classes of people in the State the needed power to live above poverty and become agents of prosperity. This, indeed, is the way forward.
•Oputeh wrote from Alausa, Ikeja.