Today is Blog Action Day, a day where bloggers write about a single topic at the same time each year.
This year's topic is poverty.
In this rapidly developing world, globalisation has become the buzzword for the 21st century. Nations who adopted the policy of globalisation has prospered well into this era, whereas other nations are struggling to keep up with the rapid pace of development.
In its wake, it has left problems, and one of them is poverty. Poverty is defined as deprivation of basic necessities such as food, shelter, clothing, and so on. In 2005, the World Bank has announced that 1.4 billion people were living under $1.25 a day. Although this has decreased from 1.9 billion in 1981, it is still 1.4 billion too many.
There has been action against poverty, but unfortunately it has shown uneven progress. According to the World Bank, poverty rates decreased in East Asia from 80% to 18% of the population. However, in Sub-Saharan nations (West African countries) the figures remain at 50% who live in poverty.
Poverty has several problems, some examples are:-
- Hunger: Hunger is when there is not enough food to go around. However, it is a well known fact that there is actually more than enough food to go around for every body. Yet one person dies of hunger somewhere in the world every 3.5 seconds. Action taken to solve this problem is "Food for work" and "Food for Education" programmes where people are paid with food at their work or education where food is provided rather than bought. This measure has been successful.
- AIDS: This is a increasingly treatable and preventable disease, yet one person dies from it every 15 seconds. AIDS have known to ravage entire communities, often attacking adults and children alike. There has been cases where medical facilities are deserted because doctors themselves have died of AIDS. To resolve this matter lies in education, but in impoverished communities education is costly, and needs lots of time resource. In short, it is a hefty investment.
- Darrhoea: Surprisingly common, yet fatal for communities with lack of medical facilities. Usually cholera and dysentary is caught by consumption of unclean water. However, it is proven that a cure for diarrhoea is cheap, simple and best of all, can be home made. Called Oral Rehydration Therapy, it is an alternative to rehydration tablets. The Therapy is carried out by mixing water with salt and sugar. This is extremely obtainable even in poorer communities. However, lack of awareness has claimed many lives to date, and 1.6 million people die of diarrhoea each year.
To alleviate the problems in poverty, some developed nations have adopted schemes such as donating 0.81% of the country's income to aid (carried out in the Netherlands).
What you can do is support organisations that aim to reduce poverty namely by volunteering, collecting funds, and so on. Another option is voluntourism, a recent idea. This is where you volunteer in a certain country and still get a chance to visit attractions, with lower cost of accommodation and food. Some even volunteer to teach ensure that education is received by everyone.
Whatever the case is, remember that you can make all the difference in the world. To the world, you may be just one person, but to to a person, you may just be the world.
