Abstract
Working out of Poverty
Somavia presents new anti-poverty proposals to ILO annual conference
- Friday 6 June 2003 ( ILO/03/26 )
GENEVA (ILO News) - Global efforts aimed at cutting poverty in half by 2015
will fail unless new ways are found to create opportunities for the world's
poor to work for a decent living, says Juan Somavia, Director-General of
the International Labour Office (ILO).
"As things stand today", Mr. Somavia warns in a new ILO report entitled
Working out of Poverty1, "the Millennium Development Goals
remain out of reach. But we have a solution - the way out of poverty is
work."
"The persistence of poverty is the moral indictment of our times", Mr.
Somavia says. "While there are some signs of progress, the fact remains
that never have we seen so much wealth while so many continue to live in
abject poverty."
Mr. Somavia is to launch a debate on ways out of global poverty when he
formally presents the report to the Organization's annual meeting of some
3,000 government, worker and employer representatives here on Monday, 9
June. He will call for new global partnerships to support national efforts
against poverty.
"We know that work is the best route out of poverty", Mr. Somavia says.
"But we cannot legislate employment in and poverty out. It is a long and
complex process requiring all elements of society to work together. We must
harness the unique power of governments, employers and workers - the global
community of work represented by the ILO's constituents - to a concerted
global drive against poverty."
"The poor have enormous reserves of courage, ingenuity, persistence and
solidarity that helps them get through the each day on less than the
equivalent of $2", Mr. Somavia said. "Instead of waging war on poverty from
the top down, the multilateral system must find ways of tapping into this
unused potential. In many ways, the working poor are the ultimate
entrepreneurs."
A key to this is to empower the poor themselves, ensuring that they have a
chance to obtain jobs, exercise their right to organize and enjoy social
protection. It also involves a massive effort to promote and sustain small
businesses that create the bulk of the world's jobs today, Mr. Somavia
says.
World poverty at a glance
Mr. Somavia's report paints a grim picture of poverty today, affecting half
the global population and every country in the world. Among the nearly 3
billion people living on less than USD$2 a day, the report says some 1
billion - or about 23 per cent of the developing world's population -
struggle along on USD$1 a day or less. Other poverty figures:
- Official unemployment - currently at some 180 million people
worldwide and growing - is at its highest point ever. This, however,
masks an even larger cadre - over a billion people working without
fully utilizing their creativity or maximizing their productive
potential;
- The world's labour force is increasing by about 50 million people
each year, as the number of entrants exceed those who stop working.
97 per cent of this increase is in developing countries;
- The "income gap" between the wealthiest and poorest fifths of the
world's population is growing. In 1960, it was 30 to 1. By 1999, it
had widened to 74 to 1;
- Women and girls are more likely than males to become trapped in
poverty. Two-thirds of the female workforce of the developing world
are in the informal economy, mostly doing the lowest paid work;
- Over the next 10 years, over 1 billion young people, today aged
between 5 and 15 will enter the working age population. However, the
global economy is not well organized to make full use of the enormous
potential of their skills, energy and ambition;
-
Poverty is a global phenomenon occurring in every society. Even in
the 20 most industrialized countries, over 10 per cent of the
population live below a poverty line of less than 50 per cent of
median income.
Regionally, poverty trends vary. On the positive side, declining poverty in
China and other East Asian countries in the 1990s significantly reduced the
number of persons living on very low incomes, from 1.1 billion to about 900
million. In South Asia, the number of people living in poverty remains more
or less stable at about 1.1 billion, although population growth now makes
this a smaller share of the population.
The situation elsewhere is another story, the report says. Slow growth in
sub-Saharan Africa in the 1990s elevated the number of people living in
poverty by 25 per cent, to nearly 500 million. During the same period, the
number of people living in poverty in Latin America and the Caribbean
increased from 121 million to 132 million, with a quarter of the population
still subsisting on USD$2 a day or less. In the Middle East and North
Africa, the number of people living at or below that line rose from 50
million to nearly 70 million, while in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, the
number increased three-fold to 97 million.
"If the poorest people living in the poorest countries were polled today, I
doubt if they would report any major recent improvement in their lives",
Mr. Somavia says.
The decent work dividend
In his presentation, Mr. Somavia calls poverty "the biggest challenge to
multilateralism today. As the multilateral system continues to be tested on
classical security issues, we simply cannot fail on issues of human
security".
The ILO, he says, is well positioned to meet this challenge by mobilizing
what he called "the community of work" - its government, employer and
worker constituents - globally and especially at the national level.
"After all, the poor don't cause poverty", he says. "Poverty results from
structural failures and ineffective, out-dated economic and social systems.
Poverty grows from inadequate political responses, bankrupt policies and
insufficient international support. And its continued acceptance expresses
a loss of fundamental human values, of international will."
The solution lies in adopting policies that produce what Mr. Somavia calls
a "decent work dividend" that will stimulate balanced and more sustainable
growth for countries and better lives for people.
"This decent work dividend involves providing more stable incomes and
productive employment", Mr. Somavia says. "The ILO is doing this with
programmes designed to create jobs, ensure basic rights and social
protection at work, end discrimination and fight child labour. These also
aim to provide access to financial services, skills development and
training, healthier and safer work environments and more entrepreneurial
opportunities for small businesses."
"This isn't a dividend just for the poor. It benefits governments and
employers as well", Mr. Somavia says.
To implement this approach, the ILO Director-General is to urge the
tripartite delegates to the annual Conference to discuss four "tools" for
poverty eradication:
- First, creating jobs: "Poverty elimination is impossible unless the
economy generates opportunities for investment, entrepreneurship, job
creation and sustainable livelihoods";
- Second, guarantee rights at work: "People in poverty need voice to
obtain recognition of rights and demand respect. They need
representation and participation. They also need good laws that are
enforced and work for, not against, their interest. Without rights
and empowerment, the poor will not get out of poverty";
- Third, provide basic social protection: "Poor people are unprotected
people. The earning power of those living in poverty is suppressed by
marginalization and lack of support systems"; and,
- Fourth, promote dialogue and conflict resolution: "People in poverty
understand the need to negotiate and know dialogue is the way to
solve problems peacefully."
"Breaking out of poverty is really about breaking into a new cycle of
opportunity and local wealth creation", Mr. Somavia says. "Employment, and
the promotion of enterprise that creates it, remains the most effective
route to poverty eradication."
"We must provide work - work that expands choices of a better quality of
life, work that creates wealth that can be distributed fairly, work that
sends children back to school and ensures that everyone who wants or needs
a job can have one", Mr. Somavia says. " The poor need a decisive
commitment from us if they are to find a dignified way to work out of
poverty. We cannot let them down."
Footnote:
-
Working out of Poverty, Report of the Director-General,
International Labour Conference, 91st session, International
Labour Office, Geneva, 2003. ISBN 92-2-112870-9. Price: 20 Swiss francs.
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- 378Kb ~ 2 min (110 pages)
