Poverty is a term that brings to mind all the negative stigmas o­ne perceives of life: destitution, wretchedness, impoverishment, inter alia.

To make matters worse, no two social scientists agree o­n how to define poverty and as such what the poverty line actually is and how to measure it. Some relate it to paucity of food, while others call it a state of being underpaid for a given job.

However, the heated debate among economists and policy makers continues o­n where to draw the line. Should it bet at less than USD1 per day, or at USD2 per day?

Today, three definitions of poverty are in vogue: Complete poverty, proportional poverty and social exclusion.

Complete poverty is the state where a person does not have the means to sustain his/her life and soul. A person is considered proportionally poor if his/her earnings do not support their participation in day-to-day social activities in a given society.

The recently introduced term, social exclusion, is defined as a society, infested by unemployment, unskilled workforce, lack of housing facilities, paucity of resources, and entrenched in criminal activities, hence becoming socially excluded.

Likewise, a person with such traits would be labelled as socially excluded as well.

Moreover, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) defines poverty in these dimensions: deprivation of a long and healthy life, knowledge, a decent standard of living and social exclusion.

Illogical assumption

The government of Pakistan's official definition of poverty is no less amusing though. The Planning and Development Division, via a letter number 1(41) poverty/PC/2002, dated Aug 16, 2002, suggested that Rupees 673.54/person/month be the official poverty line (about USD12 or RM45).

The letter implied that the poverty line is being built o­n a comprehensive household survey conducted in 1998-99. All the economic markers, like inflation and cost of living, have risen since 1998, rendering sustainable living an unbearable burden for the common person.

It seems quite illogical to assume that a man with a family can live o­n a monthly income of Rupees 673.54.

Generally speaking though, poverty varies from place to place, and every country marks its line with reference to its stage of economic development and social values.

According to the Scotland Poverty Information Unit, persons are deemed poor when their earnings fail to support their material needs, and as a consequence, they cannot participate in acceptable activities of a given society.

In Pakistan's case, none of the foreign monetary institutes, other than the UNDP, formulate to the concept of USD2/day as the poverty line. They remain silent o­n this issue and follow the government figures o­n poverty.

When asked how the World Bank defined the poverty line for Pakistan, an official said to refer to their website .

However, in the Word Bank report 'Poverty and Vulnerability in South Asia', poverty is defined as being associated with deprivation of health, education, food, knowledge, influence over o­ne's environment and the many other things that make the difference between truly living and merely living.

To complicate things further, BBC reported that the World Bank deems a person as living below the poverty line if he/she is unable to meet the basic and minimum needs and demands of life.

Questions arise

Following this definition, another set of questions arise. What are those basic needs that o­ne has to have in order to live a modest life? What are the minimal needs? Do they vary for different countries? If so, then surely the poverty line becomes even more dynamic and more difficult to define!

When the question was put to the Asian Development Bank, their reply was vague, quoting the government figures based o­n the government survey conducted in1998, and published in 2001: A total of 32.2 percent of the total population of Pakistan is living well below the poverty line. The ADB refers to these figures for measuring poverty.

Despite this, ADB officials are of the view that in order to accurately measure poverty, income should not be taken as the sole criterion. The bank is currently working with the government of Pakistan to collect relevant data to improve the mechanism of analysis and to get a more substantive assessment of poverty in Pakistan.

The representative of the International Monetary Fund, Pakistan mission, when asked about their criterion for demarking the poverty line, stated that the IMF does not fix poverty line in any country, including Pakistan. However the fund adopts the poverty line defined by the government reports.

According to the UNDP Human Poverty Index, 1997, 72 million people in Pakistan, nearly 50 percent of the total population, were living below the poverty line. While according to UNDP Human Development Report, 2002, this figure rose to 84.6 percent of the total population, translating to roughly 120 million people earning less than USD2/day, living an impoverished life, with no access to the basic amenities of life.

It may be pertinent to note that all these institutions have their own variants for defining poverty and are often vague and ambiguous. If this is the case, then how can o­ne expect them to alleviate poverty if they cannot agree o­n its definition.

Furthermore, the UNDP Report (2002) presents the poverty index for the year 2000. Therefore, it may not be too presumptuous to assume that the poverty figures may well encompass 90 percent of the populous by 2003.

Nosediving economy

During the past three years, Pakistan's economy has taken a nosedive, worsened by the sanctions imposed o­n it by the West and the deteriorating global economic scenario.

This can be gauged from the fact that between the years 1999 and 2001, in the public and private sectors some 350,000 people were laid off from their jobs in the name of "rightsizing" and "downsizing".

In addition, numerous industrialist units were closed down during the same period in certain provinces, rendering hundreds of thousands of workers jobless.

As the demand for skilled workforce increased, so did the competition, resulting in long lines outside the offices of potential employers. Simultaneously, the employers now had a free hand to choose those workers who are willing to work for lower wages, as there was no supply shortage of a cheap labour workforce.

At the same time a desperate worker, willing to work for less, may easily replace a disgruntled employee seeking a pay hike. In a nutshell, the industrial sector was not helpful in alleviating the plight of the unemployed and impoverished.

To make matters worse, the situation in the agricultural sector was gloomier. Government subsidies were retracted for pesticides and fertilisers, thereby inflating the cost of crop production.

Small farmers, especially, found themselves caught in the vicious circle of poverty when their crop yield could not match the cost of production, forcing them to borrow from the bank, or other sources, for both the next crop and to support their livelihood, plunging them deeper into the swelling poverty indices.

'Lacking credibility'

Whatever the reasons behind the deteriorating living human condition and rising poverty - such as flawed socio-economic policies, the dictates of the foreign donor agencies or excessive spending o­n defence - what is evident is that at the end of the day the common people suffer the most as the benefits of any improvement in economy never reach them.

Our economic 'gurus' never tire of the rhetoric they churn out o­n the alleged growth in foreign exchange reserves, debt re-servicing and the strengthening of the Rupee, vis- B -vis US dollar.

What they fail to realise is that these measures are short-term and that such temporary improvements in fiscal matters do not trickle down to the poor, or have a negligible impact o­n the impoverished.

The rulers and policy makers in Pakistan have failed to recognise the intensity with which poverty is rising in the country. This was clearly illustrated recently, when the government issued a strongly worded denial after the World Bank reported a rise in the poverty level.

The Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz surprised everybody when he charged that giving importance to reports released by foreign institutes was in vogue even when their findings "lacked credibility" and were completely inaccurate.

Was it not the same honourable minister who praised these financial institutions for their active guidance in designing and planning the government's fiscal policies? Were they not credible then?

In his rebuttal, the finance minister did emphasise the need to re-examine the data collected and analyse the true extent of poverty in Pakistan. However, he failed to give a time frame as to when the World Bank report will be re-evaluated.

Whether the public gets to know the truth about the nature of poverty in Pakistan is still debatable.

But o­ne thing is for certain and that is inflation will continue to rise and the poverty line will be re-defined yet again, as the divide between the rich and poor widens.

One can o­nly hope and pray that saner minds prevail and indigenous policies, "for the people and by the people", will take a lead in government legislation.

Till such a time arrives, the poor will keep struggling as they wait for the promised economic uplift through the dictates of donor agencies - which have yet to materialise.

MOHSIN BABBAR is a Pakistani journalist currently attached with a research organisation based in Islamabad.