An agenda for poverty eradication: Target 2002.

The Seventh Summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), held at Dhaka in 1993, adopted a "Consensus on Eradication of Poverty in South Asia". By doing so, the Heads of State or Government of Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka "committed their Governments unequivocally to the eradication of poverty in South Asia, preferably by the year 2002". What this decision reflects is not so much an over-ambitious target as the urgency of addressing the problem. South Asia, indeed, faces an enormous challenge in eradicating poverty. Nearly 400 million, or about 40 per cent of the 1 billion people who inhabit the region, are living in conditions beneath human dignity, suffering from hunger, malnutrition and disease, and often homeless and helpless. In this scenario, regional cooperation in South Asia has focused, from the beginning, on socio-economic issues. The Sixth SAARC Summit, held in Colombo in 1991, decided to constitute an Independent South Asian Commission on Poverty Alleviation (ISACPA), comprising eminent persons from the region. The ISACPA's mandate was to make an in-depth study of the problem and to make policy-relevant recommendations.

The ISACPA found that, while the success of poverty reduction initiatives of the past had varied, the final result showed that these programmes invariably suffered from the lack of participation of the poor in the formulation and execution of activities. Therefore, in advocating an Agenda of Action, it highlighted the importance of active involvement of the poor. The Seventh SAARC Summit endorsed this approach.

The Agenda of Action to eradicate poverty is based on a strategy of social mobilization - a policy of decentralized agricultural development and small-scale, labour-intensive industrialization and human development. Each member State agreed to draw up a relevant national plan and implement "appropriate pro-poor development strategies at macro- and micro-levels". Further, an enabling international environment was deemed fundamental.

SAARC is not a funding organization. Therefore, the responsibility for carrying out poverty eradication programmes lies with the national authorities of member States.

In the case of the Maldives, the introduction of planned development in the early 1980s, with its focus on sustainable socio-economic progress within a liberal economic framework, has been very successful. Abject poverty is nonexistent, as indicators recorded by the United Nations Development Programme's (UNDP) Human Development Index and the findings of the United Nations Committee for Development Planning show. However, vulnerability is a major problem because of geographic dispersal of island communities, diseconomies of scale and a fragile ecosystem. A poverty and vulnerability assessment survey is being carried out and would provide a further basis for policies of mitigation.

In 1995, a national poverty alleviation coordinating committee was established, in pursuance of SAARC's Agenda. A number of activities in community development were carried out in several atolls, and the national development plan has allocated more activities on poverty reduction.

SAARC acts as a catalyst in encouraging States to share experiences and expertise that would facilitate success. To strengthen institutional capacity to undertake this process, a three-tier mechanism of officials and ministers was set up in 1995, the year declared as the "SAARC Year for Poverty Eradication", and the Ninth SAARC Summit in Male designated 1997 as the "SAARC Year for Participatory Governance". The aim was to eradicate poverty through social mobilization.

The success of the scheme would require a supportive international environment. The member countries of SAARC rank quite low in the Human Development Index, and many countries of the region are among the least developed in the world. Therefore, the Seventh Summit, in adopting target 2002, called for a "new dialogue" with donors, focusing on poverty eradication. As a follow-up, cooperation agreements were signed with UNDP and the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, in order to pursue activities to enhance the capability of SAARC member States to address the problem.

Needless to say, long-term success in poverty eradication can only be achieved through economic development. In view of this, considerable emphasis has been given to economic cooperation that would provide practical benefits to the people of the region. In this regard, SAARC's broader agenda in the socioeconomic fields, such as in the creation of a free trade area by the year 2001, is of crucial importance.

In order to eradicate poverty, a multipronged approach is necessary. While action is taken at the national level, effective steps must be taken to develop the economies of member States so that eradication of poverty becomes self-reliant and sustainable. Only then can social mobilization succeed in breaking through the vicious cycle of poverty, illiteracy, disease and despair. Target 2002 is the challenge, an agenda of gigantic proportions. South Asia cannot realize its full potential until that of its least fortunate individuals is also achieved.

President Gayoom contributed this article at the request of the UN Chronicle.