In Aug 2023, you reiterated the unity government’s commitment to end hardcore poverty this year, even if additional funds are required for the purpose and if RM100 million is not enough, RM200 million.
Dear PM10, it is not about money alone.
Ending hardcore poverty doesn’t end with just giving them monies.
It is a long term program that requires sustainability.
Do not also assume that economic growth is the key also.
Benefits from economic growth do not trickle down.
We are told that growth is good.
We are told that more income lifts people out of poverty and improves their lives.
This narrative has been drilled into us by analysts, economists, the World Bank etc duly echoed and assisted by media outlets around the world.
Growing the economy provides the necessary income for the government to invest in schools and universities, doctors and hospitals, welfare support, pensions, building of infrastructure etc.
Economic growth as the sole outcome from which all else will follow will inevitably fail.
GDP figures tell us nothing about the costs of growth.
The real beneficiaries of growth in every country are always the corporations and elites who leech on the workers, local or foreign.
Increasing taxes on the rich and cutting down on the subsidies won't help too.
Managing the inflation rate through rates is also not an effective means to reduce poverty because the poor are most vulnerable to price increases.
Poverty alleviation will not occur without a broader, integrated strategy that focuses on qualitative rather than quantitative development strategies including anti corruption policies.
Simplistic stories of GDP growth blind us to the extraordinary social and ecological destruction that growth so often entails.
We urgently need to abandon this metric and pay attention instead to what is happening in the real world, who is winning and who is losing, what is gained and what is lost.
Too much is being destroyed, too fast.
It is much more like a puzzle.
It is incomplete without all the pieces, which must be carefully put together to generate good change for all, not the few.
For example, you know that ill health is not just the result of viruses, bacteria and genetics.
It also reflects non health and social factors. Poor housing, poor transport networks, no or poor employment, structural inequalities and racism, and so on.
The social determinants of health is critical to understanding why some groups were more vulnerable to the COVID virus than others tell us that to improve one’s health, one must improve the social fabric and promote equality through non-health policies as much as through hospitals and clinics.
Education is often referred to as the great equalizer.
Investing in the social fabric i.e raising human capital and skills is the critical development that will help and sustain your efforts to reduce and end poverty in the country.
It can open the door to jobs, resources, and skills that help a person not only survive, but thrive.
In fact, according to UNESCO, if all students in low-income countries had just basic reading skills, an estimated 171 million people could escape extreme poverty.
If all adults completed secondary education, we could cut the global poverty rate by more than half.
A quality education supports a child’s developing social, emotional, cognitive, and communication skills. Children who attend school also gain knowledge and skills, often at a higher level than those who aren’t in the classroom.
They can then use these skills to earn higher incomes and build successful lives.
Education is the best way out of poverty in part because it is strongly linked to economic growth.
A 2021 study co-published by Stanford University and Munich’s Ludwig Maximilian University shows that between 1960 and 2000, 75% of the growth in gross domestic product around the world was linked to increased math and science skills showing that the relationship between the knowledge capital of a nation, and the long-run economic growth rate is extraordinarily strong.
A 2019 Oxfam report says poverty thrives in part on inequality and since education is a basic human right for all, and when tailored to the unique needs of marginalized communities, it can be used as a lever against some of the systemic barriers that keep certain groups of people furthest behind.
As the number of extreme weather events increases due to climate change, education plays a critical role in reducing vulnerability and risk to these events.
A 2014 issue of the journal Ecology and Society found that highly educated individuals are better aware of the earthquake risk and are more likely to undertake disaster preparedness.
It went on to add that educated people living through a natural disaster often have more of a financial safety net to offset losses, access to more sources of information to prepare for a disaster, and have a wider social network for mutual support.
Policies that increase the incomes of the poor such as investments in primary education, rural infrastructure, health, and nutrition tend to enhance the productive capacity of the whole economy, boosting the incomes of all groups.
Even though you said education remains the crucial component receiving allocations in the country’s budget planning with the Education Ministry (MoE) allocated RM58.7 billion compared to RM55.2 billion this year, little was revealed about the National Education Development Plan which you said is currently being formulated.
In the meantime, what the ordinary rakyat witnessed in the programs and the changes instituted by the Education Ministry is more about the mode of deliveries but not on content and context, a further thumbing down of the future generation in their education.
As you said on 7 Nov 2023 at the handing over and launch of a Dilapited Building Pilot Project in Bandar Baru Bangi, the country cannot progress and develop if the quality of education does not improve.
Similarly, you cannot hope to eradicate poverty in the country if your government is not investing in the social fabric i.e raising human capital and skills.
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