poverty

By Samira Sadeque UNITED NATIONS, May 29 2020 (IPS) – Unless global leaders act now, the COVID-19 pandemic will cause unimaginable suffering and devastation around the world, the Secretary-General of the United Nations António Guterres said yesterday, May 28. He painted a picture of hunger and famine at historic proportions, with some 60 million people pushed into extreme poverty and ... Read More »

By Shafi’i Mohyaddin Abokar MOGADISHU, May 28 2020 (IPS) – While simultaneously suffering from the coronavirus pandemic, flooding and a locust crisis, Somalia, could well see a rise in the number of people who are susceptible to human trafficking. Read More »

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Thursday inaugurated the disbursement of Tk 1,250 crore cash aid for five million poor families hit hard by the coronavirus pandemic. Read More »

A recent survey finds that about 63% of coastal poor households have borrowed loan from local money lenders at high-interest rates  due to absent of institutional credit facilities. The survey also finds 57% of households are suffering from  food crisis because of the lockdown, and about 46% of households have experienced increasing violence against women. The Monitoring and Research Department ... Read More »

By Marco V. Sánchez Cantillo ROME, Apr 28 2020 (IPS) – Many uncertainties haunt the world’s campaign to counter the COVID-19 pandemic, but one thing is now sure: Global economic activity will suffer greatly, with large-scale consequences for the incomes and welfare of all, but especially for the most vulnerable food import-dependent countries. Read More »

by Luca Ratti on 27th April 2020 @LucaRatti15 The coronavirus crisis is exacerbating in-work poverty in the EU—and a powerful raft of labour-market and welfare measures is needed for an adequate response. Read More »

Dhaka, April 25: Grameenphone and BRAC teaming up on Friday launched an initiative titled “Dakche Amar Desh” to stand beside the vulnerable and most affected people in this deadly COVID-19 gripped situation. Read More »

Savar (Dhaka), April 22 – The nationwide shutdown aimed at curbing coronavirus has left her day-labourer husband jobless, leading their family, including her toddler, to starvation. As the family is new in the locality, no-one gave them any relief either. Read More »

Several hundred people besieged the office of Sarail upazila nirbahi officer on Tuesday demanding relief. Read More »

by Sarah Marchal and Ive Marx on 21st April 2020 @IveMarx The coronavirus crisis has punched a hole in Europe’s safety nets. But they were already frayed and urgent repairs are needed. Read More »

Geneva, 17 Apr (Kanaga Raja) – States need to invest massively in decreasing inequalities and poverty arising out of the COVID-19 pandemic, and not just bail out large corporations, banks and investors with no human rights or social conditions attached. Read More »

By Hassanal Noor Rashid Global inequality and injustice have been heated topics and of deep social concern throughout human history. In January 2020, OXFAM (Oxford Committee for Famine Relief), a reputable confederation of charitable organisations, declared in a widely circulated report “2,153 billionaires have more wealth than the 4.6 billion people who make up 60 percent of the planet’s population”. Read More »

by Michael Dauderstädt on 15th April 2020 After almost a decade, EU-wide inequality finally regained its previous low of 2009 due to relatively strong growth in the poorer member states between the Baltic and the Balkans. Read More »

Dhaka, April 14 – The Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) has proposed providing with Tk 8,000 per month for two months to each of 1.9 crore households, close to the lower poverty line, as COVID-19 pandemic put the poor people in trouble. Read More »

By Fairuz Ahmed NEW YORK, Apr 9 2020 (IPS) – For a Bangladeshi woman, who has been a sex worker since childhood, her post-COVID-19 future  looks hopeless. Shilpy, who works at Daulatdia, the largest brothel in the country, told IPS how she now also fears for the future of her two daughters. “When I was born, the woman my mother ... Read More »

Failing to bear the agony of abject poverty amid the ongoing coronavirus crisis, a man allegedly committed suicide by hanging himself at Dalbhanga village in Maheshpur upazila on Tuesday night. Read More »

Benapole, Jessore, April 06 – Around 200 low-income and poor people demonstrated in front of Manirampur Upazila Parishad in Jashore demanding food aid as there is no income because of restrictions on movement to curb coronavirus transmission. Read More »

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Sunday asked the officials concerned to prepare a list of distressed people for providing government assistance so that they could face the tough time evolved over coronavirus pandemic. Read More »

Geneva, 21 Feb (Kanaga Raja) — High individual and household debt, which accounts for a significant portion of private debt in most countries, has been associated with inequality, macroeconomic instability, unsustainable sovereign debt and financial crises. Read More »

By Samira Sadeque UN, Jan 23 2020 (IPS) – More than 70 percent of the global population is currently living in parts of the world where income inequality has grown, according to a World Social Report 2020 launched by United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA). Read More »

By Anis Chowdhury and Jomo Kwame Sundaram Sydney and Kualalumpur, Jan 7 2020 (IPS) – The latest November 2019 UBS/PwC Billionaires Report counted 2,101 billionaires globally, or 589 more than five years before. Earlier, Farhad Manjoo had seriously recommended, ‘Abolish Billionaires’, presenting a moral case against the super-rich as they have and get far, far more than what they might ... Read More »

Focus on jobs, gender, fragility, climate, and good governance Stockholm, December 13, 2019 — A global coalition of development partners announced today their commitment to maintain momentum in the fight against extreme poverty, with $82 billion for the International Development Association (IDA), the World Bank’s fund for the poorest. The financing, which includes more than $53 billion for Africa, will ... Read More »

By Thalif Deen UN, Nov 22 2019 (IPS) – When a coalition of international donors pledged more than $650 million to provide assistance to over 300 million smallholder farmers in developing countries, the primary aim was to help increase agricultural and livestock production besieged by droughts, floods and other natural disasters triggered by climate change– mostly in sub-Saharan Africa and ... Read More »

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Thursday said hunger has already been eradicated from the country and vowed afresh to make a poverty-free Bangladesh. Read More »

Dhaka, Oct 27 (UNB) – The preliminary report of the sixth agricultural census 2019 on Sunday revealed that 11.33 percent of the households do not possess any land. Read More »

ঢাকা থেকে ভাঙ্গা পর্যন্ত পদ্মা সেতু রেল সংযোগ নির্মানে ক্ষতিগ্রস্ত ছয় জেলার ৭৭০০ জনের মধ্যে ৩০৪১ জনকে পুনর্বাসন কার্যক্রমের আওতায় ইতোমধ্যে অতিরিক্ত অনুদান হিসাবে ৭৭ কোটি ৬৯ লক্ষ ৫০ হাজার টাকা প্রদান করা হয়েছে। বাকী ক্ষতিগ্রস্তদের সহায়তাও প্রক্রিয়াধীন রয়েছে। Read More »

By Ben Phillips Mexico City, Oct 9 2019 (IPS) – Last month 195 world leaders once again met in New York for big speeches and grand events. But on inequality, when all is said and done, more has been said than done. Read More »

By Srinivas Tata and Jaco Cilliers Bangkok, Thailand, (IPS) – It’s 1962, and in a modest Hong Kong neighbourhood, a poetic love story unfolds. Filmed almost twenty years ago, Wong Kar-wai’s seminal movie In the Mood for Love captured the world’s imagination about lifestyle in the region. Read More »

By Shuvojit Banerjee and Poh Lynn Ng Bangkok, Aug 2019 (IPS) – Asia and the Pacific is lauded globally for its rapid economic growth over recent decades and has lifted 1.1 billion people out of extreme poverty since 1990. Nevertheless, the region continues to have the largest number of poor people in the world. Read More »

By Daniel Gutman Buenos Aires, Jul 29 2019 (IPS) – On the outer edges of Buenos Aires proper, where the paved streets end and the narrow alleyways of one of Argentina’s largest shantytowns begins, visitors can find the En Haccore soup kitchen. Read More »