Sri Lanka, July 13, 2012: Social security and safety nets for the working poor is vital for poverty alleviation of a country. Every year around 50 million households in India obtain employment under the social security net which was implemented in 2006, Minister of Rural Development and Drinking Water and Sanitation of India, Jairam Ramesh said.

Delivering the keynote address at a seminar on Poverty Alleviation, the minister said approximately 60 billion US dollars goes as wage payment directly into the accounts of the beneficiaries per annum.

Ahemdabad, May 11, 2012: As many as 41% of the children in the state are underweight and 55% of the women between 15 to 45 years of age in the state are anemic. This was revealed in a Rajya Sabha session on Thursday.

Union minister of state (independent charge) for women and child development, Krishna Tirath in Rajya Sabha gave the details of the number of women and children suffering from malnutrition. Tirath was replying to a question posed by Member of Parliament from Jharkhand, Parimal Nathwani.

This country briefing presents the results of the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) and explains key findings graphically. The MPI reflects both the incidence or headcount ratio (H) of poverty – the proportion of the population that is multidimensionally poor – and the average intensity (A) of their poverty – the average proportion of indicators in which poor people are deprived. Read More

(Source: Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative)

Feb 8, 2012: Christian Aid welcomes the UK government’s continued commitment to aid to India as an important intervention aimed at helping people living in abject poverty.

A £25m programme the organisation manages as part of a consortium on behalf of the UK’s Department for International Development helps marginalised and socially excluded groups such as dalits -  previously called untouchables - tribal communities, women and others living below the poverty line.

New Delhi, Oct 4, 2011: It is a fact that India is a poor country and many of its citizens live at the level of destitution. But that still does not excuse the sorry instances of child malnutrition that come to light across the country, especially since both the state and union governments boast of an array of child welfare, health and nutrition programmes.

A Christian group is calling on the Australian government to provide WASH access for 8.8 million people each year by increasing aid to water and sanitation from the current A$ 117 million (US$ 114 million) to A$ 500 million (US$ 487 million) per annum by 2015. Based on the estimated A$ 70 billion a year that is needed to meet the MDG targets for water and sanitation by 2015, the group believes that Australia’s fair share in this effort amounts to A$ 500 million per year.

According to the Joint Monitoring Programme of WHO and Unicef, 71 per cent of Pakistan’s rural population does not have the facilities of improved sanitation, and 40 per cent of the rural population resort to open defecation.

Similar figures for Sindh are high, due to abject poverty in Sindh and, inability of the Sindh government to provide sanitation facilities due to political insensitivities and imbalanced priorities.

New Delhi, 8th Sept. 2011: As per Registrar General of India (RGI), in the year 2009, the estimated number of total deaths in children 0-4 years is about 15.85 lakhs. The Minister of States for (I/C) of Women and Child Development Smt. Krishna Tirath today stated in Rajya Sabha that Malnutrition is not a direct cause of death but contributes to increased morbidity and mortality by reducing resistance to infections. Data on the number of deaths due to malnutrition in the country is not maintained centrally.

Children account for a large percentage of the income-poor and the severely deprived worldwide. At least 600 million children under the age of 18 around the world are surviving on less than $1 a day; 40 per cent of these children live in developing countries. Every second child in developing countries is deprived of even the minimum opportunities in life.

 Deprivation in water and sanitation

ISLAMABAD (Xinhua) -- Seventy-eight infants out of 1, 000 live births die every year in Pakistan while under-five mortality in the country is 94 deaths per 1,000 live births, a local media quoted a UN official as saying on Friday. 
 
"The situation of children in Pakistan is serious with immunization, nutrition and sanitation issues, in particular, needing urgent attention," said Dan Rohrmann, UNICEF Country Representative for Pakistan.
 
Rohrmann made the remark in Islamabad on Thursday while attending a function co-organized by the World Health Organization (WH