According to the report, nearly 39 percent of Pakistanis live in multidimensional poverty, with the highest rates of poverty in FATA and Balochistan. Pakistan’s MPI showed a strong decline, with national poverty rates falling from 55% to 39% from 2004 to 2015.
In Islam, poverty is a great curse and unfortunate. Our beloved Prophet Hazrat Muhammad (PBUH) also prayed to Allah to save him (PBUH) from Poverty. Poverty is the state in which one lacks a usual or socially acceptable amount of money or material possessions. Poverty is said to exist when people lack the means to satisfy their basic needs.
Causes of Poverty:-
where jobs are low paid and there are limited opportunities for upward mobility. A number of factors explain the existence of and increase in poverty in the last decade. However, poor governance is the key underlying cause of poverty in Pakistan. Poor governance has not only enhanced vulnerability, but is the prime cause of low business confidence, which in turn translates into lower investment levels and growth. Governance problems have also resulted in inefficiency in provision of social services, which has had serious implications for human development in the country. The lack of public confidence in state institutions, including the police and judiciary, have eroded their legitimacy and directly contributed to worsening conditions of public security and law and order during the 1990s. With regard to economic factors, decline in the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate is the immediate cause of the increase in poverty over the last decade. In the 1990s, growth declined in all sectors and was slower than average in laborintensive sectors. However, the causes of the slowdown in growth may be divided into two categories, i.e. structural and others.
Environmental degradation is also a cause of poverty in Pakistan. The environment-poverty nexus manifests itself most particularly in health effects. For example, waterborne diseases are widespread because 17 percent of the urban and 47 percent of the rural population does not have access to clean drinking water
Another cause of poverty is corruption. People use wrong way to get money by using fair and unfair means. Officials waste their time has low efficiency. Only one relationship that is exists in society is money. One has to pay a heavy cost to get his right. Law and order conditions are out of control and institutions are failed to provide justice to a common man. Justice can be bought by money only. But government is unable to control such type of things. In this whole scenario some corrupt people has been occupying the properties and common man is living in miserable conditions.
Effects of poverty:-The most common effect of poverty is malnutrition and this effect is particularly seen in children of poor families. People living in poverty they have no access for highly nutritious foods. The healthiest foods are usually the most expensive, that’s why family on a very small budget is much more likely to purchase food that is less nutritious, simply people can afford. In other hand people in poverty are malnourished because they do not eat sufficient of anything. For some people around the world, quality food is a luxury. A total of 14.3 percent of people in developing countries face hunger and about 25 percent of Sub-Saharan Africa is considered malnourished. Poor nutrition causes 45 percent of deaths in children under the age of 5years.
