Eradicating poverty needs us all!

October 17^th was the International day for the eradication of poverty. Yes, you read it, eradicate poverty; a precept that may seem impossible, as there is no magical recipe to rid our society from poverty. The reason is the many features that drive people into poverty: no access to education, health, adequate housing and suffering from malnutrition.

The UN had set as a goal reducing extreme poverty 50% by 2015. It was met. Today, there are 1 billion fewer people living on less than 1.25 $ a day than there were in 1990. Right now, many developing countries have seen the number of people living in extreme poverty reduced by more than 50%. Once this goal was achieved, new objectives were set for 2030: eradicate extreme poverty and reduce all forms of poverty by 50%, eradicate hunger in the world, access to primary and secondary education for all, and other measures to build a fairer world.

The problem isn’t the lack of means, but the lack of will, and not just of a few but of everyone! Individually, at a social level and at a political level. Individually, we live in our comfort zone and find it hard to leave it and actively work towards a change in our surroundings. This attitude also affects society and therefore, the political class don’t bother finding an answer to a situation that is not perceived as a priority for society as a whole.

And here we are, moving forward but dragging our feet and continuing to allow thousands to live in extreme vulnerability, migrating to flee wars, poverty, corruption, persecution for their ideas, religion, gender or even the climate emergency.

Corporations, the media, organizations and public administrations and society as a whole should stop this poor attitude allowing these injustices to occur.

We must leave a fairer world for our future generations, where people look at reality with love and compassion, where everyone has the right to live in dignity and were we can scrub out the international day for the eradication of poverty.