. Introduction
Poverty alleviation is one of the most difficult challenges facing any country in the developing world where, on the average, majority of the population is considered poor. Evidences in Nigeria shows that the number of those in poverty has continued to increase. For example the number of those in poverty increased from 27% in 1980 to 46% in 1985 and to 67% in 1996, by 1999 it increased to more than 70% (Ogwumike, 2001). Poverty alleviation programmes in Nigeria are means through which the government aims to revamp and reconstruct the economy. The high incidence of poverty in the country has made poverty alleviation strategies important policy options over the years with varying results. Poverty alleviation strategies ranging from Operation Feed the Nation of 1978, the Green Revolution of 1982, the Directorate of Foods Roads and Rural Infrastructures DFFRI, the National Directorate for Employment NDE, poverty alleviation programme, PAP up to the National Poverty Eradication Programme, NAPEP were all attempts made by various governments in the country to curb the menace.
This chapter is aimed at appraising the performance of poverty alleviation measures undertaken within the period 1999 – 2006, specifically the Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP) and the National Poverty Eradication Progarmme (NAPEP). The next section contains the literature review and theoretical issues. Section three appraises the poverty reduction strategies in Nigeria from 1999 to 2006 and the last section contains concluding remarks.
The methodology employed is the use of secondary source of data. Information was gathered through reports, publications, the internet and other secondary sources of data. Specifically data were collected from the Central Bank of Nigeria and the National Poverty Eradication Council (NAPEC). The collected data were analyzed using simple content analysis. The choice of this technique of analysis was informed by the collected data and the objective of the research.
2. Literature Review and Theoretical Issues
2.1 Concept of Poverty
There is no standard definition of poverty because of its multi-dimensional nature. Poverty is commonly defined as a situation of low income or low consumption. It can also be viewed as a situation in which individuals are unable to meet the basic necessities of life such as food, clothing, shelter, education, security and health. Ajakaiye and Adeyeye (2000) conceptualize poverty as a function of education, health, child mortality and other demographic variables. Poverty to them is the availability or otherwise of the above parameters. In a nut shell poverty can be seen as a situation in which an individual is unable because of economic, social, political and psychological incapacitation, to provide himself and his family the barest basic necessities of life.
2.2 Classification of Poverty
Poverty can be classified, based on different criteria, as absolute poverty, relative poverty, rural poverty and urban poverty. Absolute poverty refers to lack of minimum physical requirements for existence; relative poverty on the other hand refers to a situation in which a persons’ or households’ provision of goods is lower than that of others. Rural poverty is characterized by poor material condition, low level of education, lack of infrastructures, poor health condition, underemployment, low investment and high out- migration. Urban poverty on the other hand is characterized by environmental degradation, overcrowded accommodation, low per capita income, and other problems associated with urban areas such as slums, ghettos and shanties (Galbraith, 1969; Rogers etal, 1988)
2.3 Causes and Consequences of Poverty
Obadan (1997) identified some factors as the causes of poverty among which are; inadequate access to employment opportunities, inadequate physical assets, inadequate access to markets, destruction of natural resources, lack of power to participate in design of development programmes and inadequate access to assistance for those living at the margin. On the consequences of poverty, Aku etal (1997) opined that there is general loss of confidence in a society stricken by poverty and this renders government policies ineffective. Poverty also results in increasing the fragility and vulnerability of members of society to external influences. Furthermore, poverty makes production remain largely subsistence due to lack of capital needed for expansion. Labour becomes intensive and marginal productivity remains low.
2.4 Approaches to Poverty Alleviation
There are many approaches to poverty alleviation, some of which are;
Economic Growth Approach – Given the low labour absorption capacity of the industrial sector, broad based economic growth should be encouraged. This should focus on capital formation as it relates to capital stock, and human capital. Human capital formation has to do with education, health, nutrition and housing needs of labour. This is obvious from the fact that investment in these facets of human capital improves the quality of labour and thus its productivity. Thus to ensure growth that takes care of poverty, the share of human capital as a source of growth in output has to be accorded the rightful place.
Basic Needs Approach – This calls for the provision of basic needs such as food, shelter, water, sanitation, health care, basic education, transportation etc. Unless there is proper targeting, this approach may not directly impact on the poor because of their inherent disadvantage in terms of political power and the ability to influence the choice and location of government programmes and projects.
Rural Development Approach – This approach sees the rural sector as a unique sector in terms of poverty reduction. This is because majority of the poor in developing countries live in this sector. In addition, the level of paid employment in this sector is very low this means that, traditional measures of alleviating poverty may not easily work in the rural sector without radical changes in the assets ownership structure, credit structure, etc. Emphasis in this approach to development has focused on the Integrated Approach to rural development. This approach recognizes that poverty is multi – dimensional and
therefore, requires a multi – pronged approach. The approach aims at the provision of
basic necessities of life such as food, shelter, safe drinking water, education, health care,
employment and income generating opportunities to the rural dwellers in general and the
poor in particular. One basic problem with this approach to poverty reduction is that it is
difficult to focus attention on the real poor given that poverty in the rural area is pervasive. In other words it makes targeting of poverty reduction programmes very
difficult.
Target Approach – This approach favours directing poverty alleviation programmes at specific groups within the country. It includes such programmes as Social Safety Nets, Micro Credits, and School Meal programme.
2.5 Poverty Reduction Strategies in Nigeria
In Nigeria
growth, basic needs and rural development approaches. They can be looked at from two perspectives; that is those in the pre SAP era and those in the SAP era
The Pre-SAP Era
During this era, poverty reduction was never the direct focus of development planning and management. Government only showed concern for poverty reduction indirectly. For example, the objectives of the first National Development Plan in Nigeria
with poverty reduction, emphasized increase in real income of the average citizen as well
as reduction of income inequality, among other things (see Ogwumike, 1987 and 1998).
During this era’s national development plans, many of the programmes which were put in
place in Nigeria
agencies) had positive effects on poverty reduction although the target population for
some of the programmes were not specified explicitly as poor people or communities
(Ogwumike, 1995 and 1998). Some of such programmes are, the River Basin Development Authorities
(RBDA), the Agricultural Development Programmes (ADP), the Agricultural Credit
Guarantee Scheme (ACGS), the Rural Electrification Scheme (RES), and the Rural
Banking Programme (RBP). Most of these programmes were designed to take care of
such objectives as employment generation, enhancing agricultural output and income,
and stemming the tide of rural – urban migration, which no doubt affected poverty
reduction. Despite some significant degree of success made by some of these programmes, most of them could not be sustained. In fact, with time, many of them failed as a result of diversion from the original focus. For instance, the Rural Banking and the Agricultural Credit Guarantee Scheme at many stages failed to deliver the desired
credit for agricultural and rural transformation because a lot of savings were mobilized in
the rural areas only to be diverted to urban areas in form of credits/investments. Other notable poverty reduction related programmes that were put in place in Nigeria before the advent of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP) include Operation Feed the Nation (OFN) set up in 1977, Free and Compulsory primary Education (FCPE) set up also in 1977, Green Revolution established in 1980, and Low-Cost Housing Scheme. Both OFN and Green Revolution were set up to boost agricultural production and improve the general performance of the agricultural sector among other things. These programmes made some laudable impacts; they enhanced the quality of life of many Nigerians. But the programmes could not be sustained due to lack of political will and commitment, policy instability and insufficient involvement of the beneficiaries in these programmes.
The SAP Era
Conscious policy effort by government towards poverty alleviation began in Nigeria during the era of the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP). The severe economic crisis in Nigeria
2.6 Theoretical issues
Most studies of poverty alleviation have adopted different theoretical underpinnings in order to find a workable solution to their subject matter. These theories include the underdevelopment/dependency theories, the vent for surplus theory, the theory of basic needs and the individual deficiencies theory. These theories were more concerned with alleviating poverty without giving due attention to its root cause. This work adopts the theory of cumulative and cyclical interdependencies as its framework because the theory looks at individuals and their community as caught in a spiral of opportunity and problems, hence individual and community resources are mutually dependent.
Cumulative and cyclical interdependencies theory originated from the works of Myrdal (1957) who coined it as “interlocking, circular, interdependence within a process of cumulative causation” Myrdal argued that personal and community well being are closely linked in a cascade of negative consequences, and that closure of a factory or other crises can lead to a cascade of personal and community problems including migration of people from a community. Thus the interdependence of factors creating poverty actually accelerates once a cycle of decline starts. For example, at the community level, a lack of employment opportunities leads to out migration, closing retail stores and declining local tax revenue which lead to deterioration of schools and lead to poorly trained workers, resulting in firms not being able to utilize technology fully, which in turn leads back to a greater lack of employment. This cycle also repeats itself at the individual level. The lack of employment leads to lack of consumption and spending due to inadequate incomes, and to in adequate savings, which means that individuals can not invest in training, and individuals also lacks the ability to invest in businesses, or to start their own businesses, which leads to lack of expansion, erosion of market and disinvestment, all of which feed back to inadequate opportunities. Health problems and the inability to afford preventive medicine, a good diet, and a healthy living environments become reasons the poor fall further behind.
The complexity of the cycle of poverty means that anti-poverty progarmmes or solutions need to be equally complex, since poverty is not just from one cause but many. There is the need to follow steps in order to break the cycle. The following programmes were identified by Brandshaw (2006) as cycle-breaking efforts for alleviating poverty:
(a)Income and economic assets.
(b)Education and skills.
(c)Housing and surrounding (safe, attractive)
(d)Access to health care and other needed services.
(e)Close personal ties, as well as network to others.
(f)Personal resourcefulness and leadership abilities.
A key piece of this comprehensive approach to helping individuals from poverty is that there is no way the government can do all of this for every person without first increasing social capital among communities or subcultures of the poor. Strong interpersonal ties as in villages or organized groups can provide shared assistance that professionals can not. The key is helping groups of poor people build supportive communities with shared trust and mutuality. This program consciously seeks the benefits of building social capital (following Putman 2000) based on ‘affinity groups’ where people share common interests from their ethnicity, religion, family history, living area, or other sources of friendship.
Poverty alleviation programmes should structure their efforts around three focal points for breaking the cycle of poverty. These programme structures, like the cyclical theory itself, combine strategies and tools from response to the other theories of poverty.
1. Comprehensiveness. The first strategy to breaking the cycle of poverty is to develop comprehensive programmes. Comprehensive programmes are ones that include a variety of services and that try to bridge the individual and community needs.
2. Collaboration. The key to executing extensive programmes without becoming too uncontrolled is collaboration among different organizations to provide complementary services so that by their combination of efforts, the output is greater than could be done by each one alone. Collaboration involves networks among participants, though the coordination can vary from formal to informal.
3. Community Organizing. Finally, community organizing is a tool by which local people can participate to understand how their personal lives and the community well being are intertwined. Breaking the cycle of poverty must include individuals to participate as a community in the process, just like individuals create the spiral downward when they and their community interact in a cycle of failure. For the poor, empowerment is central to this issue.
It is interesting that this is the approach to poverty alleviation that is the least commonly described in the poverty literature, but community based examples are what are brought out whenever successes are discussed. There are no comprehensive community based self-sufficiency programmes from the federal government or most states.
3. Appraisal of the Poverty Alleviation Programmes (1999 – 2006)
In 1999 when the Obasanjo administration came to power, it was estimated that more than 70% of Nigerians lived in poverty. That was why, in November 1999, the N470 billion Budget for year 2000 was to relieve poverty. Before the National Assembly even passed the 2000 Budget the government got an approval to commit N10 billion to poverty alleviation programme (Ogwumike, 2001). Poverty alleviation was seen as a means through which the government could reconstruct the economy and rebuild self esteem in majority of Nigerians. Among the poverty alleviation programmes were; the launching of Universal Basic Education (UBE) Programme, the Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP) and the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP).
3.1 The Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP)
This programme was introduced in 2000 to address the problems of rising unemployment and crime rates especially among the youth. The primary objectives of PAP, are as follows;
(a) Reduce the problem of unemployment and hence raise effective demand in the economy.
(b) Increase the productiveness of the economy and
(c) Drastically reduce the embarrassing crime wave in the society.
The targets/components of PAP as identified by Obadan (2001) include the followings;
- Provide jobs for 200,000 unemployed,
- Create a credit delivery system from which farmers will have access to credit facilities
- Increase the adult literacy rate from 51% to 70% by 2003
- Shoot up health care delivery system from its present 40% to 70% by year 2003
- Increase the immunization of children from 40% to 100%
- Raise rural water supply from 30% to 60% and same for rural electrification.
- Embark on training and attainment of at least 60% of tertiary institutions’ graduates and
- Development of simple processes and small scale industries.
Several measures were put forward in order to achieve the above objectives and they include among others; increase in the salary of public workers, rationalization of organizations and methods within the system, particularly that of the existing poverty alleviation institutions, encouraging and rewarding all deserving Nigerians for industry and enterprise, substantial reduction of avenues for easy and illegitimate acquisition of wealth and the launching of the Universal Basic Education Programme.
3.2 Appraisal of Poverty Alleviation Programme (PAP)
Looking carefully at the objectives of PAP, one can deduce that it was designed to touch almost all aspect of poverty ranging from absolute to regional poverty. It was however more specific in curbing unemployment hence raising the income of individuals so that their spending would increase and hence their needs be satisfied. However like in most programmes, PAP was hindered by poor implementation and being short term in nature it lacked continuity. The aim of the programme was defeated as credits given to finance micro enterprises were not utilized by the beneficiaries in such enterprises meaning that the target for employment generation was missed. PAP was also perceived as initiative of the ruling party’s programme and therefore was not given much attention and, in some cases, resisted by chief executives of states controlled by the opposition parties. For example, Obadan (2001) observed that in the year 2000, “there were reports that the Alliance for Democracy (AD) governors of south west zone of the country were apprehensive that the peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the centre might have conceived of the PAP for strategic political gains. Indeed there were allegations of AD governors working against the PAP in order to frustrate the PDP federal government. Despite the problems encountered in the course of implementation of PAP, Oyiza (2003) noted that it has succeeded in providing 82,000 jobs to different kinds of people across the country.
3.3 National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP)
The programme was introduced in 2001. It was aimed at the provision of “strategies for the eradication of absolute poverty in Nigeria” (FRN, 2001) It was complemented by the National Poverty Eradication Council (NAPEC) which was to coordinate the poverty reduction related activities of all the relevant Ministries, Parastatals and Agencies. The council had the mandate to ensure that the wide range of activities were centrally planned, coordinated and complement one another so that the objectives of policy continuity and sustainability were achieved. The poverty reduction related activities of the relevant institutions under NAPEP have been classified into four, namely;
- Youth Empowerment Scheme (YES) which deals with capacity acquisition, mandatory attachment, productivity improvement, credit delivery, technology and development and enterprise promotion.
- Rural Infrastructure Development Scheme (RIDS) this deals with the provision of potable and irrigation water, transport (rural and urban), rural energy and power support
- Social Welfare Service Scheme (SOWESS) this deals with special education, primary healthcare services, establishment and maintenance of recreational centers , public awareness facilities, youth and students hostels development, environmental protection facilities, food security provisions, micro and macro credits delivery, rural telecommunications facilities, provision of mass transit, and maintenance culture.
- Natural Resource Development and Conservation Scheme (NRDCS) this deals with harnessing of agricultural, water, solid mineral resources, conservation of land and space particularly for convenient and effective utilization by small scale operators and the immediate community.
3.4 Appraisal of the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP)
NAPEP was centered on youth empowerment, provision of infrastructures, social welfare scheme and natural resource development/conservation. It was however broad based and encompassing. It tried to adopt the participatory, bottom-up approach in programme implementation and monitoring. However, a critical assessment of NAPEP revealed that it concentrated more on the youth empowerment scheme (YES) neglecting the other mandates; even the YES itself focused more on the disbursement and administration of NAPEP’s vehicle popularly called “KEKE NAPEP” On the issue of natural resource development and conservation scheme, Abdu (2005) observed that less than 20% of the target beneficiaries have benefited through this scheme. This means that NAPEP has not made much impact in harnessing agricultural, water and solid minerals resources and conservation efforts especially in the rural areas where the main occupation is agriculture.
It has also been observed that most of the poor people have not participated in NAPEP’s programmes due to lack of access to social and economic infrastructures provided to improve human capital. By and large the local people were not included in the identification of projects meaning that the ones identified were in most cases, inappropriate and unsustainable. It was also observed by Abdu (2005) that in most localities, the credit facilities and other infrastructures provided by NAPEP were enjoyed by members of the ruling party while those identified as opposition were denied access and did not benefit from the programme thereby remaining in poverty. To crown it all, even where the ruling party loyalist were given the credit facilities, the funds were in many cases utilized for other purposes the result of which was that, in the long run the intended beneficiaries remained poor.
One of the greatest achievements of both PAP and NAPEP was the success of the programmes in providing jobs to a number of youth across the country. Through NAPEP’s Youth Empowerment Scheme, a lot of unemployed youth acquired entrepreneurial and business skills in many areas resulting in the relative increase in their income levels. The Universal Basic Education which is a strategy employed by PAP in increasing literacy rate also made an impact in many communities where classrooms were constructed and learning materials provided for the benefit of the citizens.
However a lot of problems have been encountered in the process of implementing the programmes. These problems includes: lack of involvement (in most cases) of the local people in the identification of projects, administrative and operational problems and above all, the failure in the selection of the target beneficiaries due to political reasons.
3.5 Conclusion and Recommendations
Considering the current poverty incidence in the country, one can conclude that the past poverty alleviation programmes have not achieved much. This is perhaps due to the problems identified as hindering the effective implementation of the programmes. The objectives and mandate of both PAP and NAPEP were aimed at provision of employment and income generation through various activities; however lack of involvement of the target beneficiaries in identifying the right projects coupled with administrative and operational failures were among the problems identified as hindering the achievement of the objectives of the programmes.
There is thus the need for involvement of the local people in the identification and design of projects so that sufficient participation can be achieved. Poverty alleviation programmes should also be designed I such a way as to be sustainable and should be geared towards provision of sustainable employment so that in the long run, their impacts trickle down to the grassroots. In addition, to alleviate poverty effectively, there is the need for the government to supply necessary inputs that can improve people’s livelihood, productivity and increase in their wealth (income). These inputs can be in form of fertilizers, farming machines, seeds, training programmes, skill acquisition programmes, credit facilities and others.
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Instead of people relying mostly on their bill protection insurance in case of unemployment, they should also be united in communicating with their government to address poverty issues.
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