Poverty reduction (or
poverty alleviation) is any process which seeks to reduce the level of
poverty in a community, or amongst a group of people or countries. Poverty reduction programs may be aimed at economic or non-economic poverty. Some of the popular methods used are
education,
economic development, and
income redistribution. Poverty reduction efforts may also be aimed at removing social and legal barriers to income growth among the poor.
Economists such as Hernando de Soto see improvement in property rights as being instrumental in poverty reduction. Other economists also highlight government corruption as a chief problem in reducing poverty in the developing world.
Since the second half of the Twentieth Century, governmental and non-government organisations have proposed or attempted to reduce global poverty through a number of strategies. As global poverty has such detrimental effects upon societies and communities, the relative merits of these strategies remain source of great controversy.
What could broadly be called free market reforms represent one strategy for reducing poverty. For example, noted reductions in poverty in the 20th century have been in India and China, where hundreds of millions of people in the two countries grew out of poverty, mostly as a result of the abandonment of collective farming in China and the cutting of government red tape in India.[1] This was critical in fostering their dramatic economic growth. However, UN economists argue that for the market reforms to work, good infrastructure is needed. China is thus willing to invest in railways, roads, ports and rural telephony in various African countries as part of its winning formula for economic development, which was something that was considered too risky by many of Africa's traditional Western partners.[2]
