DIARY NOTE:

What: Eradication of Poverty Day
When: 17 October 2006
Who: ChildFund NZ

Every three seconds poverty takes the life of a child

Tomorrow is International Day for the Eradication of Poverty – a day to highlight the impact of poverty on families and communities across the globe. It is well known that where there is poverty, it is often children who suffer the most. Poverty leaves children vulnerable to hunger, malnutrition, exploitation, and preventable diseases that most of us would not consider life threatening (such as diarrhoea and respiratory infections).

ChildFund New Zealand is marking the Eradication of Poverty Day by imploring the New Zealand government to honour its 1970 commitment to the United Nations to give 0.7% of Gross National Income to overseas aid by 2015. National Director Paul Brown says, “Our government cannot stand by and let 10 million children die a year without setting a timetable to fulfil this commitment.”

Key facts about global poverty:

- More than 10 million children die of hunger and preventable diseases every year – that’s 30,000 children dying a day, one every three seconds.

- 600 million children worldwide live in absolute poverty.

- For more than 850 million people world wide there is never enough food.

- Thanks to the efforts of aid organisations around the world, the proportion of the developing world’s population living in extreme poverty has declined from 28 to 19 per cent, but poverty is on the increase in sub-Saharan Africa.

- One of the world’s ‘Millenium Development Goals’ is to halve the number of people whose income is less than $1 a day by 2015.

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Please see below for a snapshot of ChildFund’s work in the area of
poverty eradication
Living for the future

The eradication of poverty is not just about providing short term emergency aid. ChildFund works with communities in more than 54 countries all over the world, supporting locally-led initiatives that strengthen communities, helping them overcome poverty and protect their children. It is about empowering communities to live not just for today, but for the future.

Snapshot One - from Zambia

Medium Goma is a 42-year-old disabled widow from Zambia. As the mother of two teenage children and eight other orphaned children, plus her elderly mother, she has struggled to find the means to feed her family of 12 on a daily basis. Her only way of making an income was to work in other people’s fields.

Medium was lucky – she had the opportunity of attending a tie-dye business course through the Zambia National Association for the Disabled. However, she needed seeding money to be able to set up a business and put her new skills to good use.

Eighteen months ago ChildFund gave Medium US $130 to help her buy cloth, dye and other materials needed to set up her own tie-dye business. With the simple donation of funds to help her buy the basics, Medium has been able to set up and run a successful business, earning enough money to buy food for her family, school uniforms for the children and medical care.

Snapshot Two - from Liberia

Over 14 years more than a third of Liberia’s population have been forced to leave their homes to escape rebels terrorising the countryside. When families have returned, they have had to start from scratch – with no food, no animals, no seed and no means to make a living.

ChildFund has been actively involved with Liberian communities giving them the means to begin farming, establishing clean water supplies and constructing simple hygiene facilities such as latrine blocks.

As a result of ChildFund’s activities in Liberia:
- More than 200 sheep & goats have been distributed in 33 communities
- 3,500 farmers have received seed rice and vegetable seeds
- 100 new wells and 20 latrines have been established
- 3 bridges have been constructed

Kiwis who want to make a real difference to the lives of children in need by supporting ChildFund’s work are invited to mark International Eradication of Poverty Day today by making a donation. Please call 0800 223 111 or visiting www.childfund.org.nz to donate on line.

ENDS

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