CAN A series of ministerial level meetings and expert groups of Saarc region really help in reducing the pervasive poverty in the region, where over 40 per cent of the people live below the poverty line of a dollar a day?

Can recognition of that unacceptable levels of poverty and preparation of a comprehensive poverty profile of the region help in speeding up poverty alleviation without effective and adequate other measures?

Clearly unless the Saarc states demonstrate firm resolve to combat that poverty and take essential steps on a sustained basis the rich countries will not come up with the kind of large assistance essential to speed up the process, in a world of diminishing external assistance.

The Millennium session of the UN General Assembly set the year 2015 as the deadline for halving the poverty of about 1.2 billion people of the world or one-fifth of the world’s population.

President of the World Bank James Wolfesohn says that goal is difficult but attainable but the progress in that regard is uneven. And now the global recession has hit the poor people of the developing countries harder than those of the rich states.

According to the World Development Indicators 2000 of the World Bank, a sixth of the world’s population-primarily the people of North America, Europe and Japan-received nearly 80 per cent of the world’s income or an average of 70 dollars per head per day in 1998 while 57 per cent of the world’s population in the 62 poorest countries received only 6 per cent of the world income — an average of less than two dollars a per day. That means the people of the rich countries get 34 times more than the income of people of the poorest countries.

In Pakistan itself instead of poverty levels coming down it doubled within a ten-year period in the 1990s — from 18 per cent to 36 to 36 per cent according to official excerpts. And because of the falling per capita income which is now 425 dollars as a result of the poor economic growth and steady devaluation of the rupee, Pakistan is joining the ranks of the poorest countries in the world, cautions the World Bank, from the ranks of the low income countries.

And bad governance is now held as a major reason for poverty. “The performance of successive governments in Pakistan had been disappointing due to bad governance,” says the head of the World Bank in Pakistan, John Wall. And that has increased poverty.

“I am worried about the children of Pakistan. Weaker groups have no voice and no security,” he laments.

And Jorge Braga de Macedo, who heads the Development Centre of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD] in West Paris, says: “Poverty is largely man-made and that means that it can be largely un-man-made.”

In South Asia ordinary men cannot unmake that poverty. The leaders have to do that.Vested interests have to agree to radical changes in production and distribution of incomes. The intelligentsia has to take the lead and be in the vanguard of the struggle.

The Saarc summit at Khathmandu has expressed its firm resolve to combat the problem of poverty with a new sense of urgency by actively promoting the synergetic partnership among national governments, international agencies, private sector and civil society. It reaffirmed its pledge to undertake effective and sustained poverty alleviation programmes through pro-poor growth strategy and social as well as other policy interventions with specific sectoral targets.

The summit also decided on holding a special session on poverty alleviation to the ministerial level to undertake a comprehensive review and evaluation of the state of implementation of the poverty eradication programmes carried out so far and to recommend further concrete measures to enhance effective cooperation in the region to the twelfth Saarc summit in Pakistan. The summit also directed the Council of Ministers to take necessary steps to fully activate the existing three-tier mechanism for poverty alleviation.

The summit also asked its council of ministers to co-ordinate efforts to integrate poverty alleviation programmes into the development strategy of member states. And it agreed to reconstitute the Independent South Asian Commission on Poverty Alleviation with Nepal as convenor and Bangladesh as co-convener, to review progress made in cooperation on poverty reduction and for suggesting appropriate new measures. Sense of urgency has been shown by the summit in asking the Council of Ministers to seek two nominations from each member states for the Commission by the end of this month for the proposed ministerial level meeting in April this year.

A great deal has been said on poverty alleviation in the Kathmandu Declaration, and in fact more space has been given in the declaration to this issue than to any other single issue. But will the political and military decks be cleared well before April for the Council of Ministers to take effective decisions and move quickly? The history of the 16-year-old Saarc is not reassuring in the operational area or converting fine words or pious resolutions into positive action.

The summit has also directed the Council of Ministers to review on a continuous basis the regional poverty profile to be prepared by the secretary general with the assistance of related UN agencies and independent research institutions.

The summit was not wanting in the right words and seeking the right moves. It sought to ensure social stability and protect the vulnerable sections of the people from the adverse impact of globalization and liberalization. The summit also stressed the need to enhance cooperation to create and maintain appropriate safety nets. That would call for radical reorganization of the economy, vast investment in social security measures and well calibrated assistance to the poor, including women.

The summit resolved to actively promote cooperation in the agricultural sectors of the Saarc countries, particularly in the areas of research, extension and adoption. The summit also decided on sustained measures to extend rural micro credit programmes with focus on women and disadvantaged sections of society.

As if all the measures proposed were not adequate to combat poverty, the summit directed the technical committees to identify programmes and activities that impacted on poverty alleviation. It also urged the need to create gainful employment and promote cooperation in vocational training.

The summit wanted exchange of best practices in all areas in the member states so that all will benefit by that. The secretary general has been directed to ensure such exchanges took place on a regular basis gainfully for all.

All that needs to be said has been said and all that needs to be proposed had been proposed. And the most appropriate decisions have been taken and firm directives given to the ministers, officials and experts.

Will the indicated results follow? But similar decisions had been taken in the past too. And Saarc itself means South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation, particularly in the economic sector to benefit its 1.3 billion people out of whom over 500 million are extremely poor. And poverty in these countries has largely been increasing along with the rise in population and below the requisite economic growth and maldistribution of the new incomes.

Above all such cooperation demands free movement of people, ideas and the requisite data. That has not become possible because of the fluctuating tension between India and Pakistan and the dominance of political disputes over other issues or areas of cooperation. And from time to time threat of war between them seems real.

They have not been able to separate economic exchanges from the political relations unlike the Western states and even the Soviet Union and China had done despite the prolonged cold war. Political differences between India and Pakistan creep to all other areas and make them become paralysed. So the Saarc declarations have largely been good paper-work, noted for its fine sentiments rather than harbingers of a better future.

Political disputes dominate the thinking of their leaders and make Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka feel totally disillusioned with Saarc and despair at their meetings. And yet resolutions and fine declarations continue to be adopted as if deeds and great words need not necessarily go together. If SAARC has to succeed and achieve its larger objectives its member states have to reduce their military outlays and divert more of that to poverty alleviation. And they have to improve their governance and come heavily on corruption which wastes a great deal of their resources. Bloated governments have also to give way to effective and less wasteful administrations whose activities are transparent and open to public scrutiny.

Along with that the Saarc budget has to be increased so that it can finance its programmes well and promote greater inter-governmental contacts and cooperation. Without such essential pre-requisites Saarc summits, Ministerial Council sessions and official meetings become more of a ritual with a profusion of pious words which cause more amusement than provide a spur to action.