the efficiency of poverty

Over a billion people currently live below the poverty line, earning less than R.S 100 a day. At the Earth Institute, researchers take a “human needs” approach and look at the root causes of extreme poverty, thinking beyond money to ask whether people have the basics they need for economic growth.

Researchers, scientists and development practitioners work together to fight global poverty by addressing its multifaceted causes: hunger and malnutrition, inadequate access to health care and education, lack of safe drinking water and sanitation, energy problems, trade barriers, and gender inequality.

While on the surface poverty is often defined as a lack of income or assets, in the day-to-day lives of the very poor, poverty becomes a network of disadvantages, each one exacerbating the others. The result is generation after generation of people who lack access to education, health care, adequate housing, proper sanitation and good nutrition. They are the most vulnerable to disasters, armed conflict and systems of political and economic oppression and they are powerless to improve their circumstances. These conditions often carry with them dysfunctional family and societal relationships, paralyzingly low self-esteem, and spiritual darkness. Poverty is a lack of hope.
It's clear that handouts and traditional aid are not enough to solve the problem of poverty and its many entanglements. EndPoverty.org seeks to equip the poor to free themselves from poverty in a holistic way.