THE CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS OF POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROGRAMMES
ABSTRACT
There has been a high and
growing incidence of
poverty in Lagos State in
the last two decades.
Overtime, what can be
discerned in the various
approaches to poverty alleviation in Lagos State is that the State is determined largely by making a choice between
growth promoting policies and poverty focused strategies. The reality however is that, the two approaches are not
after all mutually exclusive. They are complementary to the extent that the former serve only as a long term the latter
constitute an immediate and direct shot at the poverty itself.
This research work is designed to examine clearly the challenges and prospects of poverty alleviation programmes in
Lagos State. Ikeja local Government was the case study. The various definitions and categories of poverty, causes of
poverty, profile of poverty in Nigeria and programmes in Nigeria among others were discussed.Moreover, through the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) software, all data collected through the
questionnaire were analyzed; and, Chi-Square was used to test for the entire three hypotheses. At the end of the
analysis of findings, policy recommendations were made towards effectiveness in State Government effort in alleviating poverty in Lagos State.
CHAPTER ONE
1.1 Introduction
The rising profile of poverty in Nigeria is assuming a worrisome dimension as empiricalstudies had shown. Nigeria, a
sub-saharan African country, has at least half of its population living in abject poverty according to Ojo, 2008 Similarly,
the publication of the Federal Office of Statistics (1996) reveals that poverty has been massive, pervasive and engulfs
a large proportion of the Nigerian society. Abiola and Olaope 2008) also state that, the scourge of poverty in Nigeria
is an incontrovertible fact, which results in hunger, ignorance, malnutrition, disease, unemployment, poor access
to credit facilities and low life expectancy.
Nwaobi (2003) in his opinion asserts that Nigeria presents a paradox in which the country is rich, but the people are
poor, As noted by Omotola (2008), Nigeria is richly endowed and the country’s wealth potentials manifests in the form
of natural, geographical and socio-economic factors, With this condition, Nigeria should rank among the richest
countries of the world that should have no business with extreme poverty. However, Ope and Abu (2009) specifically
remark that Nigeria has witnessed a monumental increase in the level of poverty. According to them, the poverty
stood at 74.2%in the year 2000.
Looking at the records from the Federal Office of Statistics as documented by Garba (2006), it reveals that about 15%
of the Nigerian population was poor in 1960 but the figure rose to 28% in 1980 and by 1996, the incident of poverty in
Nigeria was 76.6million people. In the present decade, the issue of poverty alleviation is once again back in the
international limelight. To the Intertional Labour Organization (ILO), poverty is not a new agenda. Since1944, the ILO
has held fast to its declaration that “poverty anywhere is a threat to prosperity everywhere” stressing the importance
of poverty alleviation to the world attention. A number of other international bodies are now paying much more
attention poverty, for instance the World Bank.
The Inter-American Development Bank has intact actually adopted a policy that half of its loans have to contribute
directly to poverty reduction. The recent of Non- Governmental Organizations (NGOs) constitutes a yet more the
poverty alleviation campaign in most developing countries lately. Against the background of Economic Adjustment
Policy which is largely growth a need to have a thorough examination of various challenges experienced so far in alleviating poverty for a better futuristic approach to be put in place.
THE CHALLENGES AND PROSPECTS OF POVERTY ALLEVIATION PROGRAMMES