The Civil Society Organisations on the Sustainable Development Goal 1 has said poverty is a threat to the collective survival of Ghanaians and want the government to put in place measures to end poverty by 2030.
In a statement to mark World Poverty Day, a day set aside by the United Nations to have global conversations on poverty and its debilitating effects on humanity, the over 60 CSOs of the SDG 1 platform said this year’s celebration on the theme: “Building Forward Together: Ending Persistent Poverty, Respecting all People and our Planet” is more appropriate and reminds the world of its quest to ending poverty by 2030.
The group said although it is a great milestone to have steadily reduced extreme poverty for almost 25 years, the quest to end poverty has suffered its worst setback due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The group noted that despite the efforts of the Government of Ghana to reducing poverty of all forms, Ghana’s multi-dimensional poverty revealed “a lot of our poverty reduction strategies are not adequate.”
“As a platform we collectively agree to the fact that, Ghana is not poor but resource mismanagement, the missing consciousness and measurable outputs of government’s antipoverty programmes have deepened the poverty situation,” the statement said.
The group has, therefore, entreated the Government of Ghana to make deliberate efforts and invest in
• Technical Vocational Education and Training (TVET) which tends to develop more skills, create more jobs, expand businesses, generate more revenue, and reduce poverty.
• enabling business environment and creating favourable conditions for businesses to thrive and develop, which include appropriate tax systems and regimes, efficient management of business red tapes and reforms and nurturing of non-profit organization self-regulatory mechanisms, these collaborative efforts will help reduce poverty.
• Prioritising Social Protection Programmes to reduce Child poverty at both urban and rural societies.
These, the group believe will rapidly scale up social and economic safety net programmes and services, covering the immediate needs of the vulnerable and deprived.
“We further encourage Government to ensure that all anti-poverty programmes have measurable outcomes and investments into poverty driven policies should be increased for the attainment of the UN Agenda 2030 in Ghana,” the statement said.