Living below the Poverty Line (Compassion Article)

Living on a Dollar a Day
In many of the 26 countries where Compassion works, families barely survive on a dollar or two every day. Some may say that it costs so much less to live in those countries, but the reality is that living on a dollar a day simply isn’t enough.

Most people will agree that poverty goes far deeper than just not having enough money. When organisations like UNICEF and the World Bank began to recognise poverty as more than a financial condition, they also began to question absolute poverty standards.

Absolute poverty means that a person's basic survival needs such as food, water and shelter are not being met. As a result, ‘$1 a day’ was chosen by the World Bank as the international poverty line to represent the average poverty lines of the poorest countries. In 2005, this number was revised so that anything under $1.25, which equates to about 75p, a day is considered extreme poverty.

So what does $1 buy?
In Bolivia $1 would buy you about a litre of milk, while in Brazil you could get a kilogram of sugar. In Ecuador you would be able to buy about two kilograms of mangoes and in Peru you would get 10 bananas. In Honduras it would just get you a small box of cereal and in Mexico you could buy 12 ears of corn.

In Thailand you could purchase a small bag of rice for $1 while in Guatemala the same amount would buy you eight eggs. In Uganda $1 would be enough to buy soap for a week while in Rwanda you could get 1.5 kilograms of rice and in Tanzania two loaves of bread.

In Kenya you could buy two heads of cabbage for $1 and in Ghana it would buy you enough clean water to last a family just two days, while in Ethiopia you could purchase two litres of kerosene.

Some of the prices may even sound reasonable, but for families living below the poverty line, that $1 not only has to buy food for the day, it also has to cover all other basic necessities like housing, clothes, education, transport and medical care.

Living below the line
Halima Mshana lives below the poverty line in Tanzania, raising her children singlehandedly. She sells fish at the local market in order to support her family, but the income is meagre and on a good day she makes no more than $3.80. Food costs keep rising and basic staples such as beans now cost $1.15, while a kilogram of rice costs $1.50 and a loaf of bread costs $0.50. Her income simply does not stretch to other necessities such as clothes and transport.

The Borus family in Bangladesh rely on a single income of about $1.45 a day. In a country where a kilogram of rice costs $0.58, school books cost $7.25 and a medical check-up costs $1.45, it is impossible for the family to survive on what they earn.

In Colombia, the Munoz family pays $70 a month to rent their home, as well as another $20 for water, gas and electricity. The school fees for the children cost $20 a month and school supplies are an additional $40. A simple meal for the family costs $5 and they are struggling to survive on the little they have.

The difference
All three families have children who are registered in Compassion-assisted projects, where they receive meals and nutritional supplements, which means that the available income can stretch further for food for the rest of the family.

Assistance with school fees and books for the children also alleviates the burden on the families and means that the parents may have enough to send another sibling to school. The regular check-ups and medical care for the children means that if the children fall ill, they will receive the necessary care without plunging their family into debt.

Every child sponsored through Compassion represents hope to their family. Not only does the support they receive through the project lift some of the burden from their parents, but the skills they learn and the hope they receive enables them to break the cycle of deprivation and help lift their family above the line of poverty.