Strategy Paper on Poverty Eradication Government of Andhra Pradesh Vision 2020 envisages that by the year 2020, people of Andhra Pradesh will all have tremendous opportunities to achieve prosperity and well being and enjoy a high quality of life. Every individual will be able to lead a comfortable life, filled with opportunities to learn, develop skills and earn a livelihood. Poverty will have been eradicated and current inequalities will have disappeared. Women, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, backward classes and minorities will be empowered and the rights of the child protected, while the old, infirm and the disabled will be able to lead a secure and dignified life. Longevity in the State will rise to 69 years (from 62.6), infant mortality will be reduced to 10 (from 66 per thousand live births), almost every person will be literate, every child will go to school, and every one will have the opportunity to grow to his full potential Current Status The present conditions are far from this vision though we have achieved a great amount of progress in many aspects of quality of life. Longevity has risen from 45 to 62.6 between the 1960s and 1990s. The number of deaths per thousand population has been reduced from 15.8 to 8.3 between 1970s and 1990s. Infant Mortality rate has been halved between the mid 1970s to the mid 1990s (from 123 to 63). This improvement in the quality of life has not been even across the sections of people: the poor are behind the rest. Among the poor, the quality life is particularly low for the vulnerable sections such as scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, women and children. The proportion of poor people in the State has declined from 49 percent to 30 percent between 1973-74 and 1993-94 according to the State Government’s estimates. Relative deprivation and under development is adverse if we consider non-income indicators like literacy and infant mortality. While the literacy rate was 21.19% in 1961, it had increased to 44.09% in 1991 and in the latest national sample survey (53rd round) conducted in 1997 the literacy rate was 54%. Female literacy rate has increased from 12.3% in 1961 to 43% in 1997. The drop out rates at primary stage of education have been steadily going down but the number of children dropping out of the system is still quite high. Out of every hundred children enrolled in Class-I, only 60 are completing Class-V and only 42 are going on to complete Class-VII. The drop out rate is higher in the case of girls as compared to boys. The drop out rates among S.Cs. & S.Ts. are coming down over the years but only 32% Scheduled Caste children and 18% of Scheduled Tribe children are able to complete Class VII. Today there are an estimated 180 lakh illiterates in the age group of 15-50 years and 109 lakh adult illiterates in the 15-35 years age group. The poor education indicators are of serious concern, as the poor will find it difficult to meet the skill requirements of jobs being created in the non-farm economy in the future. There have been steadfast efforts at reduction of poverty and improvement in the quality of life of the people of the State. Human Resource Development Programmes for provision of safe drinking water, environmental sanitation and expansion of medical and health facilities have contributed to substantial improvements in the health conditions of the people. Children immunised has risen from 54% to 65% between 1992-93 and 1998- 99. The Integrated Child Development Scheme, implemented in 251 of the 330 erstwhile Blocks in the State provides nutrition support to children and their mothers during pregnancy and lactation, facilitates enrollment of children in schools, health awareness and livelihood skills to women and adolescent girls. The program covers 6.82 lakh women and 29 lakh children. This has contributed significantly to the sharp reduction of infant mortality and in the number of children suffering severe malnutrition. The maternal mortality has declined from 3.8 in 1993 to 1.54 in 1997-98. Crude Birth Rate has reduced from 24.1 to 22.3 per 1000. Total Fertility Rate has reduced from 2.6 to 2.5 per women. Out of the 69,732 rural habitations with a population of 534 lakhs, 55472 habitations with a population of 384 lakhs have been provided with safe drinking water facilities. All the 109 Municipalities and 6 Municipal Corporations have piped water supply with a per day per capita supply of 19 gallons as against the national norm of 22 to 30 gallons per day. In order to augment water supply in the municipal towns 53 water supply improvement schemes have recently been taken up and 37 completed; with the completion of the rest, the situation is expected to improve substantially. Housing for the poor has been an important programme and nearly 35 lakh houses for the poor have been built in the sixteen years ending 1998-99. In the past four years the number of dwelling units built has gone up to 3.5 lakhs per year. A major initiative of the State to improve the nutrition status of the poor is the Subsidised Rice Scheme. This scheme covers 113 lakh families for whom 20 kgs of Rice is supplied at a highly subsidised rate for which the State government spends about Rs 1000 crores per year. School facilities have been substantially enhanced and the enrollment of children in primary schools has risen from 73 lakhs to 91 lakhs between 1989-90 and 1999-2000. One lakh additional teachers have been added to the system in the last four years and 50,000 vidya volunteers are being deployed for mobilizing, enrolling and retaining children in schools. Self employment programmes To provide tangible income earning assets and skills 8.40 lakh families have been assisted since 1995-96 under IRDP/SGSY. 48 lakh poor women are accessing self-employment opportunities through DWCRA program. 33,000 CMEY groups are assisted to access self employement opportunities since 1996 with an investment of Rs 342 crores. Training cum Technology Development Centers (TTDCs) in the districts will build the technical and managerial capacities of the poor for undertaking self-employment activities. Wage employment programs While Employment Assurance Scheme is providing direct wage employment to the rural poor during the lean season, programs such as watershed development, Joint Forest Management Program (JFM) have enhanced the wage employment opportunities of the rural poor through out the year The Swarna Jayanti Shahari Rozgar Yojana brings all the ongoing programmes into a single integrated project with participation of the urban poor. It is applicable to all urban towns (7 Municipal Corporations and 109 Municipalities in the State) on a whole town basis. It has four components: Urban Self Employment Programme, Urban Wage Employment Programme, Urban Training Programme, Development of Women and Children in Urban Areas. It is implemented through community-based organisations in a three-tier system consisting of Neighbourhood Groups, Neighbourhood Committees and Community Development Societies. Over 41 thousand Neighborhood groups, 4415 Neighbourhood Committees and 143 Community Development Societies have been facilitated to come into being and have taken up works. Mission based approach to employment generation The Government of AP have established Employment Generation Mission to coordinate activities of all the concerned departments in employment generation and manpower planning. The Mission will prepare a time bound action plan for implementation. The Government will act as facilitator and would identify and prioritise key sectors with employment potential and ensure successful implementation. Natural Resource Management Sustained improvement in the quality of life, especially for the rural poor, depends on efficient management and renewal of natural resources. Watershed programs can be successful in harmonizing the use of water, soil, forest and pasture resources, particularly in the rain-fed areas of the state to raise agricultural productivity. Consequently, they offer a sustainable opportunity to increase growth and reduce poverty. 5472 watersheds covering an area of 27.6 lakh hectares with an investment of Rs.580 crores using participatory approaches have been taken up. Over two lakh hectares of wastelands are being treated under the Integrated Wastelands Development Programme. Forest protection and management have been taken up through the Joint Forest Management. Over 13.5 lakh people including 6 lakh women in Vana Samrakshana Samities manage 16.32 lakh hectares of degraded forests in the State. Irrigation water management has been entrusted to statutorily constituted 10,400 Water Users Associations to ensure efficient and equitable management of this high cost and scarce resource. Empowerment of poor women Self Help Groups of Women (thrift groups) programme has mobilized and organized 48 lakh poor women in the rural areas into 3.7 lakh groups. These women groups have built up a corpus fund of Rs 750 crores consisting of their savings, borrowings from banks and DWCRA revolving fund from government. The empowerment process has enabled the members of DWCRA and thrift groups in addressing poverty in all it’s dimensions. DWCRA movement has contributed to the augmentation of incomes, improvement of nutrition, better child care of the poor women and enhanced the status of women in rural households. A similar programme for the urban areas has now been started under the name of Development of Women and Children in Urban Areas (DWCUA). 5523 DWCUA groups have been formed and developed in urban areas. The Girl Child Protection Scheme endows around Rs 5000 on eligible new born girl child for pursuing education till the age of 20 along with a lumpsum amount of Rs.20,000 for self employment. The budget provides Rs 25 crores for the scheme, which will cover 50 thousand girl children born during the year. Since its inception in 1996-97 nearly 2.5 lakh girl children have been covered in this scheme. Janmabhoomi campaign Janmabhoomi campaign has given an opportunity to the poor to articulate their concerns and demand their rights and entitlements. The campaign has provided forum for identification of beneficiaries for many anti-poverty program, rendering the process more transparent. It has enhanced the accountability of the government functionaries and local bodies to the people in general and the poor in particular. State Government’s Strategy for poverty eradication The poverty eradication strategy proposed herein is designed to operationalise Vision 2020 goals in this respect. The Government of AP is committed to eradicate poverty in all it’s dimensions among all sections of the people through promoting growth, especially of such sectors, which will expand opportunities for the poor and build their human capital to enable them to participate effectively in the growth process. The government will follow empowerment approach to poverty reduction by facilitating the process of social mobilization. Strengthening the abilities of the poor to fight poverty and expanding their asset base will underpin the strategy for poverty eradication. Elements of the strategy for poverty eradication Poverty is multi-dimensional. The Government will adopt a multifold strategy to eradicate poverty. The following are the key elements of the strategy. These elements of the strategy are interlinked, and build on each other. 1. Pursuit of rapid economic growth, 2. Promotion of human development 3. Enhancing social capital of the poor by fostering organizations of the poor and their capacity building 4. Promotion of sustainable livelihoods of the poor 5. Focus on backward mandals and the poorest of the poor 6. Re-designing the administrative delivery machinery 1. Pursuit of rapid economic growth 1.1 Economic growth Past experience shows that poverty cannot be treated by itself. For instance a great effort at poverty reduction could be nullified through inflation caused by poor management of the monetary system and fiscal deficits. In general poverty reduction can be sustained only through economic growth. Experience in many countries of the world shows that a high rate of economic growth is the engine of poverty reduction. Economic growth enhances opportunities for employment and higher incomes. 1.2 Pro-poor growth The Government is convinced that economic growth though essential for poverty reduction is not enough. The government’s approach to growth is based on the premise that more equal societies are more efficient transformers of growth into fast poverty reduction. Growth must be pro-poor, expanding the opportunities and life choices of poor people. Hence the government is committed to raise the rate of reduction of poverty through growth by choosing patterns of growth that are pro-poor and employment intensive by focusing on rural growth, by integrating with emerging technological developments. 1.3 Rural growth It has been the experience that rural growth reduces poverty faster in both rural and urban areas. This is because rural growth not only enhances supplies of raw material but also widely augments purchasing power, which supports urban manufacture and employment. Rural prosperity increases demand for construction materials, cycles and mopeds, transistor radios and batteries, soaps and cosmetics and processed foods like pasteurized milk and biscuits and a wide variety of other goods and services. Hence, government will focus on employment intensive sectors such as irrigation, agriculture and agro processing. 1.4 Irrigation Irrigation raises agricultural output, and intensity of cropping thus raising demand for labour and agricultural wages. Indian experience and experience in Andhra Pradesh have shown that poverty is far less in irrigated areas than in areas without irrigation. Government will therefore augment public investments in irrigation, particularly in backward areas. 1.5 Agriculture International experience shows that it is rural and agricultural growth that brings sharp decline in poverty. Vision 2020 envisages that by 2020 Andhra Pradesh will be a powerhouse of Indian agriculture by harnessing water resources, developing agriculture in rainfed areas and reforming policy to stimulate growth. While the vision 2020 document envisaged agriculture growing at 6% per annum, the trend of rate of growth has been very modest over the past two decades. Fostering conditions for agricultural growth in the rural areas has to be a central pillar of the overall strategy for poverty reduction. Agro-processing enhances value of agricultural products and increases employment and incomes in rural areas apart from enhancing the quality of output for the consumers, rural or urban. It enhances export opportunities and values for agricultural products and enables access to the tremendous international market opportunities for our agriculture. It promotes faster growth of employment outside agriculture on which an unsustainable proportion of rural population is now dependent. Government will promote these activities aggressively. The prospects for poultry, fisheries, dairying and horticulture remain robust in Andhra Pradesh. These sub-sectors are growing at about 4 to 6 times the growth rates compared to growth registered in the food grain sector. With rising per capita incomes in the country and increasing liberalization of world agrocommodities, there is even greater scope for the development of these components, which can help pull up the overall growth in agriculture, which would have significant impact on the reduction of rural poverty. 1.6 Employment potential in service sector The service sector in the state accounts for nearly 43% of GSDP and employs 20% of workforce. The service sector will need to expand at almost 16 times it’s current size and grow at the rate of 12% a year. This sector is expected to be a major generator of new jobs, especially in rural areas. In rural and semi rural areas small-scale service segment is expected to provide significant employment opportunities in higher value-added jobs. The growth of this sector will enable occupational shift and productive employment of AP’s large number of agriculture labour, women, youth and artisans. Hence the Government will focus on developing services sector as a critical aspect of realizing its growth aspirations. It is expected that about 40 lakhs jobs will be created in service sector by 2005. This will be accomplished by skill development, provision of micro-credit and conducive policy environment to boost the service sector. Most poor women and youth will take advantage of SHG movement to set up viable self-employment ventures, to earn additional income. Corporate private sector will be involved for enhancing marketing opportunities through partnership models, establishing marketing platforms, access to modern technologies and tools, value addition to products, packaging, branding and increased marketing opportunities. 1.7 Rural infrastructure Infrastructure gaps are holding back investments and growth in both rural and urban areas. Government will therefore increase its own and promote private investments in infrastructure, especially in rural areas. Electrification of rural habitations and enhancing the quality of power supplied (assurance of supply on demand, voltage stability) will contribute substantially to the diversification of the rural economy and enhancement of the quantity and variety of outputs. It leads to growth of non-farm employment opportunities. It will change and enhance the quality of rural life increasing access to education and health. Lack of transport facilities limits marketability and augmentation of incomes and employment. Rural connectivity will raise access to markets for rural products. All habitations will be connected to the nearest market centers to enhance such opportunities for rural output. Since 1995-96, Rural infrastructure development fund (RIDF) of NABARD has strengthened rural infrastructure at an estiamated cost of Rs 1961 crores in our state. 1.8 Information technologies The emerging Information Technology (IT) has tremendous potential to bring about transformation in the rural and urban areas. IT has great potential for use in raising literacy levels, improving the quality and reach of teaching for primary and secondary schools, awareness building on hygiene, nutrition, reproductive health and communicable and other diseases. The government would focus on the interventions to enable the poor access tremendous employment opportunities emerging in this sector. 1.9 Private capital investments Private capital investments accelerate economic growth by mobilizing domestic household and international savings and generating output, employment and incomes. A predictable and stable environment of encouragement, expansion of infrastructure and liberalised markets facilitate growth of private investments. Government will use fiscal and other incentives to channel private capital into pro-poor investments. There can be no greater attraction to profit driven private capital than the gigantic market of the poor in the State. 2. Promotion of human development 2.1 Human development and growth Rapid improvements in human capabilities and economic growth can be mutually reinforcing, when a good share of resource generated by growth are channeled to human development. When pattern of growth generates demand for increasing skills, a virtuous spiral of growth and human development results in reduction of poverty. The first step in generating a growth spiral is the provision of basic minimum services to all citizens, especially the poor, women and the weaker sections. These basic minimum services have been identified as education, health, nutrition, safe drinking water, sanitation, housing, and rural connectivity. These ensure improvement in human development and access to markets, which are the passport out of poverty into a comfortable and qualitative life. Empirical evidence suggests that access to, and performance in, basic health and education have the most dramatic effect on poor children’s chance to escape from poverty. It has catalytic role for those who are most likely to be poor: women, weaker sections, and people living in rural communities. Health and education can be expected to lead to increased earning potential and improved labour mobility. The skills being provided for the poor should be based on demand for them in the open market; a match between skill supply and demand is of importance. 2.2 Education In consonance with the goal and objectives envisaged in Vision 2020, its commitment to the childs right to education, the Andhra Pradesh agenda for education as articulated in the government’s strategy paper on education has the following objectives and the pursuit of the same will have significant impact on the poverty situation in the state. • Andhra Pradesh will not be just a literate but a knowledge society capable of meeting the challenges of 21st century and to provide avenues to every person to realise his or her full potential through access to educational opportunities regardless of the class or region to which he or she belongs. • Government of Andhra Pradesh is committed to take decisive action on all fronts – legislative, administrative and socio-economic – to put a complete halt to the exploitative and shameful process of child labour within a definite time frame of 5 years. Andhra Pradesh will be free from child labour before 2005. • The primary goal would be to improve overall literacy levels from the current 54% of the population to over 95% by 2005. It will mean achieving universalisation of enrolment, retention, adult education with a special emphasis and focussed strategies to improve literacy and achievement levels in the groups with traditionally low levels i.e., rural women, minorities, scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, backward classes, child labour, girlchild particularly muslim girl child and the population of identified backward areas. • Andhra Pradesh will meet the challenges of the 21st century for providing knowledge based and skilled manpower with reference to emerging areas of manpower requirement by including IT Education in School curriculum and reorienting the Secondary Education to also incorporate vocational education. • With a decentralised, simple, moral, accountable, responsive and transparent (SMART) governance, Andhra Pradesh will move towards participatory management by the parents and local communities as partners in improving access, quality of education and overall management of education. 2.3 Health The government’s commitment to improve the quality of life of the poor is reflected in the government’s strategy paper on health where it is stated that; every person will have access to responsive basic health care and specialized health care at affordable prices. Women will have safe and successful pregnancies. Infant child mortality due to ailments like Accute Respiratory Infection (ARI) and Diarrhea will be reduced drastically. Spread of AIDs will be contained. Communicable diseases like Gastro Enteritis (GE), Malaria and TB will be effectively prevented. Families will be small and better spaced. Life expectancy will reach 68 for males and 70.6 for females. 3. Enhancing Social Capital of the Poor 3.1 Social mobilization of the poor Social mobilization enables the poor to build their organizations (Self Help Groups) at grassroots level, in which they participate fully and directly and take decisions on all the issues concerning poverty. The government will foster mobilization and organizations of the poor and empower them to address various issues concerning poverty. The ongoing efforts in facilitating the formation and development of the Self Help Groups of the poor, especially DWCRA groups in the rural areas, DWCUA groups in the urban areas, mothers committees, school education committees, watershed committees, vanasamrakshan samithies and CMEY groups would be sustained. Through these Self Help Groups, the poor are able to harness their potential, prioritise their needs, design and implement developmental initiatives. The government would pursue policies to SHG movement & their participation in the programmes critical to poverty eradication. 3.2 Organisation building With the Self Help Groups as the building blocks, the community based organsations(CBOs) of the poor are emerging at habitation, cluster and mandal level. The government would encourage this process, so that the poor would be able to articulate their demands effectively and manage the developmental initiative professionally. The government would facilitate development of selfmanaged, self-reliant and vibrant organizations of the poor, at village, mandal and district level such as Mutually aided cooperatives societies (MACS) of women being formed at mandal level in many districts. 3.3 Capacity building of the SHGs and their federations Capacity building of the SHGs and their federations will be given adequate attention. The government would develop state level, district and mandal level training capabilities so that the capacity building of the members of the organization is taken up depending on the need and the demand of the groups. The government would put in position an effective mechanism to regularly undertake the rating of the groups so that developmental inputs can be targeted in a more transparent way. The organizations of the poor, being participatory bodies will forge harmonious partnership with the representative bodies such as Grampanchayats and Mandal parishads and Municipal bodies. 4. Promote sustainable livelihoods of the poor The growth impulses in the economy should focus on generating sustainable livelihood opportunities for the poor. This can come through natural resource regeneration such as watershed and wasteland development. These protect the poor communities from adverse climatic conditions such as droughts, erratic distribution of rainfall and excess rainfall, enhance their opportunities for employment and incomes. An important concern in watershed development is the equitable distribution of the benefits of land and water resources development and the consequent biomass production. Public investment of a large magnitude is being made in both private lands and in common public property. Therefore the right of each individual in the village to an equitable share of the common lands, forest and water resources of the village regardless of his individual private land holding would be recognised and addressed through effective means. The support for micro-watershed development will be routed through the SHGs of the poor to ensure that the works taken up are demand driven and based on their felt needs, thereby ensuring better targeting of the interventions in favour of the poor. Promotion of rapid rural growth in drought-prone and rain fed areas of the state is another important means of enhancing the livelihood opportunities to the poor. Towards this end government will promote horticulture, forestry and livestock in these areas. A 10-year (1998-2007) action plan aimed at treating 10 million hectares of wastelands/degraded lands and degraded reserve forests using participatory processes has been initiated in the state. So far about 3 million hectares is being treated. The Government has recently embarked on a program A.P Rural livelihoods project, in five districts (Anantapur, Kurnool, Mehbubnagar, Prakasam and Nalgonds), with the financial support of Department for International Development (DFID), Government of United Kingdom, at a cost of over Rs 307 crores. This program addresses the issue of sustainable rural livelihoods in a framework of employment, and better conditions of living for the poor and conservation of natural resources. It provides support for strengthening participatory processes and providing sustained capacity building for the community-based organizations involved in watershed management. Andhra Pradesh has taken bold steps to demonstrate that a convergence of conservation and development objectives can be achieved through Joint Forest Management (JFM). Pursuing one of the most proactive JFM programs in India, the State has committed to the user groups, 100% of usufruct forest produce secured from the area entrusted to the JFM committees. Widespread implementation of JFM is leading to an increased flow (both value and volume) of forest products to communities and an increase in environmental benefits resulting from improved forest condition (principally with respect to soil and water regimes). Formation of JFM Committees in Andhra Pradesh has successfully targeted remote and under-served communities, in particular tribal populations. Government is committed to ensure the success and spread of this process. 5. Focus on the backward mandals and the poorest of the poor The level of development is not even in different areas of the state and poverty tends to be more intense in the less developed areas. Lack of basic minimum services like education, health, drinking water, nutrition, and housing is primarily responsible for backwardness of the areas. Backwardness is also caused due to the lack of basic infrastructure such as roads, irrigation, and electricity. Lack of adequate employment has also contributed to low income and poverty in the backward areas. Therefore government will adopt a three-pronged strategy of providing basic minimum services, improving infrastructure and creating opportunities for sustainable employment. The focus will be on bringing the level of development in the backward areas on par with the rest of the state during next five years. The growth engines under vision 2020 will be chosen to maximize the potential of each region. The Government will select a set of parameters for ranking the mandals by their development through wide consultations and identify backward mandals. There will be sharper focus for accelerated development and poverty eradication in these mandals. The Governement would also identify poorest of the poor families whose annual income is less that Rs 6000 and ensure convergence of all anti-poverty programs and area development programs so that these families can come out of poverty and secure access to sustainable livelihoods in a time bound manner. 6. Redesigning the administrative delivery mechanism All the departments of the government will be sensititve to the issues concerning poverty and poverty eradication shall become the priority. The departments would be reoriented to look at development as an opportunity to bring changes in the lives of the poor. Each department would be mandated to articulate clearly as how the departments programs address the poverty. Transparency and accountability will become the hallmark of the government’s interface with the people, especially the poor. The departments would revisit the procedures, processes and guidelines and make necessary changes to give space for participation of the poor through SHGs in designing, prioritizing, implementing and monitoring their developmental programs. Resource mobilization The government have mobilized resources from World Bank to support rural component of Velugu (APDPIP) which aims at poverty eradication in 6 backward districts of AP at an outlay of Rs 600 crores. Another Poverty reduction Project to cover about 500 backward mandals in the state at an outlay of Rs 2000 crores is being appraised by the World Bank. Considering the inadequacies in the past developmental strategies in reaching the poorest of the poor, these two projects are mandated to focus on the poorest of the poor, who have been left out of various development initiatives. The urban component of ‘Velugu’, the AP Urban Services for the Poor programme supported by DFID is under implementation in 32 Municipal towns, with an estimated cost of Rs 745 crores. The project aims at improvement of municipal management including support for municipal finances, improved environmental services (drinking water, sanitation, etc) and enhancing community participation in management of municipal development. The Government would put in all the concerted efforts to assist 40 lakh poor families in the state to come out of income poverty in next 5 years. These families will also be assisted to secure minimum living standards during the same period. Poverty Eradication Mission Government have constituted the Poverty Eradication Mission to advise it on the policies and programmes to be taken to speedily achieve the Vision 2020 goals in this respect, to promote convergence of all related activities, to identify and recommend best practices from national and international experience and to monitor the performance. The Mission will provide a platform for advocacy for the cause of the poor. The government is convinced that poverty is no longer inevitable. The state has material and natural resources, the know-how and the determined people to make a poverty-free state. It is with this conviction the government is channelising all its resources to make Andhra Pradesh, a poverty-free state.
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