War against poverty, an ongoing battle
The national hardcore poverty rate in Malaysia dropped from one per cent in 2020 to 0.2 per cent, or 18,445 households, in 2022, as recorded in the 2022 Household Income and Expenditure Survey Report.
The country’s goal of eliminating extreme poverty is getting closer, according to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim, who stated in February that there were no longer any hardcore impoverished families in Kuala Lumpur, Melaka, or Negeri Sembilan, indicating that the three states had achieved 100 per cent success in eliminating extreme poverty.
Nevertheless, Sabah’s hardcore poverty rate was 1.2 per cent, six times higher than the national average of 0.2 per cent. The 2022 Household Income and Expenditure Survey Report revealed that eight Sabah districts had greater rates of hardcore poverty than the national average, with Tongod setting a record high of 5.9 per cent.
To tackle this issue, the Sabah government is leading the way in giving land to agriculture. Presently, 390 impoverished households work on 203.96ha of land spread over eight districts to cultivate plantations. The People’s Income Initiative-Agro-Entrepreneur Initiative (IPR-Intan) is also one example of an integrated agricultural programme that focuses on employment creation in Sabah.
Apart from that, the nation still has poverty, despite the idea of “hardcore poverty eradication”.
Absolute poverty is defined as earning less than RM2,208 per month, while hardcore poverty is defined as those with a monthly income of below RM1,169.
According to Economy Minister Rafizi Ramli, tackling extreme poverty does not implicitly imply a nation’s poverty. On the other hand, this notion is an economic strategy grounded in the real population of extreme poverty in Malaysia.
Rafizi had said that fighting extreme poverty won’t end poverty altogether, and is a relative concept. He noted that for the government, the “occupation” of poverty is removing the number of hard-to-end impoverished families from their poverty status that is recorded annually.
As an illustration, in 2022, there were 18,445 hardcore poor households in the country; however, they were formally removed from this group by the government’s initiative. Meanwhile, almost 80,000 hardcore impoverished households enrolled as eKasih system participants have been removed from the system, as of the end of 2023.
Although poverty persists, the idea of hardcore poverty enables the government to recognise it and support people in need while considering the relative context of poverty. The Main Database System (PADU) is anticipated to be fully upgraded before the numbers for the hardcore poor category are received.
The government’s capacity to precisely gauge the socioeconomic standing of the populace and close the disposable income gap would be improved by PADU.
In this regard, everyone in the nation’s poorest districts would be in favour of any government initiative and support aimed at rescuing them from the impoverishment cycle.
In both rural and urban regions, this endeavour should systematically integrate, and continually incorporate the participation of the business sector, non-governmental organisations, and the local community, in addition to the role played by the government.
With this, the government has reduced the initial goal of eliminating extreme poverty by 2025 in the 12th Malaysia Plan, to this year, and announced RM500 million in the Budget 2024 presentation to fund the People’s Income Initiative (IPR), which aims to end poverty.
Concurrently, the Unity Government allotted RM1.5 billion for projects and initiatives to bring in money for the target group in the Mid-Term Review of the 12MP. The expectation is that this will spur the government machinery, especially state-level organisations, to step up efforts to achieve complete poverty eradication.
Eliminating poverty is a major goal in the pursuit of sustainable development, and even though it might be difficult to eradicate, it can be controlled and limited, with constant cooperation from all parties involved.
Datin Sri Professor Dr Suhaiza Hanim Mohamad Zailani is the Director of the Ungku Aziz Centre for Development Studies, Universiti Malaya.
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