Blog Action Day 2008: Poverty

If you’re reading this article, you have most likely never experience poverty. The Oxford dictionary defines poverty as, “the state of being extremely poor.” My definition of poverty is, “a condition in which you cannot afford the basic necessities to live.” Almost the same, but Oxford doesn’t define the effects of what poverty does to a person.

It’s a saddening thing in this world, but it’s all around us and most ignore it. The homeless guy on the street corner, the kid who can’t read or write, the family that is heading for eviction, they are all victims of poverty. The worst poverty statistics, however, deal with the children, and being a teen myself, I can’t imagine living in poverty compared to my lifestyle. It’s rather “posh” compared to the horrible living situations compared to what some children have to deal with. Listen to a few statistics from GlobalIssues.org:

Number of children in the world
2.2 billion

Number in poverty
1 billion (every second child)

Shelter, safe water and health

For the 1.9 billion children from the developing world, there are:

* 640 million without adequate shelter (1 in 3)
* 400 million with no access to safe water (1 in 5)
* 270 million with no access to health services (1 in 7)

Children out of education worldwide
121 million

Every other kid is living in poverty. Not just in African countries, as commonly thought, but all around the world. The fact that 1 in 3 kids don’t have adequate shelter or 1 in 5 don’t have access to safe water or even health services is outrageous! Organizations like UNICEF are trying their best to do as much as possible, but it only goes so far.

So what can you do?

For starters, you can get a few ideas from this gigantic list put together at BlogActionDay.org. A few that I want to reinforce…

• Donate: Either time or money. Both are extremely valuable to organizations.

• Don’t waste: Starbucks is great (seriously, it’s AMAZING), but perhaps take just a few days off and put that towards a donation to an organization.
• Educate: Why do you think I’m writing this blog post? Spreading the word of how awful poverty is can only further its awareness throughout the community and cause somebody to take action because even if only one person takes action, that person can do wonders.

The world can be a better place. You just have to take part in it.