Poverty in Zimbabwe

Introduction

Government of Zimbabwe is earnestly trying to lower the poverty in Zimbabwe by maintaining political and economic stability of the country. Zimbabwe has a lower poverty rate in comparison to other African countries. Rural areas of Zimbabwe are facing more poverty than the urban areas. It is observed that poverty is more prevalent in communal farming areas, low rainfall areas of Matabeleland South, Masvingo, and in Matabeleland North provinces. Furthermore, drought and low asset holdings by the poor made them more prone to food scarcity

Market survey reports uncover that during 1990, almost 25% of Zimbabwean people were poor. This means that they are lacking the power to acquire basic needs like food, clothing, shelter, health, and education. During 90's, seven percent of the Zimbabwean people were very poor, which means that they were deficient to acquire food.

Market analysis report

Market analysis report by World Bank reveals that in 1990, Zimbabwe experienced lower infant mortality rate, higher school registration rate and higher adult literacy rate. After independence, the government of Zimbabwe designed some plans to support smallholders agriculture and gave priority to human resource investment programmes. In the middle of 1980, Zimbabwe experienced enhanced technological advancement and better government services. However, the employment growth was not sufficient enough. However, despite the various family planning activities organized by the Government of Zimbabwe, the population growth was not dropped steadily. It continued to grow by 3% per year.

Inducement and regulative structure: The government of Zimbabwe administered some mechanisms to allocate resources. The government also regulated the selling, leasing of agricultural lands. In recent years, new indigenous enterprises are coming to operate in the market.

Statistical report on poverty in Zimbabwe

Some of the key features of market survey report by World Bank are:

During 1990-91, 25% of the people of Zimbabwe were poor
Poverty is prevalent in rural areas and low rainfall areas of Zimbabwe
Poor people in Zimbabwe have limited power to acquire land, although they are intemperately dependent on agricultural activities for their income.

Poverty reduction strategy

As a part of the poverty reduction strategy, government of Zimbabwe is organizing some plans, which will facilitate the food security, access to water, health, shelter and education. Households are now getting access to land for constructing shelters and producing food for themselves. They are also getting free access to primary education and basic health care programmes. As the components of poverty reduction strategies, World Bank suggest to emphasis on three basic areas, which are reformatory programmes on macroeconomic management, incentive programmes to promote competitiveness of the market and initiating poverty reduction programmes.