‘Governance key to ending poverty’

THE key to turning around Africa’s extreme poverty could be better governance‚ before tackling communicable diseases and improving sanitation.

This is according to a research paper‚ titled “Unlocking Africa’s potential: The relationship between effective governance and poverty”‚ launched by the Institute of Security Studies in Pretoria yesterday.

The authors, Ciara Aucoin and Zachary Donnenfeld, found that upping effective governance in Africa just modestly could lift at least 60 million people out of poverty by 2050.

“Improving governance has a profound effect on one of the continent’s gravest challenges: extreme poverty‚” they say.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to more people living in extreme poverty than those in any other region in the world.

The research compared the impact of effective governance‚ the improvement of access to universal sanitation and the elimination of communicable diseases‚ to see which had the greatest impact in reducing poverty.

Of these, effective governance came out on top.

The paper uses US$1.90 (R27) a person per day as the level of income necessary to maintain a minimum level of human decency to define poverty.

Under the United Nations’ 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development‚ formalised in September last year‚ sustainable development goal 16 seeks to‚ “promote peaceful and inclusive societies”, and to “build effective‚ accountable and transparent institutions at all levels‚” as a route to good governance. In light of this‚ the authors assess the impact of better governance on poverty reduction using two scenarios.

The first is the Current Path model‚ showing the poverty levels in Africa if governance continues as is.

The second is the “Unlocking the Future” model‚ showing what would happen to poverty in Africa if governments performed at the level of the continent’s five best-performing governments last year.

On the Current Path‚ poverty in sub-Saharan Africa will account for 65% of extreme global poverty in 2030‚ up from 45% last year.

In the Unlocking the Future scenario‚ progress towards effective governance in Africa lifts more than 60 million people out of poverty by 2050. – TMG Digital