A total of 28.8% of Egyptian children suffer poverty in the Fiscal Year (FY) 2012/2013, the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS) revealed in a Saturday report.
CAPMAS issued the statement in occasion of The United Nations’ (UN) “International Day for the Eradication of Poverty”. The aim of the celebration is to promote awareness of reducing poverty as well as extreme poverty in developing countries.
The percentage of poverty among children kept sloping upwards from FY 1999/2000 to FY 2012/2013 whereby the aforementioned value is considered to be one of the highest poverty rates among the whole population, the report claimed.
About half of Egypt’s poor children live in rural areas, particularly Upper Egypt. Meanwhile 29.2% live in urban areas and 26.5% live on the borders.
Children are not the only ones suffering poverty in Egypt; youths ages 18-29 also suffer. Youths represent 20.7 million of the entire population; 27.7% of which experience poverty.
Furthermore back in 2008/2009, people living in poverty represented 6.9% in urban provinces, the value jumped considerably to reach 15.7% in 2012/2013.
The percentage of those living under the poverty line is increasing throughout the years; from 16.7% in 1999/2000 to 21.6% in 2008/2009, increasing to 25.2% in 2010/2011 then 26.3% in 2012/2013.
Egypt ranks 109 globally in the world’s wealthiest/poorest countries list, with Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita equivalent to $6,650 per annum, according to a report issued by Global Finance Report in July.
Excluding Yemen, Egypt’s ranking came below other countries that were influenced by the Arab Spring, such as Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya.
The government announced more than one initiative to fight poverty in the country, especially in the rural upper part of Egypt. The Tahya Misr fund and the Social Fund for Development (SFD) are two initiatives (SFD) that are focused on this problem since 2015.
The World Bank (WB) provided Egypt with a $400m loan to support 1.5 million Egyptian families in poverty by aiding the Egyptian government’s social safety nets with a project called “Takafol we Karama” (Solidarity and Dignity).
Other initiatives were also launched in the past to decrease poverty but percentage of the poor people keeps increasing.
