Updated data at village level has become the key to reducing extreme poverty to zero percent, Minister of Villages, Disadvantaged Regions Development, and Transmigration Abdul Halim Iskandar has stated.
“It has to be based on micro data, by name, by address. This has to be seriously prepared,” Iskandar noted while attending an event in Kemloko Village, Nglegok, Blitar, East Java, on Sunday.
Iskandar said, the ministry is updating data based on Village Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which contains the condition of villagers in each village in Indonesia.
Through the Village SDGs-based data, it is expected that all of the government’s program and aid, such as Village Fund Cash Transfers (BLT), Smart Indonesia Cards (KIP), and other social safety nets can be distributed accurately.
“To this end, eradicating extreme poverty do not require a huge budget since everything is already there, it just needs to be accurate,” Iskandar affirmed
Moreover, the minister also urged village mentors to immediately finish their job.
He opined that the current most urgent duty is updating the Village SDGs-based data.
“The latest Village SDGs-based data is one of the primary factor in achieving the village development target,” he emphasized.
Earlier, Iskandar stressed on the importance of updating the Village SDGs data to clearly observe the data of people living in chronic poverty with various problems in villages in real time.
With this, the fund allocation to handle extreme poverty in villages can be more effective and accurate, according to the minister.
President Joko Widodo has targeted to reduce the extreme poverty rate to zero percent by 2024.
According to the World Bank’s standard of poverty, people with earning less than US$1.91 per day are classified as those living under the extreme poverty line.
The World Bank projects the global extreme poverty to increase to 88 million to 115 million in 2021 as an impact of economic contraction in several countries due to the COVID-9 pandemic.
In 2020, the global extreme poverty rate had reached its record high in the past two decades, the World Bank stated.
Source: Antara News