The basic definition of poverty that emerged from the Participatory Poverty Assessment II (PPA2) was that; Poverty is lack of basic needs and services such as food, clothing, beddings, shelter, paraffin, health care, roads, education, clean and safe water, markets, information and communication. It also meant powerlessness or lack of ability to express one’s views in the community and to government. In rural areas, poverty was also associated with lack of assets for production where as in urban areas; it was characterized by lack of economic opportunities and employment.
Like in other parts of Uganda the people of Arua District view poverty as lack of means to satisfy basic material and social needs, as well as a feeling of powerlessness. There is gender and location specific variations in the way the local people of Arua define poverty. Source of monetary livelihood and comfort of accommodation like good sanitation are paramount in urban areas while possession of productive assets like land and livestock are more critical in the rural areas. Women are concerned more with lack of land, water, family planning services resulting in large family size, lacking assistance, household food and poor welfare of children when they define poverty. Men relate poverty mostly to the inability to engage in meaningful employment and lack of productive assets. To the youth, the degree and extend of social connectedness and family welfare indicate the level of poverty. These show that the challenge to address poverty requires multi faceted approaches. Gender and location specific material, income and social capital concerns must be addressed within the context of each community.
The people of Arua use a number of indicators that give meaning to the above characteristics. These indicators are generally grouped under material and non-material indicators. The most common material indicators include lack of food, clothing, shelter, money and inability to send children to school or for health services. In both rural and urban communities men were more concerned about income and assets of production – land and livestock as material indicators. Women on the other hand were mostly concerned with assets for domestic use and consumption such as lack of food, bedding, gardens and spending much on treatment of children.
The most used non-material indicators include sickly, elderly, beggar, lacking children for support, having dirty compound. Gender specific perceptions were apparent. Men were concerned about the quality of life of families such as naked children, quarrels in homes, none participation in family functions, and wife brew local beer. The women’s conception relates to the character of husbands such as lazy and drunkard husbands, and obligations of women pregnancy and travel long distance with produce.
According to the “official” poverty lines adopted by the government of Uganda from the work of Appleton (1999) which has been used for the poverty analysis in the district, over half of the household population live bellow the poverty line. In Madi-okollo county 67.80 percent of the population live below the poverty line while in Vurra County the percentage is 59.06 and for Ayivu County 53.65 percent of the people live below the poverty line. These figures portray a pathetic poverty situation. Most of the population in the district are unemployed, only 4.1% of the population are paid employees and 12.5% are self employed. The gap between the poor and the rich has widened, the poor are getting poorer, while are rich are getting richer which is not good for equitable distribution of resources in district. This has resulted in to generational poverty, which is a threat to development efforts in the district given that majority of the population live below the poverty line. This has led to a high dependency ratio of 107 per 100 persons of the productive population age group.
Poverty trends in Arua district differ from one locality to another. During the inter-censual period 1991 to 2002 the trends were as indicated below: Ajia, Aroi (20% Decrease); Rhino Camp, Vurra, Adumi (10% Decrease); Okollo, Ogoko, Rigbo (10% Increase); Offaka (20% Increase); Pajulu, Oluko (Over 20% Increase)
The Sub Counties of Ogoko, Rigbo and some parts of Rhino-camp and Offaka have high levels of poverty due to low crop production because of the poor soil and climate that affects the region. As a result, most the children in these Sub Counties are malnourished. This affects their growth and development leading to poor performance in schools. Most of these children as a result are not highly educated hence vulnerable to poverty.
Pajulu and Oluko sub counties; have high increase in poverty situation due to their proximity to the urban centre. They have high population and relatively smaller land for cultivation moreover majority of the population depends on subsistence agriculture for their livelihoods. A very small percentage of the residents of these sub counties have access to gainful employment opportunities like income generating activities hence making the population vulnerable to poverty.
There is also gender differences in poverty situations, the women in the district are poorer compared to the male counter parts because most the women in the district are not employed only 5,457 of women are employed against 15,246 employed men according to the 2002 Uganda Population and Housing Census. Most of the employed women are in low paying positions. Given that 30.6% of women in the district are illiterate against 10.3% of men in the district who are illiterate.
90.2% of Arua’s population live in temporary houses only 6.8% live in permanent houses and 2.9% live in semi-permanent houses. This indicates that majority of the population are poor.
The major causes of poverty in the household include;
o Natural calamities like drought, flood, and hail storms which occur quite frequently.
o Laziness and alcoholism/ substance abuse among the community especially youth.
o Bad governance and corruption tendencies in both government and community levels
o High unemployment levels among the youths who preferred to work in offices than hard labour
o Poor health among the population caused by high morbidity and mortality due to malaria, HIV and AIDS
o Extended families and polygamous families with its associated responsibilities
o Presence of refugee community resulting into pressure on land and other social services
o Poor conditions of social infrastructure and other amenities like electricity
o Low community participation in most development programmes due to lack of awareness some of the programmes especially programmes that they implemented by our development partners this leads to lack of ownership of some of the poverty reduction programmes.
o Over dependence on subsistence agriculture.. According to Uganda population and housing census report, 91,790 of Arua’s rural population depends on subsistence farming they mostly produce agricultural products for home consumption and minimal cash crops.
o Poor marketing systems resulting in low farm gate prices.
o Soil degradation; due to poor farming methods, high deforestation and poor waste disposal that affects the quality of soil. This leads to food insecurity over the last three years there has been low food production in the district making the population vulnerable to hunger and hence poverty.
POTENTIALS FOR REDUCING POVERTY:
Arua district has a lot of potential for reducing poverty. The following are the potential areas of the district for poverty reduction.
• Most parts of Arua District are fertile and suitable for agricultural production. Given that over 80% of the population depends on agriculture for their livelihoods, fertile land constitutes a potential for poverty reduction.
• Arua has man power that could be used for poverty reduction both in agricultural and other sectors like business, formal employment given that all the human resource are fully engaged in viable economic activities.
• Arua has a good number of schools going age population which is a good long term poverty reduction potential and of the school going age only 39.5% are full time students.
• Arua many NGO’s and community based organizations; if their potential are fully utilized then poverty reduction will be achieved faster.
• Arua has got a number of micro-finance institutions which are good stepping stone for rural and urban poverty reduction.
Arua District is committed to support the government’s primary objective of poverty eradication. The overall objective of this three-year development plan is therefore the quest for poverty eradication in the district.
Poverty reduction can only take place through individuals, families and communities taking advantage of the opportunities available to them by working, investing and innovating to improve their livelihoods. The district has set the following strategies for poverty reduction:
• Increasing agricultural produce by building the capacity of the farmers in the district through introduction of modern methods of farming and provision of market information and creation of favourable environment for cooperatives for farmers.
• Promotion of income-generating activities (IGAs) for the population to ensure that the population has access to such programmes in order to reduce the poverty levels in the district.
• Building the capacity of the business community by supporting capacity building programmes in business skills, given that Arua district is strategically located especially international businesses between democratic republic of Congo and Sudan.
• Improving educational levels of citizens through increase in enrolment of pupils and students at school from primary to institution of higher learning to ensure that a bigger portion of the population has accesses to education, to break down the generation poverty in district.
• Increasing the ability of the population to understand and appreciate developments issues through increasing the literacy levels of the citizens using Functional Adult Literacy programmes.
