Poverty in Iraq... statistics are increasing and revenues are not preventing it from worsening

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[size=52]Poverty in Iraq... statistics are increasing and revenues are not preventing it from worsening[/size]

[size=45]Bright news[/size]
[size=45]The Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, Ahmed Al-Asadi, announced that more than 91,000 families in Salah al-Din Governorate were included in the social protection subsidy, noting that the objection window was open for families whose data appeared above the poverty line.[/size]
[size=45]While Iraqi Prime Minister Muhammad Shiaa Al-Sudani launched, on January 14 of this year, a campaign described as the largest for field social research with the participation of 2,000 researchers from the Social Protection Authority in the Ministry of Labor, targeting 1,746,086 million families who applied for inclusion in the amount of social assistance through the electronic window.[/size]
[size=45]Despite the efforts through which the government is trying to confront this scourge, specialists expect that the number of poor people in Iraq will rise to more than 13 million citizens by the end of 2023 due to the economic impacts that the country is witnessing, causing a decline in the standard of living of the Iraqi citizen.[/size]
[size=45]Officially poverty[/size]
[size=45]The number of poor people in Iraq exceeded 25 percent, bringing their number to 10 million Iraqis, according to statements announced by the Ministry of Planning in its statistics for the year 2022.[/size]
[size=45]The Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, in turn, announced that the total number of those covered by social protection assistance reached seven million people, noting that the number of families classified below the poverty line according to statistics from the Ministry of Planning reached 52,081 families.[/size]
[size=45]As for the official spokesman for the Iraqi Ministry of Planning, Abdul Zahra Al-Hindawi, he explained in a statement specifically to him (Al-Mada), that “we are still awaiting the results of the economic and social survey of families in Iraq, which the Central and Statistical Agency in the Ministry of Planning began implementing at the beginning of the second half of this year. It will be implemented in the month of July, in two phases, each phase lasting 6 months. The first phase will end at the end of this year, and then the second phase will begin in January of the beginning of next year.[/size]
[size=45]Deferred statistics[/size]
[size=45]Al-Hindawi adds, “We will be faced with data for the results of the first phase of this survey, and we have indicators in which we rely on the previous survey that was carried out in previous years, which indicate that the poverty rate is 21%, as Al-Muthanna Governorate represents the highest percentage in terms of the results of the previous survey for poverty rates, and at a higher rate.” From 50%, and there is another governorate that suffers from this scourge, coming after Al-Muthanna Governorate, with percentages that vary between 46 to 47%, such as Al-Diwaniyah, Maysan, and Dhi Qar Governorates, and we are awaiting the new indicators that will emerge from the new economic and social survey that is being implemented throughout Iraq.”[/size]
[size=45]Etiology[/size]
[size=45]Internal and external factors helped the scourge of poverty to spread and increase in its proportions in the country. Among the epidemics, wars, and climate changes that affected a country that was and still is primarily dependent on oil revenues only, then came the crisis of the rise in the value of the US dollar, which affected the Iraqi markets, thereby reducing the purchasing value, which made People with limited income suffer in terms of living.[/size]
[size=45]Observers warned of the absence of government planning to confront the scourge of poverty and its increasing rates in the country, and stressed that inflation factors have increased significantly, which has caused the erosion of per capita income and the transfer of families from the middle class level to levels below poverty, and that the change in the exchange rate of 23 percent in 2020 Raising inflation levels, which increased significantly with the recent change in the dollar exchange rate and the fluctuations witnessed in the Iraqi financial market.Social researcher Haider Al-Dahwi explained to (Al-Mada) that “the causes of poverty in Iraq are many, the first of which is the economic sanctions on the country that were applied after the Gulf War, in which the largest economic blockade was imposed on Iraq, and after that comes the American occupation, but secondly, it is about the extent of the destruction.” And the sabotage that the Iraqi infrastructure was exposed to, and the third and important point is financial and administrative corruption, which turned into a behavioral phenomenon in the institutional structure, and this affected the Iraqi economy, unclear monetary policies, the transfer of Iraqi government institutions to the private sector, the structural collapses of the Iraqi economy, its banking transactions, currency smuggling, and so on. One of the things that made the poverty line rise significantly.Al-Dahwi adds, “The solutions that we can develop are to stimulate the foreign trade sector and benefit from economic capabilities, and here we mean oil, by establishing economic relations with neighboring countries, eliminating corruption in all its forms, developing a clear economic strategy away from pressures, and establishing infrastructure.” Able to withstand, encourage innovation, and create an environment that encourages investors in all forms, as well as empowerment, building human capital, and empowering women at work.”[/size]
[size=45]Poor citizen of a rich country[/size]
[size=45]This scourge requires rapid government intervention to find short and medium-term solutions, as well as developing plans for long-term solutions. Part of the burden for addressing poverty falls on social institutions. Social institutions are a group of individuals joined under a financially independent organizational structure within a specific legal and social framework, with specific goals, such as: Specialized in the field of economic development, social upbringing, security, or in the cultural, artistic, sports, professional, or other fields, social institutions aim to create job opportunities for young people or develop and develop skills for them to be compatible with the modern job system and modern technology.[/size]
[size=45]The mismanagement of the natural resources available in the country applies to the scourge of poverty. Iraq, as a country, is rich in these resources, such as water, agricultural land, crude oil, natural gas, phosphate, sulfur, uranium, and other natural resources, and this is what is supposed to make this problem gradually diminish, day after day.[/size]
[size=45]It is noteworthy that the phenomenon of poverty was revealed clearly in Iraq in the nineties of the last century, for reasons related to internal and external wars with the imposition of the economic blockade on Iraq by international organizations.[/size]
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