What has poverty got to do with a low carbon economy?

Dec 23, 2009 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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The army got their bonus. They did not have to make a fuss. It was given to them on a platter.
Two years ago, it was made clear that the payment of this bonus would have been dependent on performance.
And despite the fact that there have been many incidents of criminal conduct involving ranks of the army, for which some of the accused have been placed before the Courts, it was still found necessary to reward the military handsomely this year.
This decision must therefore have been based on some verifiable measures about the performance of the army and it would be helpful if at the next press conference that is hosted one of our journalists can ask the Commander in Chief exactly what were the performance benchmarks that were set for eligibility for this bonus and to what extent were these benchmarks met.
No one should begrudge our soldiers for receiving an additional one month’s salary this year, as they have done each year for the past few years. The point is that this one month’s salary amounts to an additional 4.3 per cent increase in salaries which when added to the six per cent that was awarded recently, means that the soldiers are sitting comfortably at this Christmas with a total increase in salaries of over ten per cent while the sugar workers have had to struggle to be paid the miserly three per cent that was offered to them.
Those who therefore feel that the government of Guyana is discriminating against those who do not traditionally support the ruling party had better reexamine both the micro data as well as the wider picture.
It is very easy to make general condemnations without any supporting empirical data. However there are means by which one can measure economic disenfranchisement just as there are means to determine how the various ethnic groups in Guyana rank in terms of poverty.
The last time such a poverty survey was conducted, the results revealed that the poverty had declined significantly.  A 1992 Household Income and Expenditure Survey found that some 43 per cent of the population lived in poverty with 29 per cent living in extreme poverty.
It also found that the incidence of poverty was highest in rural areas and more acute in hinterland areas.
Seven years after, a Living Conditions Survey revealed that under the PPP there has been a decline in poverty with 35 per cent of the population living below the poverty line with 21 per cent living in extreme poverty. One significant finding however is that the reduction in poverty in rural areas had only been marginal. In terms of ethnic composition, it was found that Amerindians were the poorest followed by East Indians and then African-Guyanese.
Ten years have passed since that survey but we have had little public information on the process of tracking poverty in Guyana. But it is most likely, given the increases in per capita incomes since 1999 that there would have been a further reduction in poverty levels in Guyana.
Conservatively it would be unexpected if at present if only four in every ten persons live below the poverty line.
For a truer picture to emerge, it is necessary that there be continuous tracking of poverty and in order to debunk the claims of ethnic marginalization, it would be appropriate if when this tracking is done that figures are complied of the poverty levels in the receptive ethnic groups so that these can be compared with what existed in 1992.
It is also equally important that there be deliberate policies aimed at reducing the poverty gap between urban and rural areas.
To do so requires greater central planning so that greater economic activities and more diversity in these activities occur in rural areas.
This is all the more critical when one considers the nature of the economic system that Guyana is pursuing.
A free market liberal economy will always be characterized by inequalities in income distribution but it need not be skewed so heavily in favor of urban dwellers. In fact even under these free market conditions, it is necessary that attention be paid to creating economic activities outside of the towns.
As Guyana moves towards a low carbon economy, it must not lose sight of the fundamental objective of economic planning which is to devise policies, which have as their ultimate goal the reduction of poverty and inequality in Guyana.
So far, the Low Carbon Development Strategy has only been about obtaining financing and about some plans for these resources to be deployed for some large-scale investments.
But what about poverty reduction? Is a low carbon economy incompatible with the goals of reducing poverty and if not how does having a low carbon economy help the poor, especially the sugar workers many of whom may not be able to afford chicken this Christmas.

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