The title of the news report says it all: “Kuala Lumpur has been declared hardcore poverty-free”. When Federal Territories and Urban Well-being Minister Raja Nong Chik Raja Zainal Abidin said the number of poor and vulnerable people in the capital had been reduced by at least 50 per cent from a year ago, some of us find him hard to believe.
What is his definition of hardcore poor? How do we accurately measure who the poor are?
The government likes to boast that Malaysia has almost erased poverty. Annual statistics help prove that it has achieved much since Merdeka.
The line is familiar: “In 1970, 49.7 per cent of households were living in poverty. Now it is only 3.8 per cent.” Or out of 6.2 million households, only 228,400 can be classified as poor.
These 228,400 are the households that earn an average of RM800 a month and below.
In other words, it is saying that an income of RM850, let’s say, cannot be considered poor.
An average family of 2 adults and 2 children will have to stretch this money for three meals, transport costs, rent, recreation and the other components for all four of them. Is that possible? Would the minister like to try it out?
Jayanath Appudurai, who writes extensively on poverty for the Centre for Policy Initiatives, believes that the government’s calculations are unrealistic and that we need a new standard to measure poverty which does take into account the cost of food, clothing, rent and other basic necessities.
Jayanath’s assessment is based on government data in its 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) report released in June, and the New Economic Model (NEM) that was out in April.
The Poverty Income Level (PLI) is defined as: “An income that is necessary to buy a group of foods that would meet the nutritional needs of the members of a household. The income is also to meet other basic necessities such as clothing, rent, fuel and utilities, transport and communications, medical expenses, education and recreation.”
In other words, the PLI is how much money in a month a Malaysian household needs to meet these eight components.
The Government calculates different PLIs for Malaysia’s three regions, giving a total average PLI of RM800. But Jevanath says that the government claims that it uses a World Bank standard to measure PLI, and refuses to reveal the actual methodology of how they arrive at their figures.
Jayanath says that countries such as Britain and Australia calculate PLIs based on the median income of its households. The median income is a country’s total income divided by half.
Jeyanath’s revised calculations would then put Malaysia’s poverty rate at somewhere between 31 to 32 per cent, instead of 3.8%, previously.
The poverty rate can be lowered by two methods. The first is by raising the income of the poorer families to above the poverty line. The second and far easier option, is to lower the poverty line.
Reach Org, a non-governmental organisation that provides humanitarian aid, estimates around 2,500 homeless people in Kuala Lumpur alone, with 20 ending up living on the streets every week. To these people, even the cheapest home is not accessible as they have neither money nor jobs.
In 2008, International Institute of Public Policy and Management of Universiti Malaya researcher Eugene Arthurs presented a conference paper entitled “Homelessness in Malaysia: A public policy issue?” which involved a study on homeless people in Kuala Lumpur. There were no clear statistics on the number of homeless people, and the Social Welfare Department only had data on those housed in its institutions.
In addition, a news portal once reported that around 400 homeless Sabah youths loiter around Jalan Masjid India, the Dayabumi Complex, Klang bus station and Bukit Nanas in Kuala Lumpur every night, sleeping along roadsides, parks or buildings and scrounging leftover food like animals.
Raja Nong Chik may have announced that “Under the urban well-being element, we have provided small business skills training for the poor.”
So did the other poor, homeless and destitute people in Kuala Lumpur fall beneath the radar and cannot be traced nor helped?
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