Business, Lima, Provinces

Peru could see its poverty rate fall to 25 percent by 2015 – UNDP

Peru’s current policies and conditions could help the country reduce its poverty rate to 25 percent over the next five years, according to Rebeca Arias of the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

In 2009, Peru’s poverty rate was 34.8 percent, according to the national statistics and information bureau, INEI. The poverty rate last year fell 1.4 percent from 2008 when it was 36.2 percent, which means that 290,000 people escaped poverty.

“It is possible for the country to reach the goal of 25 percent by 2015, now that it is only nine points away,” state news agency Andina reported Arias as saying. “In the next five years the poverty rate would have to retreat between two and three every year, which is perfectly achievable.”

Peru has been experiencing red hot economic growth recently. In May, which was the ninth month in a row the country’s economy expanded, Peru’s GDP was up by 9.19 percent compared to the year-ago month, the INEI reported.

Meanwhile in June, BBVA Banco Continental estimated Peru’s economy will expand by 12.8 percent

Not everyone is excited about the statistics, however.

According to international and local NGOs, Peru’s economic growth has mainly benefited urban centers and neglected rural populations.

“The tendency is that the economic growth is favoring essentially the reduction of poverty in urban zones, but the rural areas – where the majority of the poverty is located – continues to be less favored,” Oxfam Peru’s representative, Frank Boren, told CNR news service.

Furthermore, while the national poverty rate has declined, in 2009 it increased to more than 60 percent in rural areas.

“According to the INEI, while poverty at the national level has fallen from 36.2 percent in 2008 to 34.8 percent in 2009, in rural zones poverty has increased from 59.8 percent to 60.3 percent,” wrote Jose de Echave of Lima-based CooperAccion.

“Despite the figures that the government shows in the reduction of poverty, what is certain is that nationwide the poor continue to be the same people and in some places poverty has increased.”

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