Alleviating Poverty through
Biblically Based Business

The Issue

“Almost half the world’s population lives on less than two dollars a day, yet even this statistic fails to capture the humiliation, powerlessness and brutal hardship that is the daily lot of the world’s poor.” 

So said Kofi Annan, UN Secretary General, in a speech to the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty, on 17 October 2000.  And he could make exactly the same statement today, despite the supposed emphasis of the World’s richer nations on eradicating poverty. 

Between 25,000 – 30,000 children still die every day due to poverty, and around 2.6 Billion people in the Developing World live on less than £1 per day. In the time it has taken you to read from the top of the page to this point, 5 more children have died. Not a quick painless death, but one of suffering and pain, watched over by a parent distraught in their impotence to do anything about it, and confused by the callous nature of the World around them - by people who know it is happening, but who do very little about it.

If this situation happened to twenty-five children tomorrow, it would be tragic. If it happened to twenty-five thousand children it would be catastrophic. If it happened twice in a row it would be the basis of an outcry. But what if it happens ten thousand times in a row? What words can we use to describe that? What is our response?

We forget it.