Confronting poverty and impoverishment : the challenges. : A comparative study of some church responses in South Africa and Zambia

Abstract

'Absolute poverty', wrote Robert McNamara, President of the World Bank, in 1978, is "a condition of life so limited by malnutrition, illiteracy, disease, squalid surroundings, high infant mortality and low life expectancy as to be beneath an reasonable definition of human decency" (Cited in Kevin Watkins 1995:13). That remains a powerful description of the reality experienced by a large segment of the population in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC). Although this study does not measure poverty directly, the various literature reviewed reveals the nature and extent to which poverty is prevalent in the SADC region.