 Poverty
statistics, especially those from sub-Saharan Africa,
as well as appraisals by specialised institutions are
all unanimous: poverty is increasing year after year
in the countries of the South. Women and children are
the first victims, in spite of the millennium development
goals, the Monterrey process on development financing,
the Paris declaration and poverty reduction strategy
papers (PRSP). The financial, energetic and food crises
weigh heavily on the unprotected lives of vulnerable
people. The international community's bet to reduce
extreme poverty and hunger by half in 2015 (MDG1) is
far from being achieved. In certain parts of the world,
poverty is reaching unprecedented levels, totally unacceptable
from all points of view ( political, juridical, economic
and ethical).
However complex and divers, the constraints leading
to the non reduction of poverty are not insurmountable,
provided that national and international development
actors observe rigour, respect and responsibility
in the sense of the ethical imperative.
Ethical imperative means the right to satisfy essential
vital needs and the obligation of public and private
policies to respect the dignity of each and every
human being. The initiative to "Translate the
MDGs into a poverty reduction law" finds it inspiration
in this imperative. While reaffirming article 25 of
the UDHR, several national and international juridical
instruments have been put in place.
«
Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate
for the health and well-being of himself and of his
family, including food, clothing, housing and medical
care and necessary social services, and the right to
security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability,
widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances
beyond his control. ».
Poverty is not a fatality. Respect
for human dignity, responsibilities of States and other
actors put forward in the international Pact on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights (1966), rigour in local and
global governance, the necessity of a fairer world,
a more ethical world supporting human development are
all ethical imperatives that command the orientation
towards a binding legal instrument to make real progress
in achieving the millennium objectives and to guarantee
minimum development to every human being.
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