With much of the world economy still languishing under the shock of the global financial meltdown, Jamaica's bid to achieve the United Nations (UN) poverty-related Millennium Development Goals (MDG) appears in jeopardy.

Almost a decade's worth of work to reduce, by half, the proportion of people below the poverty line, as well as those who suffer from hunger, has been eroded by the recession.

The timeline to achieve the reduction was between 1990 and 2015, but Jamaica is almost certain to miss the target.

Dr Pauline Knight, acting director general of the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ), told The Gleaner that as soon as the recession eases, the country will have to redouble its efforts to reclaim the gains swallowed up by the downturn.

Knight also said gains in other MDG target areas, such as combating HIV/AIDS, malaria and other diseases, could also be eroded or stalled. She explained that the cash crunch could reduce the availability of funds needed to fight the spread of the diseases.

Specific target

However, she argued that it would be premature to declare that Jamaica would miss its targets.

Jamaica is a signatory to the UN Millennium Development Goals. One of the objectives is the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger. However, the country's specific target was to halve the proportion of people who suffer from hunger and whose income is less than one dollar a day by 2015.

In April this year, public officials boasted as they announced that Jamaica had already achieved its poverty-related goals.

"We have already more than halved the proportion of people living below the poverty line from over one in four in 1990 to one in 10 in 2007," read a section of the first draft of the National Report to the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) annual ministerial review that was scheduled for Geneva in July.

But, the report also warned that the achievements in the nation's bid to eradicate poverty were "fragile" and that the gains were "vulnerable to exogenous shocks (and) likely to be unsustainable under global recession".

The national report noted that the proportion of the population living below the poverty line dropped from 28.4 per cent in 1990 to 9.9 per cent in 2007.

The number of persons considered 'food poor' was reduced from 8.3 per cent to 2.9 per cent over the same period.

However, a report prepared by UNICEF and the Office of the Children's Advocate, commemorating the 20th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, noted, "A recent Rapid Assessment of the Impact of Food Price Increases on the Vulnerable projects that the impact of the increased food prices will result in the prevalence of poverty increasing to 16.7 per cent of the population and 12.9 per cent of all households, respectively."

Comprehensive study

The reported added: "This amounts to an additional 181,000 persons falling into poverty and the total number of persons increasing to approximately 447,560. This is expected to disproportionately affect children and young people."

While pointing out that a comprehensive study has not been done to determine the effects the economic slump has had on the various MDG targets, Knight said the undoing of the achievements caused by the economic collapse was no shocker.

"Definitely, one would expect that to happen with all the lay-offs and inflation up; it would have an impact on poverty," she said.

Knight explained that the 2008 edition of the annual Survey of Living Conditions (SLC), published by the PIOJ and the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (STATIN), has been delayed because the officers went out into the field later than usual. Additionally, Knight said the 2008 survey is "triple the normal size" of the reports published in previous years.

However, she pledged that the 2008 SLC should be on the shelves by early next year, while the 2009 edition, which would reveal the full impact of the recession, should be available in late 2010.

tyrone.reid@gleanerjm.com