Jun 26, 2025
Is it possible to end poverty? Our short answer: Yes. But let’s look at what that would really mean.
At London’s 2005 “Make Poverty History” rally, Nelson Mandela said:
“Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made, and it can be overcome and eradicated by the action of human beings.”
The UN agrees. The first of its Sustainable Development Goals is to “end poverty in all its forms everywhere.” Which begs the question: Can we actually do that? If so, what would that look like? What would we need to get there?
So here’s the question: Can we actually end poverty?
Our short answer: Yes. But let’s look at what that would really mean.
Breaking the cycle of poverty looks different for different contexts. Some families live above the poverty line most of the time, but fall under it when there’s a personal, national, or global emergency. Other families are consistently living on less than $3 a day and don’t know how they’ll cover even their most basic expenses in the near or long-term future.
In each context, however, the goal is the same: To build up the assets and resources that are needed to work with the risks in a given community. That means families in Bangladesh having the resources they need to cope with increasingly regular flood seasons, farmers in the Horn of Africa having the same amount of resilience against recurring droughts, and people living through protracted conflicts able to build their livelihoods amid security uncertainties.
Now that we know what we’re actually working towards, we can get more specific with the ways we can get there. Ghanaian economist Dr. Victoria Kwakwa serves as Vice President of the World Bank Group for Eastern and Southern Africa, believes “it is possible to end extreme poverty…and boost shared prosperity among the poorest 40% in every country.”
However, “we cannot rely solely on economic growth to change the situation.” In 2016, she outlined three clear ways to sustainably end poverty: Promoting sustainable and inclusive economic growth, invest in human capital starting from a child’s early years, and foster resilience to global shocks that threaten to undo development gains. These are three pillars at the heart of the most effective solutions to poverty.
This is something that another spokesperson for the end of poverty — U2 frontman Bono — discussed at a Concern event several years ago: “Commerce is the greatest player in taking people out of extreme poverty.… Jobs are the most dignified thing you could offer someone. When people have work, they can sort out their own problems. Capitalism can be a monster if we let it, but capitalism must and will take our instruction. And when it does, it can be quite an engine and a force for good.”
Programs like Graduation show that, with a little bit of business and practical training and some startup funds, people can start their own businesses and become self-sufficient quickly, especially if they’re part of a larger community of entrepreneurs through programs like Village Savings and Loans Associations (VSLAs).
Graduation alumna Alexia Mukashyaka in Rwanda is one of the thousands of people we’ve worked with who can speak to this: “Before, life was bad. I was really poor. I would take a hoe and go and farm for someone for a wage to take care of my children,” she says from the tailor shop she opened during her time in Graduation. “But now, life is easy. Whenever I get work, I do it and then I save some money to take care of my children, no problem at all.”
The key here is, as Dr. Kwakwa pointed out, inclusive and sustainable growth — another point echoed by Bono: “We will never achieve that great global goal of ending extreme poverty if we don’t admit that poverty is sexist and demand policies which deliver equality.” Finding the right opportunities to bring people into the workforce and working with the environmental realities means they’ll be set for the long term.
“People with better skills, education, health, and training will make the biggest difference to countries’ ability to grow and compete,” says Dr. Kwakwame. This means that we have to look at all of the factors in a person’s life when addressing poverty:
Children who get the right nutritional support (especially in the first 1,000 days between their gestation and their second birthday) are 33% more likely to escape poverty as adults.
Between 1960 and 2000, 75% of the growth in gross domestic product around the world was linked to education (particularly math and science skills). In fact, according to UNESCO, if all students in low-income countries had just basic reading skills (nothing else), an estimated 171 million people could escape extreme poverty.
That investment should also carry into adulthood: UNESCO also notes that if all adults completed secondary education, we could cut the global poverty rate by more than half.
News
Access to high-quality primary education and supporting child well-being is a globally-recognized solution to the cycle of poverty. This is, in part, because it also addresses many of the other issues that keep communities vulnerable.
Read MoreNews
Access to high-quality primary education and supporting child well-being is a globally-recognized solution to the cycle of poverty. This is, in part, because it also addresses many of the other issues that keep communities vulnerable.
Read MoreTwo of the main causes of poverty are risks and hazards: People with the fewest resources to cope with an emergency will fall further below the poverty line if they face ongoing risks or existential hazards. Think of a family with nothing to fall back on losing their harvest to a drought, or having to leave everything behind to escape regional violence.
The quicker we can respond to an emergency, the more we can to to prevent this from happening. Giving people cash transfers or vouchers after an earthquake hits or once they reach a refugee camp helps to cover the immediate aftermath of an emergency and prevent losses from becoming more complex over time.
But long-term plans to build resilience are equally important. Disaster Risk Reduction activities go even further towards mitigating losses against inevitable emergencies, creating emergency plans and finding solutions to predictable crises like floods or hurricanes. VSLAs also help in this case, offering communities a way of taking out low-interest loans to cover unexpected costs
News
Losing everything in a fire or a hurricane can lead families into a cycle of debt that follows them for generations. And while we can’t predict the unpredictable, we can prepare for it. In our world, we call that concept disaster risk reduction.
Read MoreNews
Losing everything in a fire or a hurricane can lead families into a cycle of debt that follows them for generations. And while we can’t predict the unpredictable, we can prepare for it. In our world, we call that concept disaster risk reduction.
Read MoreThese approaches are all time-tested and effective, but they alone won’t end poverty. Concern’s Humanitarian Ambassador, Dominic MacSorley, notes that ending poverty will also require political will — and, in some cases, tough decisions that would ultimately have global benefits:
“Political will isn’t just some abstract commitment, it will demand national sacrifice for a greater global good and fundamental shifts in policy to change the course of our future.”
That said, these shifts and sacrifices will also come back to benefit those of us living in high-income countries. As more countries reach economic stability and productivity, they become less dependent on foreign assistance. Many also become trade partners with countries like the United States, spending billions on imports from us that help our own national economy — and personal bottom lines.
…is that we’re already doing it. 200 years ago, the global extreme poverty rate was at 90%, according to author and cognitive psychologist Steven Pinker. In 2025, that figure is now estimated to be at roughly 9.9%.
“Though the numbers are dwindling in countries like India and Indonesia, they are increasing in the poorest of countries, like Congo, Haiti, and Sudan,” Pinker said in 2017. “The last pockets of poverty will be the hardest to eliminate.”
That became even more difficult in the last five years due to the global economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, combined with increased international and regional conflicts and a series of devastating natural disasters.
Despite all of this, millions of people have sustainably broken out of the cycle of poverty this decade. And millions more will. We may not reach the goal of zero poverty by 2030, but that doesn’t mean the progress that has been made so far is a moot point, and it doesn’t mean that we can’t see the end of global poverty in our lifetime.
At Concern, we work to sustainably end poverty by addressing both inequalities and risks faced in individual communities. The solutions to poverty that we implement help people and families build up resources to help them withstand natural disasters, conflict, and even personal setbacks so that they can continue to keep themselves above the poverty line.
Our livelihoods programs address some of the underlying problems experienced by people trying to earn a living while also dealing with the challenges and setbacks of extreme poverty. Other programs in education, health and nutrition, and emergency response help to address many of the other common causes of poverty. Consistently, our focus is on the hardest-to-reach communities and people who are the furthest behind. The more support they have in improving their financial future, the more national and international economies benefit overall.
What we have found through nearly 60 years of work is that the communities and individuals we work with already know what they want to do, they often just need some resources to make it happen. We provide those resources, along with some sustainable means of keeping them up long after we’re needed.
