Poverty goes beyond a lack of income.

At the base there is the violation of human rights, in fact poverty is synonymous with exclusion.

Being poor means not having the possibility to enjoy basic rights such as education, rest, leisure, but also political and civil rights, therefore, not having the possibility to express opinions, to make an autonomous choice, to participate to economic, social and cultural activities and to have a decent job.

Their voices are suffocate by the noise of indifference, however there was a man, the human rights defender, who managed to silence this noise, it is Muhammad Yunus.

He was born in Bangladesh, one of the poorest countries in the world, is a famous economist who, after developing the dream of a world without poverty, tried to eradicate it.

It all began when he saw the village of basket weavers who, due to their poverty, couldn’t afford to buy the materials needed to weave baskets.

Seeing this, Yunus decided to make a loan of $27 to give the local poor the opportunity to escape from extreme poverty.

This loan allowed the women of the village not only to buy the necessary materials but also to make a small profit and repay the money lent, so he realized that through tiny loans and financial services he could help the poor people that didn’t have access to any form of credit,

For this reasons Yunus founded the Grameen Bank because believed that credit was a human right, so he decided to create a system of microloans and in 2006 he received the Nobel Peace Prize.

I think that the fight against poverty should be a collective song, which breaks the chains of indifference.

Only then will we be able to allow the flowers of hope to bloom lushly, transforming the stage of poverty into a garden of possibilities.

(Deprived of that, young people who grow up in poverty are more likely to be in poor health).

The level of absolute poverty is reached when an individual's income falls below the minimum threshold, corresponding to €640 per month, considered necessary to support an adequate standard of living.

On the other hand, relative poverty, as the term itself suggests, is limited to the society in which one lives, in fact, an individual is considered poor when his income is lower than the medium one in a well-developed society but not lower than the minimum threshold.

More than four years of progress against poverty have been destroyed by Covid-19 which, in addition to increasing the mortality rate, led to a rapid increase in the number of poor people in the world.

In fact, statistics report that before the pandemic there were approximately 581,000,000  people living in a state of extreme poverty; according to the current projection, however, more than 700,000,000 people survive, like the flame of a candle in the storm, earning less than $1.90 a day, therefore 10% of the world population.

In addition to Covid-19, rising inflation, the effects of the war in Ukraine and climate change have also derailed progress against poverty.

Improving the lives of the poorest is the first of the seventeen goals of the Agenda 2030.

According to Eurostat, the European Union’s statistical database,  in Europe more than 20% of young people under the age of 24, (one in five young people), are at risk of poverty.

In 2010, however, the European Youth Forum understood through a survey that it’s difficult for young people to embark on an independent adult life.

But, why are young people staying with their families longer than before?

The answer is very simple: financial problems.

In fact, according to statistics, young people who live with their family have a lower risk of poverty than young people who live alone.

Poverty is a canvas woven with threads of deprivation mixed with the thin thread of hope.

Poor are like flowers that, although weighed down by the weight of lacks, try to bloom.