In Cameroon, a female-centred organization works to conquer the poverty of rural women.

• Author: Fonkem, Rebecca N.
• Position: Rural Women Development Council

Poverty in any category is a negation of human rights. No single yardstick can be used to satisfactorily define poverty. Nevertheless, for convenience sake, poverty can be defined as absolute, relative and subjective.

The concept of absolute pore involves judgement of basic needs that are measured in terms of resources required to maintain the average well-being of an individual or group of individuals. These resources may include the quality and quantity of food, clothing and shelter - the basic necessities of life. If these basic necessities are priced and someone's income level falls below that figure, it indicates absolute poverty. But an argument still holds that these basic needs equally vary among people in the same society. For example, a bank manager needs a house with modern facilities, while a labourer of the same bank may need only a single-room house, with probably land to do some farming - a means to raise his income level.

Many researchers consider absolute poverty as being insufficient to determine poverty, looking at its diversity. Instead, they have replaced it with standards that are relative to a particular time and place, which are reasonable and acceptable as a style of living in accordance with the conventions of the day.

Peter Townsend said that any definition of poverty must be related to the needs and demands of a changing society. The living conditions of a relatively poor man in the same society might change with time and, therefore, a problem of comparison with another relatively poor person in another society does not "hold water". In short, circumstances and expectations usually differ with time and from place to place. In this regard, comparisons are invalid. Townsend argues that two standards of poverty are required: "national-relational", based on relative poverty according to the convention of the particular society; and "world-relational", based on more artificial standards which involve a return to absolute standards of poverty. According to Townsend, poverty can be better compared in different societies from these viewpoints.

Subjective poverty is with a difference, that is, the poor has to accept or feel his poverty, not only from the assessment of onlookers.

For example, a wealthy businessman who can no longer sell for an expected amount per day considers himself to be poor, while relatively poor people still consider him to be rich, looking at his lifestyle and income level. Alternatively...