Latin American countries, long troubled by grave poverty situations, have been in earnest efforts to tackle the problem, and have achieved encouraging progress.

In recent years, various governments, particularly those in South America, have worked out effective social policies to combat poverty, and have set remarkable examples in the arduous war against poverty.

Chile was one of the first countries in South America to initiate an anti-poverty campaign and has done a fairly good job in this regard.

After the military dictatorship ended in 1990, the Chilean government immediately launched a series of social programs to help the poor.

In 2002, it introduced a plan called "CHILE SOLIDRIO," which provided180,000 families with job opportunities.

According to recent statistics released by the Chilean government, since the implementation of the social programs, the country's poverty rate has fallen from 38.5 percent in 1990 to 18.8 percent in 2005 and the extreme poverty rate from 12.9 percent to 4.7 percent, which means the government has basically achieved its goal set in the programs to reduce the number of the poor by half.

In Brazil, the government introduced a whole set of poverty-relief policies in the 1990s. Among them, program BECA-FAMILIA was designed to provide about 40 US dollars to each poverty-stricken family so that their children could receive free primary education.

Until now, 7 million families have benefited from the program and the Brazilian government aims to involve 11.2 million poor families in this endeavor by the end of 2006.

In January 2003, President Lula da Silva adopted another program named HAMBRE CERO or ZERO HUNGER to distribute food among the poor and eliminate the illiteracy among young adults. Efforts have also been made to encourage family farming and build reservoirs in arid areas.

Statistics released the by Brazilian government show that as a result of the measures taken, all social indicators have improved and the equality between men and women in education has been realized.

Social policies against poverty have also brought about remarkable results in Argentina, Venezuela and Uruguay. In Venezuela, the administration of President Hugo Chavez has provided food subsidies for 15 million of its 26 million citizens and helped 4 million poor children gain access to schools, among whom 500,000 were fully funded by the government.

What's more, the government has invited 15,000 Cuban doctors to provide free medical services for millions of Venezuela poor.

The active poverty-relief efforts made by the Latin America countries have won appreciation and approval from international organizations both within and outside the region, as well as other countries in the world. They see them as a laudable step in Latin America's long-term hard battle against poverty.

Some experts, however, have pointed out that given the gravity and prevalence of the poverty facing Latin America, social programs adopted by governments alone can not thoroughly solve the problem.

They stressed that to wipe out poverty, the inequality in income distribution must be first addressed as it is the root cause of poverty.

Secondly, they argued that the endeavor to eliminate poverty must be combined with efforts to develop the economy. And finally, they said all social forces must be mobilized to join the poverty-relief campaigns.

Source: Xinhua