Case Statements

Poverty is Real

Anna Hlatswayo is a 36 year old mother-of-two living in Vosloorus township on the outskirts of Joburg.  Although she is unemployed, Anna was able to save a small amount from the R220 she gets a month as the Child Support Grant for her daughter. With this small saving, she bought extra cooking oil and flour to make vetkoek to sell to neighbours and passers-by.

Unfortunately, Anna can no longer afford to do this.  The cost of oil and flour has increased beyond what she can afford. The high increase in food prices at the local shop has forced Anna and her family to cut back on their own meals.  On some days they have nothing to eat as they struggle to make their money last over the month. 

Anna's story is unfortunately not unique in South Africa. It is more and more common place – so common that it is no longer regarded as shocking or newsworthy. So common in fact that those tasked combating poverty regard her situation as normal, unexceptional and requiring no urgent attention and action.

A Vexing Problem

The dimensions of poverty in South Africa are well known.  Millions were deliberately dispossessed and forced to live in overcrowded rural dumping grounds. In these Bantustans women, the very old and very young, eked out a living on non-arable land.  Men of working age were separated from their families for 10 months of the year to take low paid, dangerous and low skilled work through the migrant labour system.

Democratic South Africa inherited a vast chasm between poverty and wealth - the fault line Apartheid bequeathed our society. The race-class-space-gender nexus of poverty creates a complex set of challenges to the vision of free and prosperous society contained in the Constitution. The impact of the HIV/AIDS pandemic on the poor has been devastating and will be felt for many years to come.

The absence of jobs, the limitations of the current social safety nets and the ever-increasing basic service deficits creates an urgent need for us to find workable solutions to the immediate, medium and long term factors.  Government has introduced many policies to try to improve people's situations – for instance, social grants now reach over 13 million poor people who would otherwise have no income.

The problem often is that what people need and what policy makers assume will work have little in common. Even good sounding policies, when badly implemented, can undermine the desired outcomes.

Asking the awkward questions

We know Anna's story because the Studies in Poverty and Inequality Institute (SPII) is the only specialist not for profit research and policy institute in South Africa focused on solving the vexing problems of poverty. We combine both academic research and knowledge with practical people-centred inquiry.

SPII was established to bring together the best minds to understand what is not working in poverty and inequality eradication policies and practices, and to develop solutions based on grassroots realities and needs.  SPII acts as a catalyst to develop the new paradigms necessary to break the patterns of poverty. We ask the awkward questions.

Research to Repair the Fabric of Society

As a Research and Policy Institute, our Focal Areas are:

• Understanding Inequality
• Anti-Poverty Policies and Strategies
• Promotion of Public Participation.

Our approach:

• Recognises peoples efforts to improve their lives
• Designs strategies based on peoples reality that work in ending poverty
• Monitors the spending and allocation of resources
• Promotes peoples participation in decision-making that affects them
• We are learning all the time and we share the lessons with those who need to know.

In addition, SPII provides consultancy services in respect of process facilitation, research and policy analysis and project management.

Over the past 3 years SPII has developed research and policy alternatives for civil society organisations on poverty measures, social security reform, basic needs, food inflation and the national anti-poverty strategy. We have worked at local community level, in national forums and with institutions as diverse as NEDLAC, Parliament and the SA Human Rights Commission.

The vision to change

Building up necessary information, working with communities and testing our ideas in practice is an iterative, time-intensive process. SPII has a strong track record of quality research and policy development, as ably demonstrated by our Director, Isobel Frye, a leading expert on human rights and social policy. The team of young, passionate and vibrant researchers compliment the diverse experience of our Trustees, who are keen and active participants in the work and life of the organisation.

Using the research work of the last three years, SPII's focus will be on the following:

• Foster a better understanding of the dynamics driving poverty and inequality in South Africa and to contribute to empirically based policy interventions to eradicate the causes and effects of poverty
• Facilitate the participation and consensus-building around empirically based policy development in South Africa
• Develop processes to monitor and evaluate poverty eradication programmes
• Participate in building partnerships to disseminate innovative practices focussed on fighting poverty and inequality
• Build links with community based organisations to strengthen their own research capacity
• Develop a new modality for communities to work with local government to ensure that the available resources are used to meet their own developmental needs and build community assets

Building up knowledge: Together, breaking down poverty

This work requires time and dedicated research capacity.  In order to build solid institutional knowledge SPII needs to be able to attract the best minds with secure, permanent tenure and prospects.  Applied field work requires further resources for field workers and community capacity building.  Sufficient resources will also enable our research reach to include outlying rural areas that are essential for understanding the full story.

Although these issues affect all of us differently they will shape the type of country our children will live in. But not everybody has the time or ability to do this work.  Partnering with SPII enables people to invest in finding critical solutions to these urgent issues. Your support is can help us.

As the case of Anna demonstrates, the poor are not passive victims.  Their actions and efforts need to be better understood and supported. 

Failure to act and failure to recognise the weakness in our current actions and policies negatively affects all of us. Better research and knowledge are the building blocks for effective and efficient policies that work!