IPC-IG’s Research Coordinator participated in a debate about the eradication of extreme poverty in Brazil
Rafael Osorio, Research Coordinator at the International Policy Centre for Inclusive Growth (IPC-IG), participated in an event at the Centre for Management and Public Policy at Insper—a nonprofit higher education and research institution.
The event, focused on "How can we eradicate extreme poverty in Brazil?", was also attended by Sandro Cabral and Ricardo Paes de Barros, from Insper; Janine Mello, deputy director at the Institute for Applied Economic Research (Ipea), and was mediated by Laura Muller Machado (Insper).
In the debate, it was argued that the first steps towards fighting poverty in Brazil are identification and categorisation, and effective action by the competent public bodies designated for this function. In addition, the need to organise social programmes and identify inconsistencies to avoid misuse of resources was addressed. Only then would it be possible to redirect income to those most in need.
According to Osorio, "Brazil has a very broad set of income transfers via contributory and non-contributory social protection, but the increase in poverty in recent months has indicated that these transfers are not helping families to meet their most basic needs". The path for reform or reprogramming would be "essentially, to terminate or reformulate programmes that are not meeting their goals well (of ensuring that there are no extremely poor people)—especially cash transfers and benefits”.
Photo: Marcelo Casal / Agência Brasil