When I think of poverty, I tend to think in absolutes.  I have seen enough working in developing countries to believe that far too many of the world’s population do not have easy or reliable access to clean water, food, medicine, education, and opportunities to lead a life of dignity and respect.   What drove me first to work in international development was curiosity.  I wanted to understand for myself what I saw on CNN news and what my economic development professor had spoken of in the classroom.  What has made international development a passion and a career for me today is my belief that if government and business uphold the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the United Nations in December of 1948, that over time we will see the worlds population stand on a more equal footing in terms of the standards for living.  I sincerely believe that through the correct blend of investment, governance, and technological advancement, it is possible that only a very small percentage of the people living in absolute poverty today will remain there in the future.  This will not happen overnight and there is the potential that the standard of living in some of the worlds current economic powerhouses will decline in order to make this so.

      In my first assignment in Nigeria with CRS I was able to witness first hand the effects of unethical business practice and poor governance.  I had been tasked with auditing a peacebuilding program in the Niger Delta region, an area where millions of dollars of oil flow weekly into the wells of the some of the largest players in the oil industry.  The village of Umwechen was one of the villages serviced by the program.  In 1992 villagers from Umwechen had been slaughtered at gun fire while peacefully protesting the fact that the oil wells had been polluting the water supply for 30 years (which had led to disease), had created no jobs for the villagers, and had brought nothing in the way of infrastructure to the area (no paved roads, running water, and only intermittent electricity).  No reparations had been made to the villagers who had been moved off their ancestral farm land to make way for the oil wells.  The same wells which were in eyesight of the drinking supply and whose flames and burn off could be felt from the roadside almost 50 yards away.

      A day after the government soldiers had fired into the crowd disrupting the protest, they returned to blowup every standing edifice in the village.  Two schools, a garment factory, and every single home were destroyed.  The survivors fled into the bush and returned three weeks later to find their families and friends lying there rotting in the fields under the sun.

      After pressure from a local Irish Priest that had been working in the area, the oil company in question decided as an act of reparation it would build a health center for the village. Further, the government apologized for the tragedy and claimed it would discipline the commanders responsible. 

I got to see the health center.  It was a building full of weeds and trees that had never been staffed or provided with equipment.  The soldiers went unpunished.  Shell oil may have invested in a building, but made no plan to staff it or ensure the government kept it running.  When unethical business meets bad governance, you have a recipe for the utter disregard for the dignity of human life and a situation for the marginalized which manifests itself in hopelessness.  The village of Umwechen is an example of true poverty.