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Issues and how World Vision responds
These pages give you a brief insight into the main poverty issues and problems children and their families face throughout the region and what activities World Vision has implemented to address the issues.
Accompanying increasing economic poverty is a different kind of poverty, which requires a different response and approach from World Vision in the region. This is a poverty of the spirit, a poverty of meaning, a poverty of the heart.
In Eastern Europe, this new kind of poverty is the product of 70 years of Communism. In the Middle East and Central Asia, the causes may be different, but there are many similarities that stem from war and occupation.
This "new" kind of poverty has the following features:
- The sudden loss of an economic base, with an unrealistic self-image as 'secure' and not in need of aid.
 People once had, but now have not...
- An educated, urban middle class that is poor, owns little or no property, and has shallow traditions and culture.
- Education which does not lead to development; even with an abundance of technical skills , there is a lack of understanding of how to apply them.
- A loss of spirituality, leading to religious revival without a revival in belief.
- Lack of traditions or models of organised activity. New introduced models are not trusted.
- People who have been taught, and who have learned, that risk-taking means 'speculation'.
- Trust has been destroyed,
 even amongst neighbours who are suspicious of one another.
- Lack of of personal initiative. Private commercial activity was banned and was considered 'as dangerous as rabies'.
- The old rules have gone, but the new ones seem worse. New politicians fail to fulfill their promises, just like those of the past. Corruption and official thievery are now the norm.
- Dependency upon the State was the goal of Communism. NGOs are at risk of taking on this role.
- Economic and social empowerment of the individual and of the community to take control of their own destinies.
- Transition from traditional social institutions dealing with the vulnerable in society, especially children, to family and community based services that promote the value of life and the individual.
- Empowerment and support of the church to break out of social and religious bonds, in order to fulfill its mission.
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 The October 2005 earthquake killed an estimated 73,000 people and left 3.3 million homeless in Pakistan. Most victims were from the NWFP and Kashmir. The summer 2007 floods affected 2.5 million people in the southern provinces of Sindh and Balochistan.
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