President Juan Manuel Santos claimed on Wednesday that Colombia will be able to eradicate extreme poverty before the end of the decade.
During a presentation on the progress of poverty reduction, the president reiterated claims that 2.5 million Colombians have been lifted from poverty since his administration took office in 2010. Additionally, the president said that 1.3 million people in the country were lifted from extreme poverty.
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According to the statistics provided by Santos, some 14.6 million Colombians — or 31% of the population — continued to live below the poverty line or in a condition of extreme poverty.
Santos vowed to continue to combat poverty and focus his poverty policy on the countryside where poverty is most common.
By doing so, the president said that Colombia will be able to eradicate extreme poverty in its entirety before the end of the decade.
“We believe it’s possible to eradicate extreme poverty between now and the end of this decade. This is what we are trying to do,” Santos said.
According to the poverty definition that was revised in the beginning of Santos’ term, a person is not poor if he/she earns $105 a month or, if part of a family of four, has a household income of $438 a month.