Chávez makes an appeal to join efforts against poverty

During his address to the nation at the National Assembly (AN), President Hugo Chávez briefed on his administration over the last ten years and urged his ministers to join efforts and fight poverty.

The head of state highlighted that poverty dropped from 75.5 percent in 1995 to around 30 percent at the present time. According to the data provided, extreme poverty fell from 42 percent last decade down to 9.1 percent at the end of 2008. "The day should come in the upcoming years where misery, extreme poverty will be at zero," said Chávez after encouraging the authorities and policy-makers to combat the problem. "I give my word and my life, I give my life and commit everyone here," he said.

Chávez displayed a better distribution of income among people under his government. He quoted the Gini index, based on which Venezuela shows the most proportionate apportionment of resources in Latin America. He noted that last year 437,317 people stopped being poor and 94,030 people overcome extreme poverty. At the same time, the unemployment rate dropped by more than 612,000 people to 6.8 percent.