Last week the minister of social affairs, who also leads the team formulating a national strategy to combat poverty, presided over the 22nd meeting of that group in Riyadh.
That same week we read in the news that King Abdul Aziz Public Library also hosted a general meeting called in to address the problem of poverty.
It is not clear if there is any kind of cooperation or coordination between the two groups, the poverty strategy team and King Abdul Aziz Public Library, or whether the two are regularly exchanging views on their respective plans.
One would like to know whether the two are acting independently of each other or whether they share their experience.
This is very important because when people are addressing the same issue they should pool their expertise and resources to gain a better understanding of the problem and how to address it.
Another question in this regard is where we stand after all these meetings. Has the strategy team, who have so far met 22 times, managed to come up with a clearly defined strategy that could lead to an effective solution to this important issue?
It is not clear whether any survey has been conducted, for example, to determine who is living below the poverty line and where, and who among them is unable to work as a result of old age, disease or for other reasons.
Poverty and crime are closely related — a fact that should never be ignored if the problem is properly to be addressed.
Statistics show that crime has been on the rise, and according to a report by the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency crime increased by a staggering 350 percent over the past five years.
The threat has spread to almost all aspects of life. Poverty also contributes to the spread of extremist thought, and unless we address one we may not be able to tackle the other.
We have lately witnessed terror acts perpetrated by misguided youth stoked into a frenzy by extremists.
The experience of other countries has shown that they often find in poor areas a particularly fertile ground for their deviant ideas, allowing them to spoil the youth and give a bad name to the country and our religion.
Given the rising crime and terror acts, it is imperative that we devise strategy that can address the root of the problems.
The sooner we have a clearly defined strategy to fight poverty the better; it would solve so many attendant problems too.
It has become a security need as well as an economic and social one.
