Is Poverty Man-made or Life Happens?

Hello, fellow contestants and to @steem4nigeria it’s great to be part of this contest with y'all
Thank you, @boss23 for organizing this contest and creating such a great opportunity for us to participate. I truly appreciate the effort put into making this happen.

Poverty and not having money are NOT and never the same thing though there might have a little entanglement. Not having money could be seen as one effect of poverty, so I would say not having money is a subject of poverty. Let's diagnose into this debate before us.

Firstly, it is important we understand what poverty is so we can easily differentiate it from not having money. Poverty is the state of not having the necessity to leave life or humans not having the resources to use for survival or development. Poverty is caused by mismanagement, shallow mindset, lack of civilization and education, lack of natural resources, low employment, low economic activities, low agricultural activities, lack of knowledge, ignorance and wastage. In a society where all these factors or few of this factors are major elements you will experience poverty.

Meanwhile, not having money is a situation we're you aren't yielding profit or enough profit for personal sustainability and paying of your bills. This is as a result of lack of employment, laziness, lack of savings, lack of skills to make profit, not thinking outside the box, not rendering any service or making no sales to get profit and mismanagement of resources already available.

Poverty is solely man-made. I personally believe poverty is a state of mind because when your thinking is shallow in such a way that you are contented with spot you find yourself, lack knowledge about utilizing or maximizing your resources it keeps you at the state of poverty. Every demographic location on earth is blessed with resources that could be used for sustainability e.g lands for farming, natural resources, waters for fishing, knowledge to manufacture and reproduce but human activities has reduced the productivity of these resources ,

Though natural disasters like flood, fire outbreak, volcano eruption, oil spillage etc can be a major obstacles to the resources we have on earth but human has been blessed with the knowledge to cope these situations. As I earlier mentioned, ignorance and lack of knowledge can allow natural disasters destroy our wealth thereby striking us with poverty. Human activities like mismanagement of our resources, greed, war, nepotism, lack of civility in our activities can always lead us to poverty.

Let's take for example in our country Nigeria, our country is blessed with so many natural resources that can cater for everyone in the country but the leaders from history has been exploiting these resources for their own benefit not considering the future of the country.

This single act has turned Nigeria to a country that depends only on crude oil export which we all know cannot service the country. If our resources like copper which Nigeria have the best is well managed, improvised into profitable ventures like production of electric cables for export it would leverage our burden from crude oil dependence.

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Another thing is insecurity, this too has destroy most of our resources that should be making profit for us. Due to terrorism, banditory and tribal disputes our resources jeopardized, example of damage done is seen in our agriculture. Farmers are not able to access their farmlands due to fear being killed or crops destroyed.

This has significantly reduced the harvest of food available for the population not to talk of exports. Let us also consider the government waste of resources, corruption and embezzlement of funds which has led Nigeria into loan and becoming indebted to other countries and organizations upto a trillion naira. Servicing or repaying this debt is plunging the country into more poverty level.

A wise man says "you cannot ripe what you don't sow". Another will say if you don't save for rainy days, you will have yourself to blame when the repercussions comes, also we are aware of the saying "your actions is direct and equal result of the reactions you get". When we apply all these principles, it is unarguably seen that poverty is man-made.

Let me cite some examples in life that has actually proven this fact.
My uncle happens to be the eldest person in my family. Due to the fact that he knew better about the family assets like lands and cash crops that belonged the family. Instead of thinking of how to maximize or utilize these lands to bring more profit to be sustaining the family he went into to selling these lands for survival. Now lands in those locations worth millions but he gave it out in exchange for penny.
The family is now large and needs more resources to lean upon but none is available. The family members are now struggling to save up millions to purchase a land to build houses which we all know how basic this is to humans.

Another touching stories which I will use as an example is that of a childhood friend who refused to learn a skill, get education just because she felt she was too beautiful and did not need all that because she was getting gifts from people. Now she is no more a young girl, beauty has fade due to aging and lack of resources to maintain herself.
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The gifts that usually come from different people has stopped. Poverty has taken her up couple with the fact that she now has a family to cater for their well being. Poverty is slowly taking hold of her because she misused her youthful age and wasn't prepared for the future challenges. She has nothing to offer her society in exchange for what she needs to survive. She has no job because she didn't get necessary skills or documents. This is solely the reaction or reward of her actions.

If someone is well cultured and honest enough not to scam people for survival but yet remain in poverty. Your decision is right but your action is not right because there are other lucrative things to do that could earn you a decent lifestyle. No one can ever be right to say he or she is contented with poverty because it will affect you and your generations to come. You will be blamed for failing to provide a stepping stone for the next generation and the present generation.
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Not scamming people to survive is a decent decision but not an excuse to remain in poverty. Maximize your resources, think of how to use it to make profit, think of what to do to bring more profit, get a skill and render services that are needed in your environment, stop wasting those resources you already have, save for the future, get more resources for future use.

Don't be ignorant about what you have in your control, get education so your knowledge would grow wider. Think outside the box instead of being contented with the little you find yourself because it will eventually finish. Always remember your future begins now.

It is my pleasure to invite you to this contest. @toflex @kidi40, @basil20 @jozzie90

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@bossj23
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