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Rural poverty in Namibia

Although Namibia is classified as a middle-income country, the income gap between rich and poor is one of the most marked in the world. The government has made good progress in addressing structural problems such as gender parity and access to basic education, yet the situation of imbalance persists. Although a tiny proportion of the population enjoys considerable wealth, overall poverty rates are high. About 27.6 per cent of households are classified as poor and 13.8 per cent as severely poor; poverty is especially prevalent in rural areas.

About 70 per cent of the population lives in rural areas, and about 60 per cent are concentrated in the seven northern regions. The rural poor are typically undereducated, with limited access to health care, adequate sanitation and gas and electricity supplies. Food shortages are a major problem during years of drought, and nutritional intake is consistently poor.

Namibia is unusual in the region in that rural people are less dependent on agriculture than their counterparts in other countries. Sources such as pensions and remittances provide important additional income for many subsistence farmers.

Namibia has one of the highest incidences of HIV/AIDS in the region. The epidemic is a major factor in the incidence of poverty and vulnerability among the rural population.

Who and where are the country’s rural poor people?

Poverty is particularly concentrated in the northern regions of Namibia, home to the majority of the indigenous population. A veterinary cordon fence extends from east to west across the country about 70 to 100 km south of the Angola border to block the southerly movement of livestock diseases. This fence effectively separates the poorer north, where subsistence farming is the main source of income, from the south and its rich commercial ranchers. The highest rates of nutritional deficiencies can be found in the north-east, in the Kavango and Caprivi regions.

The poorest households are those headed by women, which amount to about 43 per cent of all households in rural areas and are more likely to be dependent on subsistence agriculture. Rural women are traditionally disadvantaged. Their access to productive assets and employment opportunities is less secure. They have less control over earnings and property, and they bear a heavier burden of agricultural and domestic work. The burden on rural women is further exacerbated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Other disadvantaged households are those without alternative income sources, those with inadequate access to land and water, and those without livestock. All of these households lead extremely precarious lives, and are at risk of falling into severe poverty as a result of an unexpected event such as a family sickness or period of drought.

Why are they poor?

The social and economic imbalances of the apartheid system, introduced into Namibia in 1964 under South African rule, left a deep divide in Namibian society. The black population was largely denied access to productive resources and basic infrastructure, while white settlers had privileged and exclusive access to large areas of land and strong government support for their farming enterprises.

These structural inequalities have made job creation and poverty reduction difficult. Redressing inequality of land distribution became a priority political issue for the government with the National Conference on Land Reform held in 1991. But since then land distribution has proved expensive and slow. Commercial farm land for redistribution is located mainly in arid and semi-arid areas, and is suitable only for large-scale ranching. In recent years the land question has become more complex and also more pressing. Within communal areas, problems of conflict have arisen between poor farmers and better-off farmers who have fenced off land and access to water points.

Degradation and desertification are increasingly a threat to agricultural productivity. The rural economy is also held back by low demand for domestic products, high transport costs and competition with South African products.

Poverty is exacerbated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Incidence rates are among the highest in the region and the epidemic remains a major threat to the nation’s economy and human resources.


Source: IFAD