Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Coordinating Minister for People`s Welfare Agung Laksono said the government was planning to slash the number of poor people in the country to 16 million by 2014.

"The government has set a target of reducing the number of poor people to 16 million by 2014," Minister Agung Laksono said here on Saturday.

The number of poor people currently was around 32 million or over 14 percent of the country`s population.

It would be a very heavy task cutting the number into only eight percent or 16 million as it is only four years left to 2014, he said.

Therefore, the government was doing efforts to speed up the poverty eradication programs, he said.

He explained that Vice President Boediono last Wednesday (March 10) led a coordinating meeting on poverty eradication with cabinet ministers.

In the meeting, they decided to set up a national team on poverty eradication acceleration program as stipulated in the presidential decree No. 15/2010 and led by Vice President Boediono.

Vice chairmen of the team are Coordinating Minister for People`s Welfare Agung Laksono and Coordinating Minister for Economic Affairs Hatta Rajasa.

The team`s members include Home Affairs Minister Gamawan Fauzi, Finance Minister Sri Mulyani, Social Affairs Minister Salim Segaf Al Jufri, Public Affairs Minister Djoko Kirmanto, Head of the Presidential Working Unit on Development Supervision Kuntoro Mangkusubroto, Cabinet Secretary Dipo Alam, and Chairman of the National Development Plan Agency Armida Alisyahbana.

To support the program, the government will update data on the country`s poor.(*)

Editor: Aditia Maruli
COPYRIGHT © 2012

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