All the countries of the world have to face poverty. However, in third-world countries the life conditions of the poorest sectors of the population are appalling. Although a prosperous country like Argentina – with enough natural resources to provide to all its inhabitants and make them live in normal conditions- almost half its people lives in abject poverty.

Not all the shantytowns are the same in each city. In Rosario, which is one of the biggest cities in this country, there is a good public education and the public health care for underprivileged people is one of the best in the country. For this reason, entire families from the northern providences, as Chaco and Corrientes, migrate to Rosario. As common as it can be the migration to Rosario doesn't mean that the living conditions will improve for these people. As soon as they get here, they settle along the railroads, state lands, abandoned buildings or old warehouses where they build their precarious homes.

In Rosario, you can see from far away, entire blocks of humble houses with corrugate iron roofs and walls made of tin and wood. The Constitution seems a text without value when you see how poor people live. They cannot live with their basic needs unsatisfied. Without electricity, they stole it from their neighbours. Without water they have to look for it in a public tap. No electric heater in the chill winter, no fan in the hot summer. Its unbelievable people can actually live there. The fact is around twenty percent of the population in Argentina lives in those precarious living conditions. How can they survive?

Shanty People

Poor families trying only to survive - even though they have nothing to feed their children - live in the shantytowns. They just manage to live day by day without a sustainable job which could provide them with just the amount of money they need to support their families. Begging on the streets, "cirujeando" or "cartonenado" as they call it, collecting cartons - or anything else - from the garbage in order to sell or consume. With these kinds of "jobs" they earn just a few cents to feed all their children. The worst of all is that these are often the job that children do. In Rosario, all the kids have the chance to go to good public schools, but poor children leave it to work and support their whole family. Neither the kids nor their parents see that education is the vital key, but they don't take advantage of the only thing they are given to them to get out of poverty: education. They can't realize that the only way to obtain a job is with proper qualification. For that reason, kids should finish school so they can look for a good job to maintain their family. However, how can they ever think about tomorrow when they don't have enough money to survive today?

Horror and Fear

Dwellers – the ones who came from other regions for an opportunity as well as the ones excluded from formal economy by the policies of the 90s - only wanted to survive by getting a job in the construction business or in domestic tasks so they could send their children to school. However, there were criminals, thieves, drug dealers and the mafia who took advantage of these irregular settlements to live comfortably, hidden by the humble houses of honest people. As there are no streets or sidewalks, these shantytowns become true labyrinths where there is no access to police patrols or proper vigilance: therefore, it is common to find all kinds of illegal activities. According to the Medias, there are several cases in which the police officers work together with the criminals. These cases of corruption are common all over the world. Besides, when well intended officers want to protect the people and catch the criminals, they escape by entering the so called "maze" of corridors which no one knows how to get in and out except the ones who are in the heart of the shantytowns.

Even though the heart of the shantytown still remains the hiding place for criminals, nowadays, it's quite difficult to determine who is who. All values seem to be lost. Everyday, more and more young children start dealing drugs and arms. Neighbours steal from each other and follow the wrong path to earn money. What happened to these people? What has become of them?

Imagine living in a place where no human hand is lent to help you, where you have nothing to live on. Imagine what it is like when government and society aren't there when you need them. Imagine if the only available things are drugs and arms. You need a strong willpower to continue going on the right path. The worst of all is that little children are the most vulnerable to this kind of evilness, and therefore, the ones who are most frequently tempted to follow the wrong path.

According the Media, in the core of shantytowns, the mafia provides little children with drugs so they become addicted to them and begin to steal money to buy more or become cheap distributors or dealers. As they grow up, they create their own gangs and spread fear amongst the inhabitants of the shantytown.
There is a beautiful song, called Marrón , which depicts perfectly well this reality:

¿De dónde saco flores

Si no hay ningún balcón,

Si sobran los dolores,

Si falta la razón?

¿De dónde saco flores,

Si nadie las plantó?

Where can I pick up flowers,

If there are no balconies,

If there is too much pain

And not a bit of sense?

Where can I pick up flowers

If none nurture them?

A dangerous and frightened atmosphere covers this miserable place, in which poor people who only want to sustain their family live in constant fear and insecurity. Middle and high class people avoid the shantytowns because they don't want to jeopardize their lives. Taxis, buses and ambulances don't pass along those blocks. Instead of trying to integrate poor people to society so they could live in a more secure and pacific place, they keep separating them from the rest of society. Thus, we let our fears and prejudgments lead to social exclusion, when these people need us the most. To reincorporate them to the social system we need to give a hand, to open ourselves up and invite them to enter our world so they have a better life! They need a job to be able to provide their families with enough money to live decently, but they aren't employed by any one as they are “villeros” (shanty dwellers).

Our commitment

This place is no place to live. Its unfair how so many people live without rights, without people to protect them, without a secure and safe environment for their children! It’s unfair that the children can’t go to school because their parents send them to work instead. Where are human rights for children? Shouldn’t we do something for these people? We can’t continue to look away when we see kids begging on the streets. The solution is not to separate but to integrate. This article may describe the precarious conditions of life of poor people in one city of one country in the whole world. But this is not an exception. Millions of people share the same condition all over the world. Shantytowns are part of the landscape of every large city in Latin America, and developed countries have their own third world within their frontiers. Erasing poverty from the world must be humanity’s first goal. It’s the responsibility of all those who call themselves human beings. There are ways to erase poverty

The government and society should take action! Programs and projects should be carried out to give food for the kids suffering from malnutrition, to alphabetize the children as well as the parents, to provide them with a home to live in, out of the dangerous shantytowns, in order to improve the general living condition of poor people. However, that would be just the first step to fight against poverty. We need to prevent poverty from keeping on growing.

Unemployment is the main cause of poverty. Without a job these people can’t have a decent life. There must be equal job opportunities for anyone and that would be possible only if government policies promote industrial development. The main cause of unemployment in this country has been the economic policies of the last two decades which have cause the national industry to collapse. The problem is, as in many other underdeveloped countries, there is no possibility for our industry to compete with multinational companies. That’s why governments should help national companies in order to give more labor opportunities to the less privileged people in Argentina. The growth of our economy will improve the life of those who have been excluded during the last decades from formal economy. We have the power of vote to choose the candidates that will help poor people. We can organize our own group and programs to help poor people in anyway we can. There is a way we can help. And fortunately in here there are many programs from NGOs or from the government that encourages kids to go to school or provides them with food so they don’t have to work.

We need a fair system with equal opportunities for all, with no poor people starving and living in poverty. The world produces today enough food to feed the equivalent of four worlds like ours, but only part of the world can eat. Isn’t this unfair? Can’t we change this? We can do it if instead of being selfish and greedy, we start being reasonable and generous and understand that there is room for everyone if there is a better distribution of the world’s wealth.