According to Encyclopedia Americana (1989) poverty can be viewed from two different perspectives and these two points of view are: (i) “ moneylessness” which means both an insufficiency of cash and serious inadequacy of resources of all kinds to satisfy and meet basic human needs, such as, nutrition, rest, and body maintenance; and (ii) “powerlessness” meaning those that lack the chances and choices open to them and whose lives seem to them to be governed by forces and persons outside their control. From this, it is seen that poverty has various manifestations which include among others: lack of income and productive resources enough to make sure sustainable livelihood, hunger and malnutrition, limited or lack of access to education, ill health, and other basic services, increased morbidity and mortality from illness, homelessness and inadequate, unsafe and degraded environment and social discrimination and exclusion
LITERATURE REVIEW
Vital to the clamour for policies and programmes that will reduce poverty is the issue of the conceptualization of poverty. Conceptually, there three dominant views that will be identified as the meaning of poverty in this paper.
Aliyu, (2002) has specifically identified the first view that views poverty as a chronic deprivation of some basic human needs at the individual or household level. Put differently, poverty is a material deprivation and this can best be measured and quantified in monetary terms. While this conceptualization of