Malawi, one of Africa's poorest nations, said Monday that despite recent efforts to grow the economy, it will be unable to meet a United Nations set target date of halving poverty by 2015.
"Poverty levels still remain very high" and Malawi will not meet the UN Millenium Development Goals (MDG) target of "halving the proportion of people living below the poverty line by 2015," Ben Botolo, a director in the ministry of economic planning and development, told AFP.
"There has not been significant economic growth over the years to help eradicate extreme poverty and hunger," he said, putting the gain over the past decade at just two percent per year.
The World Bank, one of the major sponsors of Malawi's reform efforts, says the agriculture-dependent economy needs to grow six percent annually to begin reducing poverty levels.
Botolo said Malawi had also made "little progress" in slashing its infant mortality rate, currently at 984 per 100,000 live births, compared with 1,120 deaths seven years ago.
In July, Malawi, one of the world's most impoverished countries, launched a plan to accelerate economic growth to six percent.
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