Portrait of Poverty and Economic Growth in the Pagar Alam Municipality 2020

Judging from the percentage of poverty, in the last three years, from 2018 to 2020, it has shown an increase, namely from 8.77 percent (2018), 8.90 percent (2019) and 9.07 percent (2020). The trend of increasing the percentage of poverty that occurred in the three years, cannot be directly related or indicate a decline in the performance of the Municipality Government of Pagar Alam in improving the welfare of its people, but rather to natural unpredictable conditions that occur, such as long droughts and the phenomenon of tiger attacks in 2019. and the COVID-19 outbreak that hit Pagar Alam in 2020. In particular, the impact of the COVID-19 outbreak, this happened evenly in almost all regions of the country. However, despite the enormous pressure on the economy, Pagar Alam's economy was still able to grow positively, amounting to 0.01 percent. This shows that the economic resilience of the Pagar Alam community is still relatively better than other regions in South Sumatra, where almost all regions experience negative economic growth, including South Sumatra Province, which only grows by -0.11 percent in 2020.

The consumption pattern of the people, which tends to restrain consumption due to its annual income, has made the economic conditions of the Pagar Alam community sensitive to market economic fluctuations, especially fluctuations in the price of coffee and tea commodities. It is feared that if the market price level drops, it will make many Pagar Alam people fall into poverty. The coffee cutting program, at least can increase people's income because productivity is believed to increase, and make the community free from the trap of being vulnerable to poverty. In addition, there is a need for a major and real breakthrough to advance the tourism sector which has enormous potential in the Pagar Alam Municipality, and this great potential is still lacking in touch with economic policies.