Measuring poverty trends in Uganda with non-monetary indicators

Type Conference Paper - Wye city group on statistics on rural development and agriculture household income
Title Measuring poverty trends in Uganda with non-monetary indicators
Author(s)
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2011
City Rio
Country/State Brazil
URL http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/templates/ess/pages/rural/wye_city_group/2011/documents/session3/Daniel​s_-_Paper.pdf
Abstract
Uganda has experienced high economic growth rates over the past decade, averaging 5.4 percent per year, while poverty rates have declined over 14 percent. However, conventional wisdom is that the benefits of poverty reduction have not been distributed equally. This paper seeks to examine poverty trends across Uganda from 1995 to 2010 by using non-monetary indicators based on household assets, housing characteristics, and household size and composition. In a variation on poverty mapping methods, we select household characteristics that are available in four national Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) and the 2005 Uganda National Household Survey (UNHS). Using the UNHS data, regression analysis is used to estimate equations that predict household per capita expenditure based on these characteristics. Finally, these equations are applied to the same characteristics from the DHS data to generate estimates of per capita expenditure. This method offers the ability to examine poverty trends more frequently and at a lower cost since DHS surveys are implemented every three to four years in many countries whereas expenditure surveys are more costly and less frequent. Furthermore, this method avoids many of the difficulties associated with comparing household expenditure data over time including recall problems related to expenditure, adjustments for inflation and currency fluctuations, and changes in the poverty line. Finally, the DHS surveys use virtually identical wording, the same questionnaire format, and similar sampling methods, which ensure comparability of survey results.

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