POVERTY

Mr. Chesco Habili

+255 627 496 434
 Meaning of Poverty
 Poverty is a multidimensional concept that can be
viewed in terms of income and non-income
perspectives.
 Income poverty
 Involves lack of savings
 Predominantly rural life
 Non-income poverty
 Lack of access to basic needs & social services, e.g. food,
health, safe water, shelter etc.
 Lack of personal justice & freedom, empowerment to
participate in the political process & in decisions
 Poor relations
 Generally, poverty can be viewed as the situation
that keeps an individual from leading the kind
of life that everyone values (decent life).
 This manifests in:
Lack of adequate food and shelter, education,
health services and clothing;
Vulnerability to ill health, economic crisis /
shocks, natural disasters etc.
 It is an economic state where people
experience scarcity or lack of certain
commodities that are required for the lives of
human beings like money and material things.
 Therefore, poverty is a multifaceted concept in
clusive of social, economic and political
elements.
 Classification of Poverty
 It is complex to define poverty. Because it
depends on multifaceted and multidimensional
elements like region, era, geographical
condition, circumstances and many more.
 On the basis of social, economical and
political aspects, there are different ways
to identify the type of Poverty:
 Absolute Poverty Vs Relative Poverty
 Situational Poverty Vs Generational Poverty
 Rural Poverty Vs Urban Poverty
• Absolute Poverty: Also known as extreme
poverty or abject poverty, it involves the
scarcity of basic food, clean water, health,
shelter, education and information. Those who
belong to absolute poverty tend to struggle to
live and experience a lot of child deaths from
preventable diseases like malaria, cholera and
water-contamination related diseases. Absolute
Poverty is usually uncommon in developed
countries.
• "It is a condition so limited by malnutrition,
illiteracy, disease, squalid surroundings, high
infant mortality, and low life expectancy as to
be beneath any reasonable definition of human
decency." Said by Robert McNamara, the
former president of the World Bank
• Relative Poverty: It is defined from the social
perspective that is living standard compared to
the economic standards of population living in
surroundings. Hence it is a measure of income
inequality. For example, a family can be
considered poor if it cannot afford vacations,
or cannot buy presents for children at
Christmas, or cannot send its young to the
university.
 A condition in which basic needs might be met
but where there is an inability to meet perceive
d needs and desires in addition to basic needs.
 It takes into account the welfare distribution of
the whole society/living standards of the broad
er community.
 Usually, relative poverty is measured as the per
centage of the population with income less tha
n some fixed proportion of median income.
• Situational Poverty: It is a temporary type of
poverty based on occurrence of an adverse
event like environmental disaster, job loss and
severe health problems. People can help
themselves even with a small assistance, as the
poverty comes because of unfortunate event.
 Generational Poverty: It is handed over to indivi
dual and families from one generation to the one.
This is more complicated as there is no escape be
cause the people are trapped in its cause and unab
le to access the tools required to get out of it.
“Occurs in families where at least two generations
have been born into poverty. Families living in th
is type of poverty are not equipped with the tools t
o move out of their situation” (Jensen, 2009).
 Rural Poverty: It occurs in rural areas with po
pulation below 50,000. It is the area where ther
e are less job opportunities, less access to servi
ces, less support for disabilities and quality edu
cation opportunities. People tend to live mostly
on the farming and other menial work availabl
e to the surroundings.
 Urban Poverty: It occurs in the metropolitan area
s with population over 50,000.
 These are some major challenges faced by the
urban Poor people:
 Limited access to health and education.
 Inadequate housing and services.
 Violent and unhealthy environment because of
overcrowding.
 Little or no social protection mechanism.
Absolute Poverty Measurements
1. Poverty Line (Poverty Threshold)
i. Food Poverty Line
ii. Non Food Poverty Line
iii. National Poverty Line
 Food Poverty Line
Minimum amount of food an individual must c
onsume to stay healthy.
 Non Food Poverty Line
Average per capita non-food expenditure of ho
useholds whose per capita total expenditure is
close to the food poverty line.
 National Poverty Line
This is the percentage of people living below t
he national poverty line.
 In Tanzania the national poverty line as in 202
2 was 1.90 U.S. dollars a day.
 Criticisms on Poverty Line
 Poverty Line is a measure based solely on
the cost of food.
It is needed to measure poverty through multip
le factors such as housing, transportation, and r
egional economic differences.
 The thresholds are low.
Current poverty thresholds (poverty line
measures) were established in the 1960s. Thres
holds should vary geographically to reflect var
iations in the costs of meeting the needs in the
thresholds.
 The analytical data are low to find the soluti
on to reduce the poverty.
It is essential to have the categories (sex, age e
tc) which are more affected from poverty. The
n the solutions can be used to that affected gro
up.
 Absolute Poverty Measurements
Cont….
2. Human Poverty Index.
The Human Poverty Index (HPI) is an indic
ation of the standard of living in a country, dev
eloped by the United Nations.
Not only poor countries but also industrial cou
ntries suffer from the human poverty. So econo
mists introduced separate two indices to measu
re the poverty.
A. Human poverty index for developing countrie
s. (HPI 1)
 Percentage of people who are living more than
40 years. (Longevity)
 Adults percentage with illiteracy. (Knowledge)
 Percentage of people who are impossible to acc
ess for pure water.
 Percentage of low weight infants below 5 year
old. (Decent standards of Poverty)
B. Human poverty index for developed countries.
(HPI 2)
 Percentage of people who are not living more t
han 60 years from the total population.
 Percentage of people who are unable to read an
d write in day to day activities from the total po
pulation.
 Segment of people who suffer from income pov
erty. Group of population suffer from the unem
ployment more than 12 months.
 Indicators of Poverty
a. Income/monetary indicators
Monetary poverty measurement may use income
, consumption or expenditure data
Income levels
Purchasing power and expenditure
Low savings – less expenditure
Unemployment - increases income poverty
b. Non-monetary indicators
(i) Education indicators
Years of schooling
Child school attendance - low net enrolment ra
tio, small proportion of individuals with access t
o school
(ii) Health care indicators
Child mortality - infants and under-five, inadeq
uate child immunization, low life expectancy.
Nutrition – malnutrition/poor nutritional status,
food insecurity
(iii) Living standard indicators
Drinking water
 Lack of access to improved drinking water (according
to SDG guidelines) or safe drinking water is at least a
30-minute walk from home, round trip
Electricity
 Household (hh) without electricity
Assets
 HH doses not own more than one of these assets:
Radio, TV, telephone, bicycle, motorbike, or refrigerator
and does not own a car or truck etc.
Housing
 Housing materials for at least one of roof, walls and fl
oor are inadequate: the floor is of natural materials and
/or the roof and/or walls are of natural or rudimentary
materials
Cooking fuel
 Lack of clean cooking fuel
Households cooking with dung, wood or charcoal
Sanitation
 Lack of improved sanitation facility (latrines/toilets) or
improved but shared with other households.
 Internal Causes of Poverty
1.Low levels of productivity – caused by
Insufficient support to the agricultural sector
e.g. poor infrastructure, lack of subsidies to f
arm inputs, post harvest losses etc.
Low level of production technology especial
ly. in agric. sector, which provides most of t
he employment and a large share of GDP
2. Diseases
16,000 children die each day from preventable
diseases such as measles and tuberculosis
AIDS is now the leading cause of death among
teenagers in SSA
A lot of money is used to combat the diseases e.g.
buying retroviral drugs
HIV&AIDS affects:
 material well being (decline in productivity)
 bodily well being, security (fear and anxiety to patients,
caretakers and others)
 social well being - victims avoid to go into public places
3. Poor governance & political instability
 Results into conflict in some countries e.g. Rwanda, Burun
di, Somalia, DRC, South Sudan, Zimbabwe etc.
4. Large household size (Big Family)
Household (hh) size becomes an impoverishing force
when most of the individuals in the hh depend on the h
h head as the major breadwinner
5. Laziness and irresponsibility
Corruption, bribery, theft and tax evasion cost developi
ng countries US$1.26 trillion per year
More than 204m people were unemployed in 2015
6. Internal conflict
Unrests caused by conflicts result in massive loss o
f human lives, diseases, hunger, violence, destructi
on of property & infrastructure, etc.
7. Income inequality
 Unequal distribution of income globally
The richest 10% earns up to 40% of total global inc
ome
On average, income inequality increased by 11% in
developing countries between 1990 and 2010.
8. Culture/traditions
 Traditional ceremonies like marking puberty, burial rituals
etc. (use people’s time & income)
 Bride price –increase poverty & vulnerability through impo
verishment of the husband or husbands family, increased te
ndency for abuse for women, impoverishing young, newly
married couples etc.
 Taboos – e.g. restricting pregnant mothers to eat certain kin
ds of food
Affects their health and makes them vulnerable to death
Increases mortality rate of infants as they are poorly nourishe
d in the mothers’ womb
9. Gender inequality
Women are vulnerable in various spheres:
-Inequality in the labour market
 Globally, women earn only 77 cents for every dollar
that men earn doing the same work
-Lack of control over economic resources (e.g.
land, household income)
 Less than 20% of the world's landholders are
women
-Lack of access to social services like education
 Two thirds of countries in the developing world
have achieved gender parity in primary education
-Poor gender division of labour (unpaid care and d
omestic work)
 Females have triple roles, among which is the repro
ductive role - not counted for in the labour market
 External Causes of Poverty
1.Unequal exchange in international trade
 Low prices for agric. products vs industrial produ
cts
 Trade barriers like high taxation on import goods
& services
2.Problem of refugees
 Destruction of schools & health centres, increased
burden to the host country, conflicts with
indigenous people, environmental degradation,
depletion of food & natural resources etc.
3. Debt burden
Inhibits the govt. to adequately provide social & other
services to the public (infrastructure, education, health
care services etc.
4. Frequent natural disasters
 For example floods, droughts, hurricanes etc.
Since 1970, the number of natural disasters worldwide h
as more than quadrupled to around 400 a year
The annual average losses from tsunamis, tropical cyclo
nes and flooding amount to hundreds of billions of dolla
rs
5. World conflict and insecurity
Every day in 2014, an average of 42,000 people had to
abandon their homes due to conflict
Every minute, nearly 20 people are displaced as a result
of conflict or persecution. At the end of 2016, the total n
umber of forcibly displaced persons was 65.6 million
The problem of insecurity (e.g. terrorism):
Hinders the flow of aids to poor countries
Causes destruction of resources & physical structure
6. Impact of colonialism
The structure of economy, inherited from
colonial masters is based on monoculture system
mainly agric. products like coffee, cocoa, cotton etc.
The prices of the products are very low
people get low income
Colonialism created dependency
makes people feel inferior in decision-making