The author investigates the determinants and dynamics of poverty during the five-year growth period that followed the 1994 CFA franc devaluation in Burkina Faso. Results show that the nature and dynamics of poverty determinants are influenced by the spatial location of households and that the...

The arithmetic of poverty in Bangladesh is challenging from a number of perspectives. Counting Bangladesh's poor is difficult to do with seemingly tolerable precision, even just to get some idea of whether recent efforts to alleviate poverty have succeeded. But that is only the beginning of the...

This paper reviews the empirical evidence on the existence of poverty traps, understood as self-reinforcing mechanisms through which poor individuals or countries remain poor. Poverty traps have captured the interest of many development policy makers, because poverty traps provide a...

Growth is pro-poor if the poverty measure of interest falls. According to this definition there are three potential sources of pro-poor growth: (1) a high rate of growth of average incomes; (2) a high sensitivity of poverty to growth in average incomes; and (3) a poverty-reducing pattern of...

The authors characterize poverty in Sri Lanka, using data from two recent household surveys (for 1985-86 and1990-91). Poverty rates in 1990-91 were highest in the rural sector and lowest in the estate sector, with the urban sector in between. Between 1985-86 and 1990-91, national poverty...

The authors present new estimates of the extent of the developing world's progress against poverty. By the frugal $1 a day standard, they find that there were 1.1 billion poor in 2001-almost 400 million fewer than 20 years earlier. Over the same period, the number of poor declined by more than...

In March 2001, the Government of Vietnam produced an Interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (I-PRSP), and announced its intention to develop a Comprehensive Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (CPRGS) by the end of April 2002. In the I-PRSP, the Government outlined its commitment to involve a...

Cote d'Ivoire conducted household surveys between 1985 and 1995, making it possible to trace changes in urban and rural poverty and changes in poverty among different socioeconomic groups. During the decade surveyed, the country experienced a major recession. Poverty increased substantially and...

More effective development aid could greatly improve poverty reduction in the areas where poverty reduction is expected to lag: Sub-Saharan Africa, Eastern Europe, and Central Asia. Even more potent would be significant policy reform in the countries themselves. The authors develop a model of...

The authors show how subjective poverty lines can be derived using simple qualitative assessments of perceived consumption adequacy, based on a household survey. Respondents were asked whether their consumption of food, housing, and clothing was adequate for their family's needs. The author's...