ISLAMABAD: More than 40m Pakistanis - or 22.4 pecent of households - who live in the rural areas of Pakistan are living below the poverty line, suggests a study conducted by the Pakistan Institute of Development Economics (PIDE).
The think tank, which is attached to the Planning and Development Division of the Government of Pakistan, has based its analysis on the Pakistan Panel Household Survey (PPHS).The study which involves reviews of the same panel of households over a period of time.
According to PIDE, in the PPHS surveys conducted in 2001, 2004 and in 2010, more than 50 percent of rural households in Punjab and Sindh qualified as poverty-stricken for at least one period.
Poverty in rural Punjab and Sindh, claims the study, declined sharply from 29.5 percent in 2001 while 21.8 percent in 2004 but then jumped up to 28 percent in the 2010 survey made by the group.
Meanwhile, figures for the rural areas of all provinces show that poverty declined from 27.5 percent in 2001 to 22.4 percent in 2010.
The official poverty line, which is predicated on calorific intake, was Rs 723.4 per adult per month in 2001 and Rs 878.64 in 2004. In 2010, however, this figure jumped up to Rs 1,671.89 for 2010.
Interestingly enough, the detailed analysis of figures seems to indicate that poverty remained relatively constant in north/central Punjab between 2001 and 2004 while in southern Punjab and in Sindh, it declined between 2001 and 2004 and then increased in 2010.
In southern Punjab, the increase in poverty between 2004 and 2010 is much larger than the decline between 2001 and 2004.
The panel survey findings, claims PIDE, shows that around 60 percent of the population is in the ‘never poor’ category whereas the remaining 40 percent have either remained impoverished during these periods or moved out of the category or fell into poverty.
The distribution of 40 percent population, which experienced at least one episode of poverty, shows that approximately nine percent remained impoverished during the last one decade. While 15.86 percent moved out of poverty, 13.25 percent fell under the poverty line.
The results show that while four percent of households in rural Pakistan qualify as chronic poor, the chronic poor in southern Punjab comprise 6.46 percent.
In rural Sindh, meanwhile, roughly two-thirds of the households surveyed have remained below the poverty line for one or more periods.
According to PIDE, the major factors for the incidence of rural poverty are lack of assets (land and livestock); low human capital (education); shocks (inflation, floods, droughts) and high dependency.
In its analysis, PIDE concludes that the data shows that over a longer period.
The proportion of population who ever lived below the poverty line is much larger (51 percent) than the results suggested by cross-sectional surveys.
Second, claims PIDE, moving in and out of poverty is a common phenomenon in rural Pakistan and is more persistent in Sindh and southern Punjab.
Third, suggests the study, one portion of the rural population has continuously been locked into poverty.
The PIDE recommendations to sustainable rural poverty reduction are the creation of assets for the rural poor; improvements in human capital; the minimisation of shocks; the development of rural infrastructure and the establishment of rural-urban linkages through investments in farm as well as non-farm sectors.
Internews
