Poverty Measurements

(paper for EBSW)

The aim is to enhance knowledge and skills in measuring many dimensions of poverty and deprivation. Poverty, the core subject of my studies, is defined as lack of opportunities to satisfy basic needs and avoid deprivation of some minimal economic capabilities and elementary social abilities (Sen-Foster, and Townsend) increasingly acknowledged as being multidimensional. For some needs like food the main satisfiers are objects such as food stuff. For emotional needs in contrast the central satisfiers are human relations, while for growth needs, particularly for esteem and self actualization needs, satisfaction derives mainly from the subject’s activity itself.

The interaction between needs, satisfiers of needs and resources will show how conventional approaches reduce all of basic needs drastically, so that the resulting conception is one where human beings have only material needs which are satisfied only with objects. The most fruitful approach to the standard of living however is about human flourishing. Therefore need satisfaction has to include the development of needs and the development and application of human capacities and well being. Therefore objects, relations and activities are general classifications of the satisfiers of human needs. But in this category outstanding role of activities is immediately associated with human capacities, as in every human activity human capacities are deployed. Human development is basically the development of human capacities, but these cannot be separated from needs.

In conventional approaches to poverty time, knowledge and abilities are the resources which are usually ignored. The three are required to promote personal relations, to carry out personal activities which sustain self esteem and educational development. Townsend replaces satisfaction of needs with participation in the ordinary patterns of life, customs and activities. In his definition, Townsend includes as part of the ordinary patterns of life: types of diet, conditions of life and facilities which together with customs and activities, constitute basic grounds in which one has to participate in order not to be poor.

There is no reason to limit a concept and even measurement of poverty and vulnerability to income, consumption or other money metric dimensions only, even when using quantitative means. Other dimensions of poverty, such as related to educational opportunities, mortality, nutrition and health are of great concern but broader dimensions, such as exclusion, the experience of poverty and sufferings from humility, the esteem needs, the need for dignity, the need to participate and belonging as defined by Maslow in addition to factors of bad governance, bad debts, overpopulated or remote surroundings, identity based frustration and isolation are important dimensions to consider as well.

Assessment data is meaningless without subsequent analysis of the information and the setting of priorities. Compiling a problem tree may allow a closer examination of the causes of problems and possible solutions and help to focus on the most significant risk factors. A problem tree is formed by outlining problems and for each problem asking the question ‘why’. By continually asking ‘why’, the root causes of problems may be discovered and priorities for intervention thus become clearer. In carrying out assessments and organising programmes the structure, procedures and capacity to capitalise on previous experience can really improve intervention each time. It is important to assess what did or didn’t work well last time and why, and how we can learn from that.

Two basic points of entry for intervention are access to health and education. In many communities there are considerable possibilities for the health sector to interact with social development. However such programmes have been initiated rather infrequently and rarely evaluated. With increasing numbers of communities now looking toward their own activities for improving health rather than relying on governments there are considerable opportunities for evaluating the impact of programmes which enhance analysis, planning and action by communities themselves. Whereas there is a strong knowledge base on how to enhance participation within other sectors such as agriculture and rural livelihoods, there is little documentation of its impact on health.

Communities are units of conflicts and co-operations which in economic terms is a framework to distinguish three levels, from assets, over incomes generated from these assets to outcomes and capabilities. Households and individuals have assets, such as labour, human capital, physical capital, social capital, commons and public goods at their disposal to make a living. Assets are used to generate income in various forms, including earnings and returns to assets, sale of assets, transfers and remittances. Households actively build up assets, not just physical capital but also social or human capital, as an alternative to spending.

Incomes provide access to dimensions of well-being: consumption, nutrition, health, etc., mediated by information, markets, public services and non- market institutions. Generating incomes from assets is also constrained by information, the functioning of markets and access to them, the functioning of non-market institutions, public service provision and public policy. Poor households are seen in this framework severely constrained in their options by their assets and the conditions they face.

At present there is a shift in emphasis, with a greater proportion of projects investigating barriers to infrastructure provision, maintenance and access, with a particular focus on sustainable solutions and pro-poor ‘livelihoods’ approaches and participatory involvement in projects. Working with local partners facilitates access to local communities, understanding specific vulnerabilities and building trust amongst project participants. Studies are focused on technical, managerial and policy solutions in the infrastructure and urban development sectors that enable poor people to escape from poverty on a sustainable basis.

Infrastructure is found to be the key to achieving the central MDG of halving poverty by 2015. There is emphasise on the importance of an ‘innovation’ approach rather than a more narrowly focused ‘research’ approach. This emphasis has arisen out of awareness that overcoming gaps in knowledge is not, in and of itself, sufficient to ensure a positive pro-poor outcome from programmes. This generic guidance has been effective in helping to shift the focus over time away from primarily ‘engineering’ solutions developed at arms length from potential users, to a far more participatory, action research and innovation centered approach. It has also been helpful in ensuring that projects cover more than one (and ideally all) of the key stages of the knowledge process – ranging from identification of needs, the research and development of one or more viable solutions, the production of outputs and transfer of results, commercialisation or policy implementation and uptake pathways.

Improved infrastructural services can bring immediate benefits in terms of helping poor people to meet their basic needs for safe drinking water, secure shelter, energy, transport, and so on. While research confirms the importance of infrastructure service provision to sustainable development, investment in infrastructure has not always contributed to pro-poor growth. Inadequate attention to governance and institutional frameworks, high levels of personal and political corruption, and weak systems have resulted in a situation where the benefits have often been less than anticipated, and too often there have been negative rather than positive consequences for poor people.

Despite these negative experiences with infrastructure investment, it is hard to imagine how any country could escape from poverty whilst its people lack proper access to basic services such as water, energy and transport. Therefore interventions should revolve around developing an improved understanding of the technological, economic, social and institutional problems associated with the provision of infrastructure

Innovation policy makers have tended to move away from instruments that give money to single actors and increasingly invest in partnerships and, more recently, innovation networks. The idea is to secure the needed coupling between push and pull, to strengthen the network relationships that help innovation and to support the growth of absorptive capacity.

The recent House of Commons Select Committee report on the use of science in UK development policy stresses the importance of science for development, the need for DFID to strengthen its policies and its personnel in this important area, to increase the involvement of beneficiary countries in developing its research strategy and the need to evaluate the outcomes of research.

There is also concern about the guides on dissemination and communication, which while of a good quality and utility, do not help much to overcome the key barriers identified. The barriers to information dissemination, lack of resources, and lack of attention to real needs are not easy to overcome, but their resolution certainly requires more than improved information management and dissemination organised at the UK end of things. Reviews of the literature and experience suggest that research is more likely to be taken up into policy in international development if research programmes develop a detailed understanding of the policymaking process and the key influencing factors, and their relation. Also the nature of the evidence whether it is credible, practical and operationally useful, and see who else can contribute.

Development actors’ terms of reference include assessments, design and implement the programme, and coordinate work with other organisations. Another part of the role is to recruit and train local people so they can take over after you have gone. It's also really important to maintain the dignity of people. For women in particular provide certain privacy. Ultimately what should be achieved is to put households in charge of their life. This is the basis for developing an overall strategy and practical activities for ensuring that the programmes maximise their chances of policy influence.


Sources:

www.Oxfam.org.uk
www.dfid.gov.uk
Ringen, S., Seminar Current poverty approaches, A Critical View, Oxford Univ., June 2005
Dercon,S.,Vulnerability to Poverty: A Framework for Policy Analysis, 2001
http://www.economics.ox.ac.uk/members/stefan.dercon/