Uganda – a new set of utility consistent poverty lines

Bjorn Van Campenhout, Haruna Sekabira and Fiona Nattembo

No 525565, Working Papers of LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance from KU Leuven, Faculty of Economics and Business (FEB), LICOS - Centre for Institutions and Economic Performance

Abstract: Uganda has seen impressive economic growth and substantial poverty reductions over the past few decades. Today, official headcount poverty stands at about 20 per cent. However, recent research relying on non-monetary wealth indicators challenges official poverty statistics and suggests that headcount poverty is about 60 per cent higher. We argue that an outdated poverty line that does not take into consideration the spatial variation of diets in Uganda could explain the divergence. In this paper, we document how we estimate a new set of utility consistent poverty lines for Uganda using the Uganda National Household Survey of 2012-13 and use these updated poverty lines to calculate poverty. We find poverty levels to be higher and much more in line with what other studies suggest.

Keywords: poverty lines; diet; basic needs; spatial patterns; Uganda (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-12
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Published in WIDER Working Paper 2015/129 , pages 1-19

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Working Paper: Uganda - A new set of utility consistent poverty lines (2015)
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