Vulnerability to Poverty in Fiji

Raghbendra Jha, Tu Dang and K L Sharma

Departmental Working Papers from The Australian National University, Arndt-Corden Department of Economics

Abstract: In the extant literature either income or consumption expenditures as measured over short periods of time have been regarded as proxies for the material well-being of households. However, economists have long recognized that a household's sense of well-being depends not just on its average income or expenditures, but also on the risks it faces. Hence vulnerability is a more satisfactory measure of welfare. In this paper we measure the extent of vulnerability as expected poverty, and examine the importance of its determinants, on the basis of a household survey for Fiji. We find that in Fiji, vulnerability (and poverty) is largely a rural phenomenon. Moreover, the distribution of vulnerability across different segments of the population can differ significantly from the distribution of poverty. In addition, there is a sizable fraction of the population Fiji observed to be non-poor but estimated to be vulnerable to poverty. Thus, poverty reduction strategies in Fiji need to incorporate not just alleviation efforts but also prevention.

Keywords: Poverty; Vulnerability; Cross-section data; Fiji (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C21 C23 I32 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 34 pages
Date: 2008
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Journal Article: Vulnerability to poverty in Fiji (2009)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pas:papers:2008-07

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