Other Poverty Study
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Publication
The Gambia Poverty and Gender Assessment 2022: Securing a Robust and Inclusive Recovery
(Washington, DC, 2022-06)The Poverty and Gender Assessment examines the structural challenges to securing a robust and inclusive recovery from the pandemic and sustained progress in poverty reduction and gender equality in The Gambia. It leverages a diverse set of data sources to understand the nature of poverty and household welfare, and highlights constraints to and opportunities for poverty reduction. The report discusses the recent increase in poverty in The Gambia due to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the important progress registered prior to the pandemic in improving key non-monetary indicators of welfare such as school attendance, maternal and child health, and access to water and electricity. Finally, it presents evidence on the link between education and jobs for men and women, gender disparities in labor market outcomes, and the challenges faced by the agricultural sector during a period of increased climate volatility. -
Publication
A Better Future for All Nigerians: Nigeria Poverty Assessment 2022
(Washington, DC, 2022)This poverty assessment lays out the broad development challenges that Nigeria faces, which constrain the country’s poverty reduction. The discussion provides the backdrop for the detailed analysis presented in later parts of the report. First, the introductory section links Nigeria’s macroeconomic performance with its prospects for poverty reduction, emphasizing that the country may be struggling to stimulate inclusive growth: that is, growth that would benefit Nigerians across the welfare distribution. Second, the section examines the proliferating climate and conflict shocks that Nigeria faces, which further complicate poverty reduction. Third, the section describes how the “double shock” of COVID-19 has affected Nigeria, through both health and economic impacts and discusses the recent acceleration in inflation. Finally, this introduction considers Nigeria’s data landscape, explaining how new microdata offer vital insights into the country’s pathways out of poverty. -
Publication
The Effects of Fiscal Policy on Inequality and Poverty in The Gambia
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-01)The overall objective of this study is to assess the impact of the fiscal system on poverty and inequality in The Gambia as of 2015. The study presents the first empirical evidence on the distributional impacts of taxes and social spending on households in The Gambia. Furthermore, it also evaluated the distributional effects of recent fiscal policy reforms in The Gambia. The assessment was based on the Commitment to Equity (CEQ) Methodology with data from the Integrated Household Survey of 2015 and fiscal administrative data from various government ministries, departments, and agencies. The analyses show that while the fiscal system in The Gambia reduces inequality by 1.2 Gini points, it increases the national poverty headcount by 5.3 percentage points as all households (including the poor) are net payers into the fiscal system. Most of the inequality reduction is due to primary education benefits, with a marginal contribution of 0.44 Gini points, and most of the poverty increase is due to custom duties and VAT with marginal contributions of -2.63 percentage points and -2.07 percentage points, respectively. Simulating the effect of changes in the structure of personal income tax (PIT) and the government’s ongoing absorption of the School Feeding Program indicate that these changes reduce inequality but do not offset the impoverishing effect of the fiscal system. Hence, more cashable transfer programs targeted to the poor are needed to offset the impoverishing effect of indirect taxes and make the fiscal system more pro-poor. -
Publication
Inequality in Southern Africa: An Assessment of the Southern African Customs Union
(Washington, DC, 2022)The Southern African Customs Union (SACU) is the most unequal region in the world. While there has been some progress in recent years, inequality has remained almost stagnant in the most unequal countries. Using an innovative framework, this report provides a systematic and comprehensive analysis of inequality in the region. The main conclusions are as follows: first, inherited circumstances over which an individual has little or no control (i.e., inequality of opportunity) drive overall inequality, and their contribution has increased in recent years. This is an important concern particularly because this type of inequality is not the result of people’s efforts. Second, lack of access to jobs and means of production (education, skills, land, among others) by disadvantaged populations slows progress towards a more equitable income distribution. In a context where jobs are scarce, having post-secondary or tertiary education is key to both accessing jobs, and obtaining better wages once employed. Third, fiscal policy helps reduce inequality through the use of targeted transfers, social spending, and progressive taxation, but results are below expectation given the level of spending. Fourth, vulnerability to climate risks and economic shocks makes any gains towards a more equal society fragile. Looking ahead, accelerating inequality reduction will require concerted action in three policy areas: (a) expanding coverage and quality of education, health, and basic services across subregions and disadvantaged populations to reduce inequality of opportunity; (b) strengthening access to and availability of private sector jobs. It is important to accompany structural reforms with measures that facilitate entrepreneurship and skills acquisition of disadvantaged populations, and to improve land distribution and productivity in rural areas; and (c) investing in adaptive social protection systems to increase resilience to climate risks and economic vulnerability, while enhancing targeting of safety net programs for more efficient use of fiscal resources. -
Publication
COVID-19 in Nigeria: Frontline Data and Pathways for Policy
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-11)The COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic and its economic and social effects on households have created an urgent need for timely data to help monitor and mitigate the social and economic impacts of the crisis and protect the welfare of Nigerian society. To monitor how the COVID-19 pandemic is affecting the economy and people of Nigeria and to inform policy interventions and responses, the National Bureau of Statistics with technical support from the World Bank implemented the Nigeria COVID-19 National Longitudinal Phone Survey (NLPS) from April 2020 to April 2021. This report draws on NLPS and other relevant data to analyze COVID-19 impacts in Nigeria’s human capital, livelihoods and welfare. It also looks ahead to the broad challenges of building back better in Nigeria and summarizes priorities for policymaking and implementation. -
Publication
Poverty and Gender in Malawi: A Background Paper for the 2021 Malawi Poverty Assessment
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2021-09-23)The paper, which serves as a gender background paper for the 2021 Malawi Poverty Assessment, is structured as follows. It first presents the data and empirical strategy. Chapter two presents poverty data and discusses the intersection of poverty and gender. Poverty by household composition is essential for understanding gendered differences in poverty. From there, chapter three explores gender disparities in economic opportunities, following the analytical framework cited earlier. The authors will then move to potential drivers of economic outcomes: endowments (chapter four) and agency (chapter five). The last section offers conclusions. -
Publication
Monitoring Social and Economic Impacts of COVID-19 on Refugees in Uganda: Results from the High-Frequency Phone - Third Round
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-05-18)The High-Frequency Phone Survey for refugees in Uganda (URHFPS) tracked the socioeconomic impacts of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) crisis on refugees throughout three rounds. The World Bank (WB) in collaboration with the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) launched and conducted the URHFPS. The URHFPS tracked the impacts of the pandemic between October 2020 and March 2021. Data collection for the first round of the URHFPS took place between October 22 – November 25, 2020, the second round took place between December 5-24, 2020, and the final and third round was conducted between February 8-March 14, 2021. This brief discusses the results from the third round. Where possible and appropriate, the results are compared across the three rounds and also benchmarked against Ugandans by using the national High-Frequency Phone Survey on COVID-19 (UHFPS). Detailed results for the first round are available in Atamanov et al. (2021a) and for the second round in Atamanov et al. (2021b) -
Publication
Monitoring Social and Economic Impacts of COVID-19 on Refugees in Uganda: Results from the High-Frequency Phone Survey - Second Round
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-03-26)The High-Frequency Phone Survey for refugees in Uganda (URHFPS) tracks the socioeconomic impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on refugees. The World Bank (WB) in collaboration with the Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) launched and conducted the URHFPS. The URHFPS tracks the impacts of the pandemic on a monthly basis for a period of three months. Data collection for the first round of the URHFPS took place between October 22- November 25, 2020. Data collection for the second round of the URHFPS took place between December 5-24, 2020. This brief discusses results from the second round of the URHFPS. Where possible and appropriate, results are compared across the two rounds. Detailed results from the first round are available in Atamanov et al. (2021). -
Publication
Monitoring COVID-19 Impact on Refugees in Ethiopia, Report No. 2: Results from a High-Frequency Phone Survey of Refugees
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-03-03)The World Bank Group, the Ethiopia Agency for Refugee and Returnee Affairs (ARRA), the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), and the World Bank-UNHCR Joint Data Center on Forced Displacement (JDC) collaborated to integrate refugees in the ongoing High-Frequency Phone Surveys (HFPS) . The World Bank-led HFPS of households seek to monitor the economic and social effects of the COVID-19 pandemic among Ethiopian nationals and refugees. The main objective is to inform timely and adequate policy and program responses. Since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ethiopia, two rounds of data collection of refugees were completed between September and November 2020. The first round of the joint national and refugee HFPS was implemented between the 24 September and 17 October 2020 and the second round between 20 October and 20 November 2020. -
Publication
Monitoring COVID-19 Impacts on Households in Ethiopia, Report No. 8: COVID-19 and the Rural Economy - Evidence from High Frequency Phone Surveys
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-03-02)The COVID-19 pandemic and its economic and social effects on households have created an urgent need for timely data to help monitor and mitigate the social and economic impacts of the crisis and protect the welfare of the least well-off Ethiopians. To track how the pandemic is affecting Ethiopia’s economy and its population and to inform interventions and policy responses, the World Bank is conducting a high-frequency phone survey of households (HFPS-HH). The HFPS-HH tracks households with access to a phone, with selected respondents, typically household heads, completing phone-based interviews every month.