§ Mr. BercowTo ask the Secretary of State for International Development (1) what the changes are to survey methods and the revisions to statistical estimates in relation to the poverty reduction target for South Asia referred to on page 186 of the 2004 departmental report; [171711]
(2) what the changes in statistical methodologies are which make it impossible to measure firm progress on the target for sustainable poverty reduction in East Asia and the Pacific. [171704]
Mr. Gareth ThomasThe 2000 poverty data are not directly comparable with the 1998 baseline data in these two regions because of significant changes to the raw data used to estimate the poverty figures. This, combined with the inherent uncertainty associated with the data and the small time period being considered, means the available data does not allow an accurate assessment of progress. However, the data does point to a reduction in poverty. More details are provided in the following paragraphs.
Progress towards these poverty reduction targets is measured using the proportion of the population living in absolute poverty (defined as less than an international $1 a day). The data comes from the World Bank, which publishes estimates in their annual Global Economic Prospects report. Each year the World Bank provides the data for the latest year (currently 2000), and revises the data for 1990.
Estimates for past years can change because additional or updated data is included in the analysis, or the estimation methodology is updated.
688WUsually this results in a relatively small change to the data for previous years. However, this year there were substantial changes to the China and India data. These populous countries have a large impact on the East Asia and the Pacific and South Asia regional figures.
In China, data on household expenditure instead of income was used for the first time (this has not been available before). Expenditure data is considered more reliable than income data for poverty analysis as expenditure tends to be more accurately reported by households than income. In India, data from an additional household survey was included in the analysis. This additional data, and other more minor methodological changes, resulted in a significant reduction to the poverty figures in East Asia and the Pacific and South Asia for both 1990 and the latest year when compared with the estimates available last year.
The World Bank does not currently update figures for the years between the latest year and 1990. Hence we do not have 1998 poverty figures that have been estimated using the additional data sets. This means the 1998 baseline data is not directly comparable with the 2000 data published in the Departmental Report.
There are many problems with the accuracy and reliability of this data. However, it is still the best internationally comparable measure of absolute poverty currently available. DFID is working with the World Bank to improve the quality of this data.
More information on the methodology is available in Chapter 1 of the World Bank's 2004 Global Economic Prospects:http://www.worldbank.org/prospects/gep2004/chapter1.pdf.