Poverty Maps: Uses and Caveats

1. Poverty Maps: Uses and Caveats Tara Vishwanath Lead Economist World Bank

2. Uses of Poverty Maps • A visual illustration of estimated poverty indices at DS division level or below (currently excluding N-E region due to lack of data) • Further benefits from overlaying poverty maps with other GIS info • Making a case for reform initiatives • Identifying broad policy priorities for reducing poverty and inequality • Caveats

3. Poverty maps and GIS information in Sri Lanka • Poverty maps • Headcount ratios at DS division level and below - starkly identifies the pockets of poverty • Pockets of severe poverty in the least poor district - Colombo • Headcount ratio versus population of the poor: important for designing poverty programs. • Overlaying other GIS information with poverty map can be very instructive • Remoteness and Poverty Map • Road Network and Poverty Map • Droughts and Poverty Map • Food insecurity and Poverty Map • Impacts of Tsunami and pre-tsunami Poverty

4. Poverty Map (Headcount Ratio) Accessibility Index

5. Uses of poverty maps in poverty alleviation programs: International Experience • Many countries have experimented with different policy applications • Nicaragua: Used poverty map to guide expansion of health services in especially poor areas • South Africa: Combined poverty map with GIS on safe water and a map of cholera outbreak (2001) to identify high risk areas and devise protection mechanisms • Brazil: The most comprehensive use of poverty map combined with GIS to inform poverty reduction initiatives (educational programs, providing safe water and sanitation for schools, establishing health care teams, etc.) • Guatemala and Panama: Combined poverty map with GIS of road network to devise a road strategy and identifying need for roads in poorest districts • Cambodia: Used the map to guide food aid (World Food Program food aid (2001-02)) to alleviate food insecurity

6. Caveats • Poverty maps indicate poverty correlates (such as remoteness/droughts). • However, poverty maps do not identify causes of poverty • Therefore can help policy prioritization but not actual policy design • Poverty maps indicate geographic mis-targeting in poverty programs • Useful for “motivating” the need for reform but not how to design the actual reform • For both, need further careful analyses with well-focused surveys

7. Example in Geographic Targeting • Targeting transfers to poor areas (geographic targeting) is a well known poverty alleviation policy • Administratively simple but politically challenging • Poverty maps are considered to be very useful for aiding geographic targeting • Higher resolution maps locate poorer areas better • May even help build political consensus for geographic targeting (e.g., Panama) • But: Maps need to be combined with other information to determine criteria for eligibility and resource allocation

8. Broader Issues in Geographic Targeting • Desirability of geographic targeting is still an open question • Resources to poor areas do not guarantee that benefits reach all • Cost–benefit analysis of whether geographic/individual or a combination of both needs further investigation. • Room to explore this question in the context of Welfare Reform in Sri Lanka

9. Other Applications for Sri Lanka • Explore scope for using poverty maps to plan infrastructure investments-i.e., roads • Overlaying poverty map with nutrition and health facility map could help to identify policy levers for addressing malnutrition • Overlaying satellite images of service facilities in focused areas like estates could be quite informative • Scope for expanding and improving HIES for higher resolution maps.