Are households in Kagera region in Tanzania vulnerable to poverty?

Abstract

This paper uses the six wave Kagera Health and Demographic Survey (KHDS) panel data to examine whether or not households in Kagera Region were vulnerable to poverty in the period 1991 - 2010. Using the Kagera poverty lines for 1991 and 2010, the paper examines the extent to which variability in households’ incomes and consumption engendered the risks (as a measure of vulnerability) to poverty. The results show that risk to poverty was relatively low for the 1991 poverty line and high for the 2010 poverty line. This difference indicates that the risk of households falling into poverty tends to increase over time. However, when households in rural Kagera are analyzed separately, the results do not show variation between the two poverty lines, which implies that in the long run, stabilization of consumption is advantageous to poverty reduction. Thus, the government should strategically earmark resources for consumption stabilization and emphasize interventions that promote pro-poor farming.