Poverty assessment of farming community in rice wheat zone of Punjab, Pakistan

Purpose. Poverty in Pakistan mostly exists as a rural poverty rather than urban poverty and presents a desolate vision. Rural poverty shows divergence with respect to area, region or any other administrative division. The tenacious rise of rural poverty in the history of Pakistan with some omissions, it affords plenty of material and remains a lot of questions related to poverty in the mind of researchers. The current study focused on three main poverty measures i.e. incidence, depth and severity of rural poverty in the rice-wheat zone of Punjab, Pakistan (Middle Punjab). Methodology / approach. To overcome the existing poverty issues in the area, we utilize secondary datasets at districts, regions, provinces or at national levels collected from Pakistan Bureau of Statistics, Islamabad (PBS). Poverty assessment for the year 2011–2012 is analyzed through Foster Greer and Thorbecke (FGT) method. Moreover, the Logit model is also used to find out the empirical values existing in the datasets. Results. The fluctuations in rural poverty for the year 2011–12 in the existing zone was analyzed by using logit regression model and data source was Household Integrated Economic Survey (HIES). The incidence of uni-dimensional and multidimensional poverty in middle Punjab (2011–12) were 35.38 and 27.40 percent has been seen after estimations. Originality / scientific novelty. The education level, health services, availability of assets, facilities and age of household head are the key factors related to incidence, depth and severity of poverty. All the above mentioned factors have negative relation with poverty measures. Practical value / implications. The decline in poverty can be achieved via implementation of sharp economic activities including the dimensions as analyzed in the manuscript. At this point, policy makers did not pay attention on the key factors that influence rural poverty at regional levels. There is a dire need to make development in basic standards of life to alleviate poverty in a long way in the middle Punjab.