Determinants of Poverty in Rural Tigray: Ethiopia Evidence from Rural Households of Gulomekeda Wereda

The study was carried out at Gulomekeda wereda of Tigray National Regional State with the main objectives to describe correlates or determinants of rural poverty in the study area. In order to attain this objective the study made use of cross-sectional household survey data collected by Relief Society of Tigray (REST) from 191 sample households. The data collected were analyzed and discussed applying poverty index, descriptive statistics and logit regression model analyses. To this end, identifying poor and non poor households, examining the incidence, depth and severity of poverty in the community, demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of poor and non poor households and measurement of the dimensions of poverty have been made. Using cost of basic needs approach the study found that total poverty line (food and non food poverty line) of the area is 2094 birr per year per adult equivalent. Using this poverty line as bench mark the study indicated that 51 percent of the households are poor. The result of the logistic regression model revealed that out of 12 variables included in the model, 8 explanatory variables are found to be significant up to less than 10 % probability level. Accordingly, total family size& dependency ratio were found to have positive association with poverty of the household and statistically significant. Meanwhile, farm size, total livestock owned (TLU), value of asset, educational status of the household head, access to credit and access to off farm income were found out to have strong negative association with the households poverty status and statistically significant up to less than 10 percent level of significance