Estimating economic subsistence and nutrition poverty levels from primary data, Bangladesh, 1981-85
Greene, B.A.
Bangladesh Journal of Agricultural Economics 9(2): 39-54
1986
Document Number: 253833
Two indicators were used in the study: the economic subsistence level (ESL) where annual income equalled expenditure; and a nutritional poverty line (NPL) where average annual total income equalled the estimated cost of an acceptable nutritional diet per average household for each size grouping. Across three samples reviewed in detail, 22% of the total sample of 135 Bangladeshi farmers were below the ESL and 16% below the NPL. A further 15% were around the ESL and 5% around the NPL. These figures appeared to be much lower estimates than those found by other researchers. The main difference was that the data for this study were collected from weekly monitoring over the whole season/year and should therefore have been more accurate than the cross sectional data used in other studies.