Poverty Concepts, Trends in Global Poverty and Sri Lanka

Abstract

There is a large body of literature on the concept of poverty in general and its measurement. Poverty has been one of the most debated concepts in development economics and international trade, with the international focus on poverty reduction under Millennium Development Goals (MDG) drawing much attention to its definition and measurement. Over at least the last two decades, the definition of poverty has also been a central issue in policy making towards poverty reduction in developing countries. The reason for this is because poverty definitions and measurements have important implications for poverty reduction policies. A study of India and Peru, drawing on both national data and micro surveys, found that significantly different people were identified as poor in the two countries. This was determined according to two different measurements of poverty ranging from a narrow definition, in terms of the monetary capability, to a broader definition, in terms of the participatory approach adopted by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) (Ehrenpreis, 2006)