Approaches to assessing poverty and food security

Poverty reduces people’s quality of life and opportunities and limits countries’ economic growth and development. It is not only a representation of a lack of income and purchasing power but also has socioeconomic dimensions such as the ability to access services, decent work and opportunities. The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 1 aims to eradicate extreme poverty by 2030. Effective poverty measurement helps countries determine whether poor people’s incomes and living standards are acceptable and shape poverty interventions and policies. Notably, the current pandemic-related job losses, health crises and food insecurity require relevant poverty measurement tools to assess the adverse impact of the pandemic on vulnerable populations and develop strategies to support, rehabilitate and build resilience at the community level. This chapter reviewed several empirical poverty measures, including the Foster-Greer-Thorbecke class of poverty measures, Sen-Shorrocks-Thon index, asset-based poverty measures and the multidimensional measures of poverty.