II. POVERTY PROFILE
1. The Planning Commission has decided that the official poverty line for Pakistan will be estimated on 2350 calories per adult equivalent
per day. This is based on an adult equivalent intake of 2150 calories in the urban areas and 2450 calories in the rural areas. The poverty
line for Pakistan for FY1999 on this basis has been defined at Rs. 670 per capita per month.
2. In 1991, FBS started the Pakistan Integrated Household Survey (PIHS) incorporating a broader range of variables including education,
health, fertility and family planning, and water supply and sanitation. From FY1999 the PIHS and the HIES surveys have been
combined.
he declining trend in poverty
Tin Pakistan during the 1970s and 1980s was reversed in the 1990s.
Most of this increase in poverty in
Pakistan has taken place after Fiscal
Year (FY) 1997, coinciding with the
onset of a period of slow growth in
the country. Poverty has
consequently emerged as the central
challenge of development for the
G o v e r n m e n t o f P a k i s t a n .
Recognizing this, the Government
has prepared an Interim Poverty
Reduction Strategy Paper (IPRSP)
which lays down the framework for a
poverty reduction strategy that
ensures pro-poor growth through
macroeconomic reforms, improved
access to social services, governance
reforms and targeted interventions.
Poverty is multidimensional, and
is characterized as much by lack of
income and non-fulfillment of basic
needs as by lack of access to social
infrastructure and vulnerability.
Although a great deal of research has
estimated income or expenditure
based poverty lines, there has been
little systematic research on who the
poor are and how they relate to
private sector markets and public
agencies at different levels. Perhaps
most importantly, there is little
understanding of how the poor
perceive and react to barriers to
moving out of poverty, or the
circumstances determining their
entry into poverty.
This...