IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/imf/imfwpa/2002-114.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Poverty in a Wealthy Economy: The Case of Nigeria

Author

Listed:
  • Sudharshan Canagarajah
  • Mr. Saji Thomas

Abstract

This paper describes the nature and evolution of poverty in Nigeria between 1985 and 1992. It highlights the potential wealth of the Nigerian economy and examines how the economic policies pursued in the 1980s and 1990s impacted economic growth and welfare. The headcount measure of poverty in Nigeria declined from 43 percent to 34 percent between 1985 and 1992. Decomposing the factors causing the reduction in poverty shows that the overall decline of 9 percentage point was the net result of a 14 percentage point decline owing to the growth factor and a 5 percentage point increase owing to the income distribution factor. The paper proposes that promoting broad-based growth and targeted interventions in health, education, and infrastructure need to be central strategies in the fight against poverty in Nigeria.

Suggested Citation

  • Sudharshan Canagarajah & Mr. Saji Thomas, 2002. "Poverty in a Wealthy Economy: The Case of Nigeria," IMF Working Papers 2002/114, International Monetary Fund.
    • Handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2002/114
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.imf.org/external/pubs/cat/longres.aspx?sk=15789
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Atkinson, A B, 1987. "On the Measurement of Poverty," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 55(4), pages 749-764, July.
    2. International Monetary Fund, 1998. "Nigeria: Selected Issues and Statistical Appendix," IMF Staff Country Reports 1998/078, International Monetary Fund.
    3. Foster, James & Greer, Joel & Thorbecke, Erik, 1984. "A Class of Decomposable Poverty Measures," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(3), pages 761-766, May.
    4. Ravallion, M., 1992. "Poverty Comparisons - A Guide to Concepts and Methods," Papers 88, World Bank - Living Standards Measurement.
    5. Baker, Judy L. & Grosh, Margaret E., 1994. "Poverty reduction through geographic targeting: How well does it work?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 22(7), pages 983-995, July.
    6. Datt, Gaurav*Ravallion, Martin, 1990. "Regional disparities, targeting, and poverty in India," Policy Research Working Paper Series 375, The World Bank.
    7. Besley, Timothy J & Kanbur, S M Ravi, 1988. "Food Subsidies and Poverty Alleviation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 98(392), pages 701-719, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Omilola, Babatunde, 2009. "Estimating the impact of agricultural technology on poverty reduction in rural Nigeria:," IFPRI discussion papers 901, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    2. Dr. ADEKOYA, Olusoji Adetayo, 2014. "Analysis of Farm Households Poverty Status in Ogun States, Nigeria," Asian Economic and Financial Review, Asian Economic and Social Society, vol. 4(3), pages 325-340, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Christophe Muller & Sami Bibi, 2006. "Focused Targeting Against Poverty Evidence From Tunisia," Working Papers. Serie AD 2006-01, Instituto Valenciano de Investigaciones Económicas, S.A. (Ivie).
    2. Christophe Muller, 2007. "Anti-Poverty Transfers without Riots in Tunisia," Working Papers DT/2007/08, DIAL (Développement, Institutions et Mondialisation).
    3. Duclos, Jean-Yves & Makdissi, Paul & Wodon, Quentin, 2005. "Poverty-dominant program reforms: the role of targeting and allocation rules," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 53-73, June.
    4. Canagarajan, Sudharshan & Ngwafon, John & Thomas, Saji, 1997. "The evolution of poverty and welfare in Nigeria, 1985-92," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1715, The World Bank.
    5. Miguel Székely, 1997. "Opciones de políticas para la paliación de la pobreza," Research Department Publications 4063, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    6. Miguel Székely, 1997. "Policy Options for Poverty Alleviation," Research Department Publications 4062, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
    7. Duclos, Jean-Yves & Makdissi, Paul & Wodon, Quentin, 2003. "Poverty-Efficient Transfer Programs: The Role of Targeting and Allocation Rules," Cahiers de recherche 0305, CIRPEE.
    8. Christophe Muller, 2008. "Anti-Poverty Transfers and Spatial Prices in Tunisia," Discussion Papers 08/13, University of Nottingham, CREDIT.
    9. Székely, Miguel, 1997. "Policy Options for Poverty Alleviation," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 1277, Inter-American Development Bank.
    10. B. Essama‐Nssah & Peter J. Lambert, 2009. "Measuring Pro‐Poorness: A Unifying Approach With New Results," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 55(3), pages 752-778, September.
    11. Paul Makdissi & Quentin Wodon, 2000. "Consumption Dominance Curves: Testing for the Impact of Tax Reforms on Poverty," Cahiers de recherche 00-05, Departement d'économique de l'École de gestion à l'Université de Sherbrooke.
    12. Norbert R. Schady, 2002. "Picking the Poor: Indicators for Geographic Targeting in Peru," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 48(3), pages 417-433, September.
    13. Higgins, Sean & Lustig, Nora, 2016. "Can a poverty-reducing and progressive tax and transfer system hurt the poor?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C), pages 63-75.
    14. repec:dau:papers:123456789/4334 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. ALi Abdel Gadir Ali, "undated". "Poverty in the Arab Region: A Selective Review," API-Working Paper Series 0402, Arab Planning Institute - Kuwait, Information Center.
    16. Stefan Wachter & Sebastian Galiani, 2006. "Optimal income support targeting," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 13(6), pages 661-684, November.
    17. Kanbur, Ravi & Keen, Michael & Tuomala, Matti, 1994. "Optimal non-linear income taxation for the alleviation of income-poverty," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 38(8), pages 1613-1632, October.
    18. Christophe Muller, 2008. "The Measurement Of Poverty With Geographical And Intertemporal Price Dispersion: Evidence From Rwanda," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 54(1), pages 27-49, March.
    19. Quisumbing, Agnes R. & Haddad, Lawrence James & Peña, Christine, 2001. "Are women overrepresented among the poor?," FCND discussion papers 115, International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).
    20. Ravallion, Martin, 1991. "The challenging arithmetic of poverty in Bangladesh," Policy Research Working Paper Series 586, The World Bank.
    21. Kanbur, Ravi, 2000. "Income distribution and development," Handbook of Income Distribution, in: A.B. Atkinson & F. Bourguignon (ed.), Handbook of Income Distribution, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 13, pages 791-841, Elsevier.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:imf:imfwpa:2002/114. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Akshay Modi (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/imfffus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.