Indicator 1.2.1 Proportion of population living below the national poverty line, by sex and age

1. End poverty in all its forms everywhere

1.2: By 2030, reduce at least by half the proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty in all its dimensions according to national definitions

1.2.1 Proportion of population living below the national poverty line [1.2.1] (SI_POV_NAHC)

June 2021

National Institute of Statistics (NIS)/ General Directorate of Planning (GDP), Ministry of Planning

Mr. Poch Sovanndy/Mr. Nor Vannady

General Directorate of Planning, Ministry of Planning/Department of Economic Statistics, NIS

Deputy Director General/Director

855 12 931 264/855 12 557 468

No. 386 Street 360, Sangkat Boeung Kengkang I, Khan Chamkarmon, Phnom Penh,​ Cambodia

sovanndypoch@gmail.com/norvanndy@gmail.com

The national poverty rate is the percentage of the total population living below the national poverty line. The rural poverty rate is the percentage of the rural population living below the national poverty line. Urban poverty rate is the percentage of the urban population living below the national poverty line.

Percent (%)

Cambodia Socio-Economic Survey (CSES)

CSES is conducted by NIS since 1993. The survey provides a comprehensive set of indicators on living conditions in Cambodia, covering main socio-economic areas such as housing conditions, health, education, labor force, economic activities, victimization, vulnerability and others. The survey questionnaire was asked for the household and for the household members. The CSES is conducted annually from 2007 to 2017. The sample size was determined for annual CSES is about 3,600 households. Every 5 years it is conducted with a big sample size is about 12,000 households. The last four big sample surveys were conducted in 2004, 2009, 2014 and 2019. From 2019 onwards the survey will be conducted biannually (every two years).

Since the CSES 2004, the diary method for collecting data on household expenditure/consumption and household income was introduced. As the recall method has been used in the previous rounds it was also decided to include in the recall modules. Thus, both methods are retained. The data collection was carried out throughout the whole calendar year, started from January to December. Face-to-face interview using the questionnaire was done and about 15 households per village were selected.

The detailed documentations of the survey, such as questionnaire, filed operation annual and technical report on survey design and implementation are stored in NADA (National Data Archive), NIS website: http://nada.nis.gov.kh/index.php/home

The next round survey: January, 2021

One year after the reference period of the survey, January 2022

National Institute of Statistics

National Working Group on Poverty Measurement, Ministry of Planning and Ministry of Economy and Finance, NIS

By virtue of the article 12 of Statistics Law of 2015, NIS in is responsible for:

• Collecting, processing, compiling, analyzing, publishing and disseminating basic data by conducting censuses and surveys, and utilizing administrative data sources;
• Compiling national accounts and price indexes, as well as economic, environment and socio-demographic indicators;
• Coordination with line ministries as data producers as mandated by the Statistics Law; and

Functioning as the central repository of SDG indicators.

Monitoring national poverty is important for government development agenda, especially for monitoring the progress of National Strategic Development Plan and Royal Government Rectangular Strategy. National poverty lines are used to make more accurate estimates of poverty consistent with the country’s specific economic and social circumstances, and are not intended for international comparisons of poverty rates.

Poverty is a multidimensional concept: The concept of poverty is applied to situations at both individual (or household) and country levels. From both these perspectives, poverty is a multidimensional approach. At the country level poverty is linked to the capacity of the economy to provide a central administration with sufficient resources to develop infrastructures, organize public services and implement development programs. Key economic factors that determine this capacity include: the level of economic activity, the state of the international market, and the currently exchange rate. While the first of these three factors can be directly affected by policy at national level, the latter two are closely related to the global economic context. In addition, social factors are also key determinants of the capacity of the economy to provide adequate resources to the central administration.

The poverty lines which initially defined by using the 1993/1994 Socioeconomic Survey of Cambodia (SESC) in 1997 have been used for poverty estimation in Cambodia until 2008. However, the economic development in Cambodia was remarkable during the period of 1993-2008. In line with the changes, the Royal Government of Cambodia decided to define a new poverty line for the country in November 2011 by using the 2009 Cambodia Socio-Economic Survey (CSES). For this reason, the Royal Government of Cambodia set up the Inter-Ministerial Working Group to examine option in redefining poverty lines. The National Working Group on Poverty Measurement (NWGPM) is led by the Ministry of Planning (MOP).

In 2015, Cambodia’s Gross National Income (GNI) amounted to USD 1,070 which was higher than the threshold of USD 1,025 for lower-middle-income country – indicating that Cambodia has already graduated from Least Developing Country to Lower-Middle-Income Country. This also implies that the current poverty line no longer reflects the consumption patterns of the poor due to the rapid economic developments the country had made. Given this new development along with the survey instrument change in 2019/20, the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (Goal #1: reducing extreme poverty and Goal #10: reducing inequality) and the new formulation of National Strategic Development Plan 2019-2023, the Royal Government of Cambodia has redefined poverty line for Cambodia in late 2020.

Cambodia, NWGPM decided absolute poverty approaches to define new poverty lines: the cost of basic needs, food energy intake, and subjective evaluations (Jonathan and Shahidur, 2009). And then, to compute poverty lines based on the cost of basic need approach: to compute one poverty line for all individual but to adjust prices in different locations (common basket) is used method.

Comparisons of the results from the 2007 CSES with previous surveys in 1993/94, 1996, 1997 and 1999, are not recommended due to differences in the survey design. Fieldwork from the last five surveys (2004, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010) covered 15 months, and results can be reported for both 12 month (calendar year) and 15 months period.

The weights used in the reports from CSES 2004, are adjusted by using the preliminary population projections which give over estimated population counts. The weights in CSES 2007 are adjusted by using the preliminary result from 2008 Population Census. Some provinces were excluded, due to cost and other reasons, in the sample for 2007. The estimates are however, adjusted for the under-coverage error caused by excluding those provinces. A recalculation of the weights in CSES 2004 has been made for the coming analyses to obtain higher comparability between CSES 2004, and the surveys conducted from 2007 and onwards.

The formula for calculating this indicator is as follows:

where P0 represents the headcount index, I() is an indicator function that takes on the value 1 if the bracketed expression is true, and 0 otherwise. If individual consumption or income (yi) is less than the international poverty line (z), then I() is equal to 1 and the individual is counted as poor. Np is the total number of the poor and N is the total population.

The current extreme poverty line is set at $1.90 a day in 2011 PPP terms. The international poverty line maintains the same standard for extreme poverty - the poverty line typical of the poorest countries in the world - but updates it using the latest information on the cost of living.

The percentage of population living below the international poverty line is calculated using either consumption or income data, gathered from nationally representative household surveys. Consumption is preferred to income for measuring poverty, because income is more difficult to measure accurately and can vary over time even if the standard of living does not. However, in practice the two methods yield similar results.

Consumption, including consumption from own production (or income when consumption is unavailable), is calculated for the entire household and then divided by the number of persons living in the household to derive a per capita measure. Households are then ranked by either consumption (or income) per person and compared to the poverty line to determine the numbers of people living above and below the poverty line.

The sample distributions of poor people are weighted by household size and sample expansion factors so that they are representative of the population of each country. This generates an estimate of the number of people living in households with levels of per capita consumption or income below the poverty line. The total number below the poverty line is divided by the total population to estimate the proportion of the population that is extremely poor. This number is multiplied by 100 to derive a percentage.

This indicator provides the proportion of Number of Cambodian population living below the national poverty line among the total Cambodian population disaggregate by sex, age, and geography.

Numerators: Number of Cambodian population living below the national poverty line disaggregate by sex, age, and geography in the year

Denominator: Total number of Cambodian population disaggregate by sex, age, and geography in the year

To align the international best practice concept and definition, the applied average household size and the total of population has been used and the results in general are the same of household-based approach.

The NIS decided to use statistical methods (calibration) to achieve better comparability between the different rounds of the CSES surveys by adjusting the samples to the population size and structure that was established by the national population census carried out in 2008. To mirror the rapid changes in the population, it proved necessary to project the population forwards to 2017 and backwards to 1993, taking into account fertility, mortality and internal migration rates

NIS adheres to the fundamental principles of official statistics and implements the criteria of national quality assurance framework (NQAF).

And Global team of World Bank

NIS adheres to the fundamental principles of official statistics and implements the criteria of national quality assurance framework (NQAF).

Global team of World Bank

The CSES is conducted by the NIS first time in 1993, followed by in 1996, 1997, 1999, 2004, and conducted annually from 2007-2017. The CSES was conducted biannually (every two years) started from 2019 onwards.

Data are available by region (urban/rural) and by geographic location (Phnom Penh).

The preferred household surveys should contain variables that can identify both the poverty status of households and give information on the economic activity of the household’s members, which would allow further disaggregation of this indicator by sex, age, employment, education status and geographic location (urban/rural), and by ecological zones: Tonle Sap lake, plain, coastal, and plateau and mountain.

Disaggregation by Employment

The working poor are employed persons living in households that are classified as poor, that is, that have income (or consumption) per capita levels below the poverty line used for measurement.

The proportion of the working poor is calculated by dividing the number of employed persons living in households below the

The indicator is produced globally using micro-level data on household income or consumption expenditures from nationally representative household surveys, which is reported to the World Bank’s development research group and/or the ILO (for working poverty). Only nationally representative surveys that contain sufficient information to produce a comprehensive consumption or income aggregate (including consumption or income from own production) and allow for the construction of a correctly weighted distribution of per capita consumption or income are used.

Statistical Survey include household income and expenditure surveys (HIES), living standards measurement surveys (LSMS) with employment modules, or labour force surveys (LFS) that collect information on household income. Such surveys also offer the benefit of allowing the employment status and income (or consumption expenditure) variables to be derived from the same sampled households ideally for the same long observation period.

The international poverty line is a threshold used to measure extreme poverty based on consumption or income levels. A person is considered extremely poor if his or her consumption or income level falls below the minimum level necessary to meet basic needs. For this indicator, the line is set at $1.90 (2011 PPP). It replaces the $1.25 a day poverty line measured in 2005 prices since October 2015. And for Lower middle-income countries is set at $3.20 (PPP).

The purchasing power parity (PPP) conversion factor is the number of units of a country's currency required to buy the same amounts of goods and services in the domestic market as one United States dollar would buy in the United States. It is based on the System of National Accounts’ concept of actual individual consumption.

The proportion of the population living below the poverty line is also known as the poverty headcount index (or incidence of poverty orData Sources and Collection Method

In making international comparisons of poverty estimates, there are conceptual and practical problems to address. Potential problems include the following:

• Internationally comparable lines are useful for producing global aggregates of poverty. However, such a universal line is generally not suitable for the analysis of poverty within a country. For that purpose, a country-specific poverty line needs to be constructed that reflects the country’s economic and social circumstances, and adjusted for different locations such as rural and urban areas.
• The reliability of poverty estimates using the international poverty line is significantly influenced by the underlying PPP data, national consumer price indices and their production timelines. Therefore, comparison across contries may not be accurate in terms of needs deprivation.
• Differences in the relative importance of consumption of non-market goods may affect poverty rate estimates. The local market value of all consumption in kind (including own production) should be included in total consumption expenditure.
• This indicator measures poverty based on household per capita consumption, ignoring intra-household inequality in the distribution of resources, and does not take into account other dimensions of poverty such as vulnerability, people’s feeling about relative deprivation and lack of voice and power of the poor.

Cross-country comparisons should not be made using national poverty lines, as these do not reflect any single agreed-upon international norm on poverty. However, when the focus is narrowed to one country and the same poverty line has been used consistently over time, analyses of trends and patterns of poverty may be informative and in many cases more useful for national inferences than analysis of international poverty lines.

Cambodia Socio-Economic Survey Reports: https://www.nis.gov.kh/index.php/km/14-cses/12-cambodia-socio-economic-survey-reports

Official SDG Metadata URL

World Bank - https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/metadata/files/Metadata-01-01-01a.pdf

ILO - https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/metadata/files/Metadata-01-01-01b.pdf

Internationally agreed methodology and guideline URL

World Bank. Povcalnet Online Poverty Analysis Tool. Washington, DC. Internet Site http://iresearch.worldbank.org/PovcalNet/povOnDemand.aspx

World Bank (2015). A Measured Approach to Ending Poverty and Boosting Shared Prosperity: Concepts, Data, and the Twin Goals. Washington DC. https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/20384/9781464803611.pdf

Other references:

http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2015/10/25114899/global-count-extremepoor-2012-data-issues-methodology-initial-results

International Labor Organization (2013). Decent Work Indicators: Guidelines for Producers and Users of Statistical and Legal Framework

Indicators. Available from: http://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/—dgreports/—stat/documents/publication/wcms_223121.pdf

International Labor Organization. Key Indicators of the Labour Market (KILM), 9th edition. Internet Site www.ilo.org/ilostat/kilm

Country examples

The National Working Group on Poverty Measurement (NWGPM) is led by the Ministry of Planning (MOP)