Incidence, depth and severity of poverty in Southern Ethiopia: understanding the demographics and micro level factors in the densely populated and fastest growing City of the Region (Hawassa)

Tsigereda Beyene, South Regional Government Economic and Finance Office, Ethiopia
Nigatu R. Geda, Hawassa University and University of Saskatchwan

This crossectional study examined the status of household poverty in terms of incidence, gaps and severity ( P0, P1, and P2 ) in the capital of Southern Ethiopia (Hawassa) and identify the key predictors of poverty severity based on 311 randomly selected households. The Cost of Basic Needs approach (CBN) was employed to estimate the poverty line of the sampled households, and the main predictors of poverty severity were examined using the Tobit regression model. The values of the three indices were high (43%, 24 % and 15% respectively) compared to some previous studies conducted in Ethiopia. Five variables were found to predict the poverty severity level at different p values (p< 0.05): age of household head, number of dependent household members, household size, education of household head and quality of house owned/lived. Finally, the study highlighted periodic review on the problem and strengthen the poverty alleviation strategies to better address the heterogeneous population.