Editing Extreme poverty (section)

==Definition==
===Previous definitions===

In July 1993, [[Leandro Despouy]], the then UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights made use of a definition he adapted from a 1987 report to the French Economic and Social Council<ref>Joseph Wresinski. [https://www.lecese.fr/sites/default/files/pdf/Rapports/1987/Rapport-WRESINSKI.pdf#page=8 "Grande pauvreté et precarité économique et sociale"], 10–11 February 1987.</ref> by Fr. [[Joseph Wresinski]], founder of the [[International Movement ATD Fourth World]], distinguishing "lack of basic security" (poverty) and "chronic poverty" (extreme poverty), linking the eradication of extreme poverty by allowing people currently experiencing it a real opportunity to exercise all their human rights:

{{quote|The lack of basic security connotes the absence of one or more factors enabling individuals and families to assume basic responsibilities and to enjoy fundamental rights. The situation may become widespread and result in more serious and permanent consequences. The lack of basic security leads to chronic poverty when it simultaneously affects several aspects of people's lives, when it is prolonged and when it severely compromises people's chances of regaining their rights and of reassuming their responsibilities in the foreseeable future.<ref>Leandro Despouy. [https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/170999/files/E_CN-4_Sub-2_1993_16-FR.pdf "Preliminary report on human rights and extreme poverty"], 2 July 1993.</ref>}}

This definition was mentioned previously, in June 1989, in the preliminary report on the realization of economic, social and cultural rights by the UN Special Rapporteur [[Danilo Türk]].<ref>Danilo Türk. [https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/64870/files/E_CN.4_Sub.2_1989_19-EN.pdf "Preliminary report on the new international economic order and the promotion of human rights"], 28 June 1989.</ref> It is still in use today, among others, in the current UN Guiding Principles on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights<ref>[[María Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona|Magdalena Sepúlveda Carmona]] [https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/732765/files/A_HRC_21_39-EN.pdf "Final draft of the guiding principles on extreme poverty and human rights"], 18 July 2012.</ref> adopted by the UN [[United Nations Human Rights Council|Human Rights Council]] in September 2012.<ref>UN Human Rights Council. [https://digitallibrary.un.org/record/737029/files/A_HRC_RES_21_11-EN.pdf Resolution 21/11] dated 27 September 2012.</ref>

===Consumption-based definition===
[[File:Poverty headcount ratio at 1.90 a day.png|alt=|thumb|[[List of countries by percentage of population living in poverty|Poverty headcount ratio]] at $1.90 a day (2011 PPP) (% of population). Based on [[World Bank]] data ranging from 1998 to 2018.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Poverty headcount ratio at $1.90 a day (2011 PPP) (% of population) {{!}} Data|url=https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/SI.POV.DDAY?view=map|access-date=23 July 2020|website=data.worldbank.org}}</ref>]]
Extreme poverty is defined by the international community as living below $1.90 a day, as measured in 2011 international prices (equivalent to $2.12 in 2018). This number, also known as the [[international poverty line]], is periodically updated to account for inflation and differences in the cost of living;<ref>Sala-i-Martin, Xavier. [http://blog.ub.ac.id/andanewyork/files/2012/05/World-Distribution-of-Income.pdf "The world distribution of income: falling poverty and convergence period"]. ''The Quarterly Journal of Economics'' 121.2 (2006): 351–397 (370).</ref> it was originally defined at $1.00 a day in 1996. The updates are made according to new price data to portray the costs of basic food, health services, clothing, and shelter around the world as accurately as possible. The latest revision was made in 2015 when the World Bank increased the line to [[Geary–Khamis dollar|international-$]]1.90.

Because many of the world's poorest people do not have a monetary income, the poverty measurement is based on the monetary value of a person's ''consumption''. Otherwise the poverty measurement would be missing the home production of [[subsistence farmer]]s that consume largely their own production.

===Alternative definitions===
[[File:Share of population living in multidimensional poverty, 2014.svg|thumb|upright=1.6|Share of population living in multidimensional poverty in 2014]]
The $1.90/day extreme poverty line remains the most widely used metric as it highlights the reality of those in the most severe conditions.<ref name="usaid1">[http://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1870/USAID-Extreme-Poverty-Discussion-Paper.pdf "Getting to Zero: USAID Discussion Paper"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170830045430/http://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1870/USAID-Extreme-Poverty-Discussion-Paper.pdf |date=30 August 2017 }}, 21 November 2013.</ref> Although widely used by most international organizations, it has come under scrutiny due to a variety of factors. For example, it does not account for how far below the line people are, referred to as the depth of poverty. For this purpose, the same institutions publish data on the [[Poverty gap index|poverty gap]].

The international poverty line is designed to stay constant over time, to allow comparisons between different years. It is therefore a measure of absolute poverty and is not measuring [[relative poverty]]. It is also not designed to capture how people view their own financial situation (known as the socially subjective poverty line).<ref>{{Cite web|url = https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/bitstream/handle/10986/3254/WPS5968.pdf|title = Poor, or Just Feeling Poor?|date = February 2012|website = The World Bank [[Open Knowledge Repository]]|author=Martin Ravallion}}</ref>  Moreover, the calculation of the poverty line relies on information about consumer prices to calculate [[purchasing power parity]], which are very hard to measure and are necessarily debatable. As with all other metrics, there may also be missing data from the poorest and most fragile countries.

Several alternative instruments for measuring extreme poverty have been suggested which incorporate other factors such as malnutrition and lack of access to a basic education. The [[Multidimensional Poverty Index]] (MPI), based on the [[Sabina Alkire|Alkire]]-[[James Foster (economist)|Foster]] Method, is published by the [[Oxford Poverty & Human Development Initiative]] (OPHI): it measures deprivation in basic needs and can be broken down to reflect both the incidence and the intensity of poverty. For example, under conventional measures, in both Ethiopia and Uzbekistan about 40% of the population is considered extremely poor, but based on the MPI, 90% of Ethiopians but only 2% of Uzbeks are in multidimensional poverty.<ref>Dan Morrell.[http://harvardmagazine.com/2011/01/who-is-poor "Who Is Poor?"], [[Harvard Magazine]]. January–February 2011.</ref>

The MPI is useful for development officials to determine the most likely causes of poverty within a region, using the M0 measure of the method (which is calculated by multiplying the fraction of people in poverty by the fraction of dimensions they are deprived in).<ref>OPHI.[http://www.ophi.org.uk/research/multidimensional-poverty/alkire-foster-method/ "Alkire-Foster Method"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140815052310/http://www.ophi.org.uk/research/multidimensional-poverty/alkire-foster-method/ |date=15 August 2014 }}, 2014.</ref> For example, in the [[Gaza Strip]] of Palestine, using the M0 measure of the Alkire-Foster method reveals that poverty in the region is primarily caused by a lack of access to electricity, lack of access to drinking water, and widespread overcrowding. In contrast, data from the [[Chhukha District]] of [[Bhutan]] reveals that income is a much larger contributor to poverty as opposed to other dimensions within the region.<ref>Sabina Alkire and James Foster.[http://www.ifpri.org/sites/default/files/publications/oc63ch03.pdf "Counting and Multidimensional Poverty"], [[International Food Policy Research Institute]].</ref> However, the MPI only presents data from 105 countries, so it cannot be used for global measurements.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://ophi.org.uk/multidimensional-poverty-index/global-mpi-2018/|title=Global MPI 2018|website=ophi.org.uk|access-date=10 March 2019}}</ref>