Poverty Assessment Methods

In a rapidly changing world, Evidence for Development works to find new and better ways of understanding poverty. Our research focuses on micro level assessment methods, providing insights into problems such as climate change and adaptation, or the impact of HIV/AIDS. This approach also allows policy makers and aid donors to assess the effectiveness of programmes such as cash transfers (social welfare payments) and farm input subsidies.

The Individual Household Method (IHM)

This is a short introduction to the Individual Household Method (IHM). The IHM is a reliable, standardised method of collecting and using household income data. The approach was devised by Evidence for Development to fill a gap in widely used survey methods. It has two parts: (i) a method of data collection which aims to systematically minimise known sources of error arising from the more usual questionnaire based approach; (ii) specialised software designed for data checking and analysis. This can be used by researchers in the field and rapid analysis provides the up to date information needed by decision makers.

Using Household Economy Methods for Social Protection

This paper describes the use of household economy information in the policy making process: specifically, to support poverty reduction and disaster management programmes. It covers the Household Economy Approach (HEA), used to assess the vulnerability of groups of households to major shocks or changes and the more detailed Individual Household Method.