Connecting the Dots : Transport, Poverty, and Social Inclusion - Evidence from Armenia

World Bank

World Bank, Yerevan

关键词: POVERTY REDUCTION;    SOCIAL INCLUSION;    RURAL TRANSPORT;    RURAL POVERTY;    SATELLITE IMAGERY;   

RP-ID  :  125193

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This report examines the impact of ruralconnectivity on poverty, access to basic services, andincome in Armenia, a country which has found itself in alow-growth, low-investment nexus, with stalled povertyreduction. This study attempts to shed light on the linkagesbetween transport and poverty in Armenia. The rest of thereport is structured as follows: Section 1 explains theevolution of selected social, economic, and demographicindicators for Armenia during the analysis period; Section 2lays out the conceptual framework for operationalizingshared prosperity and poverty in rural transport operations;Section 3 proposes a systematic but non-exhaustivecollection of literature on rural road impact studies inlow- and middle-income countries; Section 4 examinesregional gaps in accessibility to markets and services whichwere computed with the use of the first geographicinformation system (GIS) based mapping platform of its kindin Armenia, and introduces the potential association betweenaccessibility and poverty in Armenia; Section 5characterizes key social and economic indicators in theproject’s immediate area of influence to then summarizehousehold-level outcomes obtained from a comprehensivequalitative analysis and community-level findings resultingfrom a nighttime lights analysis; and Section 6 summarizesthe lessons learnt and the directions for future research.The report concludes with policy implications from thisresearch and directions for future analytical andoperational work on transport and poverty in Armenia.