Vulnerability to Drought and Food Price Shocks : Evidence from Ethiopia

Vargas Hill, Ruth ; Porter, Catherine

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: vulnerability;    poverty;    drought;    inflation;    climate change impacts;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-7920
RP-ID  :  WPS7920

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

Although the measurement anddeterminants of poverty have been widely studied,vulnerability, or the threat of future poverty, has beenmore difficult to investigate due to data paucity. Thispaper combines nationally representative household data withobjective drought and price information to quantify thecauses of vulnerability to poverty in Ethiopia. Previousestimates have relied on self-reported shocks and variationin outcomes within a survey, which is inadequate for shockssuch as weather and prices that vary more across time thanspace. Historical distributions of climate and price shocksin each district were used to simulate the probabledistribution of future consumption for individualhouseholds; these were then used to quantify vulnerabilityto poverty. The analysis shows that many Ethiopians areunable to protect their consumption against lack of rainfalland sudden increases in food prices. A moderate droughtcauses a 9 percent reduction in consumption for many ruralhouseholds, and high inflation causes a 14 percent reductionin the consumption of uneducated households in urban areas.Vulnerability of rural households is considerably higherthan that of urban households, despite realized povertyrates being fairly similar. This finding reflects that thehousehold survey in 2011 was conducted during a year of goodrainfall but rapid food price inflation. The resultshighlight the need for caution in using a snapshot ofpoverty to target programs, as underlying rates ofvulnerability can be quite different from the poverty ratecaptured at one point in time. The results also suggest thatsignificant welfare gains can be made from risk managementin both rural and urban areas.