A Counterfactual Analysis of the Poverty Impact of Economic Growth in Cameroon

Essama-Nssah, B. ; Bassole, Leandre

关键词: ABSOLUTE REDUCTION;    ABSOLUTE SENSE;    ABSOLUTE TERMS;    ABSOLUTE VALUE;    ADVERSE EFFECTS;   

DOI  :  10.1596/1813-9450-5249
RP-ID  :  WPS5249

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

The Government of Cameroon has declaredpoverty reduction through strong and sustainable economicgrowth the central objective of its socioeconomic policy.This paper uses available household survey data to assessthe performance of the economy with respect to thisobjective over the period 1996-2007. The authors usecounterfactual decompositions based on both the Shapleymethod and the generalized Oaxaca-Blinder framework toidentify proximate factors that might explain differences inobserved outcomes over time, across regions and households.The concept of pro-poorness provides a basis for a normativeevaluation of these outcomes. The analysis of changes in thesize distribution of economic welfare reveals that formalsector employment, access to credit, education, and urbanresidence are characteristics that bring significantly highreturns to households. Employment in smallholder agriculturehas a negative impact on welfare across quantiles. Economicgrowth was accompanied by significant poverty reductionbetween 1996 and 2001. But poverty barely decreased between2001 and 2007 due to very weak growth. Over the same period,household investment in human capital took a serious hit.Given the additional finding that the pattern of growth ischaracterized by urban bias and regional disparity, theoverall assessment is that economic growth has been weaklypro-poor in Cameroon. There is therefore a need tore-examine and possibly reform the mechanisms governing theallocation of public resources designed to supportindividuals' efforts to improve their standard of living.