ADB sets new poverty line benchmark for Asia
Thursday, 28 August 2008, 16:11 IST
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Manila: The Asian Development Bank (ADB) Wednesday said it has adopted a new benchmark for poverty line that is more accurate and more relevant to the Asia-Pacific region. The new benchmark, called the Asian Poverty Line, has been fixed at an income of $1.35 per day, the Manila-based regional lender said in a press release while releasing its annual statistical publication -- Key Indicators 2008. ADB said according to the new evaluation system, there were probably 843 million people in Asia who lived under the poverty line in 2005. Ifzal Ali, ADB's chief economist, called it a landmark study, saying that it is the first time a thorough sensitivity analysis of internationally comparable poverty estimates has been carried out. He said while the World Bank's $1-a-day poverty line remains an appropriate benchmark for counting the extent of extreme poverty in Asia, in a region that has witnessed rapid economic growth it might also be time to evaluate poverty incidence using a benchmark that reflects the region's dynamism.
Source: IANS
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