Vulnerability to expected poverty in Afghanistan

This paper measures vulnerability to expected poverty (VEP) an ex-anti measure of well-being for Afghanistan using a single cross-section data. We measure VEP using household consumption expenditure during 2007/08 to predict probability of future consumption being lower than a specific probability threshold. Our results show that 66 per cent of Afghan population is vulnerable to poverty in near future compared to 42 per cent of the population who currently live under the poverty line. Our results show that poverty and vulnerability vary across geography and seasons and interestingly, areas most exposed to war have the lowest levels of poverty. The results further indicate that household head education, household head being male, housing condition, and ownership of irrigated agriculture land have a positive effect on consumption. In contrast, the fact that the household is rural or nomadic and proportion of family members under 15 and over 50 years of age have a negative effect on household consumption.