Editorial – November 2018

This edition tells the story of how two multidimensional poverty indexes (MPIs) were created. One was constructed in Mozambique, a country of 29 million inhabitants, which has become the first African nation to have an official multidimensional poverty measurement. The second was developed in Andhra Pradesh, a state in India with a population of nearly 50 million people, which is the first in that nation to adopt the MPI. This is a significant milestone given that India is the country with the largest number of multidimensionally poor people in the world.

Why does a country make the decision to measure poverty from a multidimensional perspective? In this edition’s interview, Jimmy Vásquez, who was involved in the creation of El Salvador’s MPI, gives us some insights on why the index is a necessary tool for public policy.

In this edition we also explore a central theme: several countries within the United Nations are promoting the inclusion of the MPI as an indicator for monitoring Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 1, which consists of reducing poverty in all of its forms worldwide. We share an article about the recently launched strategy by the government of Colombia to implement the SDGs and how it is using the national MPI as one of the indicators to help achieve them. This makes Colombia the first country to officially incorporate the MPI into this agenda.

Finally, we are offering a new section that will provide comparisons of the innovative ways different countries are using the MPI to guide public policy. In this edition, we show you how Colombia and Costa Rica are using their national MPIs to establish goals through simulation exercises. These exercises promote new coordination mechanisms, improve the monitoring of poverty reduction strategies, and they strengthen governance.

The ‘Data of the Month’ is inspiring: the new version of the global MPI shows that 271 million people came out of poverty in India between 2005/6 and 2015/16. However, the country still has the largest number of people living in multidimensional poverty in the world: 364 million.

We invite you to read Dimensions, a new perspective for understanding poverty.

 

Carolina Moreno and Diego Zavaleta, editors

 

Original in Spanish. Translated by Kristin S. Fisher.

Read 5th Dimensions Issue here.