Quarterly Update September 30, 2015 Issue 27 $1.90 international poverty line incorporates 2011 PPPs On October 4, 2015, the World Bank updated the international poverty line from US $1.25 per day to US $1.90 per day, incorporating the 2011 PPPs produced by the ICP. According to this new line, the World Bank projects that global poverty will Still from the World Bank’s “One 60th ISI World Statistics Congress, fall to just under 10% of the world Generation, Two Goals, 60 Seconds” video July 30, 2015, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil population this year. Read more about how 2011 PPPs shaped the new poverty line in the supporting Workshop on Crowdsourcing “How we adjust this materials below: Food Prices in Africa [poverty] line up or down  Press release  Policy research note The workshop "Crowdsourcing Food Prices will have a large influence  Blogs: Let’s Talk Development and Open in Africa - Technical Inception" was held in Data Brussels, Belgium on July 7-9, 2015. The on policy, global aid flows  Policy Research Working Paper: A global European Commission’s Joint Research count of the extreme poor in 2012 : data Centre organized the event, with the and, ultimately, issues, methodology and initial results  Infographics in six languages objective of sharing knowledge about crowdsourcing through ICT for price data human well-being.”  FAQs collection activities, particularly in Africa. Participants discussed innovative -Kaushik Basu th information-gathering methods to tackle 60 ISI World Statistics food security challenges. The workshop was Congress attended by international development Toward Better Global Poverty Measures agencies, the private and non-profit sectors, and academic institutions. Topics In Martin Ravallion’s paper, “Toward Better The 60th International Statistical Institute included strategies for collecting Africa’s Global Poverty Measures,” the author uses World Statistics Congress took place in Rio food price data, ICT networks in Africa, and PPPs to discuss the social effects on de Janeiro, Brazil, on July 26-31, 2015. more. welfare, the need to monitor progress in The World Bank organized a session on raising the consumption floor and counting “The International Comparison Program: the number of poor living near the floor, Results of the 2011 Round and the Way Latest Uses of ICP Results and making inter-country comparisons of Forward.” The session included various price levels facing poor people. presentations that covered understanding Measuring poverty in a rapidly changing the results of the ICP 2011, application of world Preferences, purchasing power parity, and PPPs for poverty analysis, impact of the World Bank Chief Economist Kaushik Basu inequality: analytical framework, new 2011 PPPs on the PPP time series, wrote in his blog about the use of PPPs to propositions, and empirical evidence recommendations of the ICP 2011 update the global poverty line this year. He A policy research working paper by Amita evaluation and the way forward. explained “The PPPs being computed on Majumder, Ranjan Ray and Sattwik Santra The African Development Bank organized the basis of price data from across the makes empirical contributions to studies on two additional sessions on “Measuring world by the ICP means that the PPPs by introducing a preference-based Economies using the ICP data: Regional computation of poverty in different nations analytical framework departing from the perspectives“ and “Purchasing Power Parity is sensitive to the fact that prices in conventional Balassa-Samuelson, and Concepts and Methodology: A Multifarious different nations may have risen at providing an alternative methodology for Outlook.” China organized the fourth different rates.” The new global poverty calculating PPPs benchmarked against the session entitled “Improving the ICP rates are integral to the Sustainable ICP 2011 PPPs. This exercise suggests that methodology in emerging economies,” Development Goals recently launched at ICP 2011 understates PPPs and overstates which marked the first time a country the UN General Assembly. Read more in his GDP, and that PPPs vary across expenditure organized a session on the ICP in this blog, “Measuring poverty in a rapidly percentiles. forum. More information available online. changing world.” ICP Quarterly Update — September 30, 2015 — Issue No 27 Page 2 PPP Infographics Regional Activities A new infographic video released by the Africa World Bank explains PPPs in rudimentary A follow-up workshop to launch the 2015 terms. The video, available in five languages, ICP-Africa activities was organized by the also explains how PPPs come into play in the African Development Bank on August 3-7, calculation of the international poverty line. 2015 at Lusaka, Zambia. The workshop was What exactly is a PPP? Watch to learn. attended by experts from the seven countries and two sub-regional organizations that did not attend the sessions in Dakar, Sub-national PPP workshop, Senegal earlier in the summer. September 14-17, 2015, Abu Dhabi, UAE In autumn 2015, a national accounts workshop is scheduled to be organized to train countries on national accounts ICP Operational Guide instruments to ensure that they can adhere Now in in eBook and printed formats, the ICP to the roadmap agreed upon in Dakar. Operational Guidelines and Procedures for Measuring the Real Size of the World Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) Economy has been completely edited and A meeting of the CIS National Statistical published to ensure the ICP approach and Offices will be held in Moscow, Russian data requirements used in the 2011 round Federation, from November 30 to December are fully transparent. 3, 2015. The agenda will include discussion of the status of the current PPP comparison in the CIS region as well as the review of the ICP in the Media diagnostic tables for consumer items and the (July – September 2015) validation of the associated prices. Earth’s poor set to swell as World Bank Western Asia moves poverty line, Shawn Donnan, The United Nations Economic and Social Financial Times Commission for Western Asia held a regional meeting for the Harmonization of Price Measuring poverty in a rapidly changing Statistics and the Production of Biennial PPPs in Istanbul, Turkey on August 11-13, 2015. world, Kaushik Basu, World Bank Blogs The workshop hosted price and national accounts experts representing the National World Poverty Drops, With China Leading Statistical Offices of eleven Arab countries. the Way, Lindsey Cook, U.S. News & World The main objective of this meeting was to Report discuss and agree on a unified regional product list, consisting of a regional CPI Data point to poorer global middle class, subset, a regional ICP subset, and a global Shawn Donnan, Sam Fleming, Financial ICP subset. The result was a unified list to be Times integrated within the regular CPI work of participating countries and used also for the A Global Middle Class Is More Promise than purpose of computing PPPs for the Western Asia region. This achievement forms a very Reality, Rakesh Kochhar, Pew Research important milestone for the 2016 Western Center Asia regional PPP round and the cornerstone for a regular PPP production in the region. Moreover, a sub-national PPP workshop took International Comparison Program (ICP) place in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates on Development Economics Data Group September 14-17, 2015 to monitor progress, finalize methodologies, provide training on The World Bank, 1818 H Street, NW the ICP tools, and set the future timeline for Washington, D.C. 20433 USA the regular production of sub-national PPPs Phone: 1 800 590 1906 in the United Arab Emirates. The final PPP +1 202 473 3930 results at the Emirate level are expected to Email: ICP@worldbank.org be produced and released by the end of March 2016. Web: www.worldbank.org/data/icp