Absolute and Relative Consumption Poverty in Sri Lanka

This study is a profile of poverty, unique in that its estimates of poverty include a wider geographical coverage than many previous studies, and in that it uses a range of poverty lines rather than a single poverty line. It also provides information on the association between poverty and some characteristics for which evidence was not previously available.

This study is one of few recent studies to analyse poverty in the Northern and Eastern provinces of Sri Lanka, drawing as it does on household consumption information collected in the Consumer Finance Survey of 2003/04. It uses several poverty lines that provide a wide ranging picture of poverty, from the situation of the very poor who face absolute deprivation to the vulnerable
non-poor who are in relative poverty.