Assets, Shocks, and Poverty Traps in Rural Mozambique

Arbeitspapier

Using a micro-level approach to poverty traps, this paper explores welfare dynamics among households in post-war rural Mozambique. Conceptually, the paper builds on an asset-based approach to poverty and tests empirically, with household panel data, for the existence of a poverty trap. Findings indicate that there is little differentiation in productive asset endow-ments over time and that rural households gravitate towards a single equilibrium, which is at a surprisingly low level. The analysis shows that shocks and household coping behavior help to explain the observed poverty dynamics. The single low-level equilibrium points to an overall development trap in the rural farm-based economy. This is attributed to the long-term impact of the civil war, which has consolidated unfavorable economic conditions in ru-ral areas and limited new economic opportunities outside of the agricultural sector.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: GIGA Working Papers ; No. 150

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Personal Income, Wealth, and Their Distributions ; Measurement and Analysis of Poverty ; Microeconomic Analyses of Economic Development ; Economic Development: Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Analysis; Housing; Infrastructure
• Subject: poverty trap ; shocks ; asset-based approach ; violent conflict ; Mozambique ; Ländliche Armut ; Vermögen ; Schock ; Ländliche Wirtschaft ; Haushaltsökonomik ; Bürgerkrieg ; Mosambik

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Giesbert, Lena ; Schindler, Kati
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): German Institute of Global and Area Studies (GIGA)
• (where): Hamburg
• (when): 2010

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/47772
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:41 AM CET