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Poverty has remained largely unabated in Nigeria despite the efforts made in tackling it. Previous studies on poverty focused on total expenditure and did not adequately cater for regional differences in prices, needs, tastes and preferences. This study, therefore, examined the incidence, depth and severity of food poverty in Nigeria and produced a food poverty profile for the country based on zone-specific food poverty lines. The study used data from National Bureau of Statistics' Nigeria Living Standard Survey, 2004. Linear programming technique in the spirit of the Food-Energy-Intake (FEI) approach, and the Foster-Greer-Thorbecke (FGT) index were utilized. The estimates of the study showed, among other things, that food poverty lines varied across zones, and food poverty was pervasive in the country and varied across zones. Thus policies and programs that will adequately increase people's access to food and minimize the incidence of food poverty in Nigeria should be adopted.

This paper proposes a new way of establishing a food poverty line taking into account regional food preferences and prices. It uses this poverty line to derive a food poverty measure which satisfies the desirable fundamental properties of such measures and has the additional advantage of being additively decomposable. The measurement of food poverty is further generalized to heterogeneous groups of households facing different sets of relative prices and exhibiting different food preferences. (DSE)

A fundamental policy objective in developing countries is the
reduction of poverty and the provision of an adequate level of income
sufficient to allow for the basic consumption needs of the lowest income
group. It is not an easy objective because resources are limited.
Moreover, the definition of basic needs itself is difficult since these
needs vary from region to region, and over time. Nevertheless, the
poverty problem is sufficiently important to justify the development of
practical measures of at least the biological and physical needs: food,
clothing, and shelter. With such measures, a translation of basic
consumption needs from physical to expenditure units and the calculation
of an absolute poverty line is possible.

Unlike some other countries, there is no legislated poverty line for South Africa. Various absolute poverty lines exist, but there has been little analysis of the methodological decisions underpinning each line. There is no consensus as to which line is best. This paper critically reviews existing South African poverty lines and introduces two new money-metric thresholds. These poverty lines are created according to Ravallion's (1994) Cost of Basic Needs method and use a combination of household survey data, caloric information for various foods, and price data. Our methodology is described in depth, and the implications of unavoidable methodological decisions are discussed. The theoretical foundations of the method are also examined, and it is argued that the lower-bound poverty line is not conceptually coherent and is not appropriate for poverty measurement. The upper-bound and food poverty lines remain worthwhile, however. The implications of these lines for rudimentary estimates of poverty are then examined, using the 2010/2011 Income and Expenditure Survey. ; The authors acknowledge and appreciate the extensive support received from Statistics South Africa. Without the agency's support this paper would likely not have been possible, and we therefore view it as somewhat of a collaborative effort. In this regard we are particularly grateful to Sandile Simelane and Marietjie Bennett. We also thank Morne Oosthuizen from the Development Policy Research Unit, who provided invaluable advice regarding the conversion of food expenditures into calories.