Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/49440 
Year of Publication: 
2010
Series/Report no.: 
DIW Discussion Papers No. 1073
Publisher: 
Deutsches Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung (DIW), Berlin
Abstract: 
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 endowments 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 rural areas and limited new economic opportunities outside of the agricultural sector.
Subjects: 
Asset-based approach
Mozambique
poverty trap
shocks
violent conflict
JEL: 
D31
I32
O12
O18
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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