Multidimensional and Monetary Poverty Among Children in Burundi

Final Report

Burundi is at a key moment in its development and is pursuing structural reforms, as it continues to implement its National Development Plan 2018-2027 with the objective of achieving a transformation of its economic, demographic and social structures.
However, this development agenda has been disrupted by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic as well as the difficult economic context induced by the war in Ukraine. With 47% of its population aged 17 years or less, Burundi cannot adequately plan this development process if it does not know with some precision the poverty profile of this segment of its population. This is especially true since this age group is the one most at risk of being affected by the many poverty-induced deprivations in the various essential areas of their well-being, namely education, health, food, protection, water, sanitation, housing and information.

This analysis is timely, as it updates the child poverty profile based on the 2019-2020 MWIS data, in order to understand children’s deprivations, inform policymakers about their situation, and lead reflections to put in place policies and strategies for the country’s development that aim to address the identified deprivations.
The methodology used is the Multiple Deprivation Overlap Analysis (MODA). MODA focuses on child poverty using the child as the unit of analysis and makes original contributions to the debate on multidimensional poverty by using (i) a holistic child-centered approach, (ii) a «life-cycle» approach, recognizing that children’s needs are not homogeneous during their childhood and (iii) the creation of profiles of deprived children.

This method makes it possible to measure and analyze the incidence, intensity and severity of multidimensional poverty according to the geographical location, the characteristics of the children, the households to which they belong and their mothers, with a sectoral analysis on the one hand and a multidimensional analysis on the other. This analysis also contributes to the establishment of a status report on the situation of Sustainable Development Goal 1 in Burundi.

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