Report-03-10-08 - The South African MPI: Creating a multidimensional poverty index using census data

The main purpose of this report is the provision of poverty maps and poverty data at provincial and municipal level. In so doing, this report details how the South African Multidimensional Poverty Index (SAMPI) was conceptualised and constructed using data collected by Stats SA through Census 2001 and 2011. The SAMPI, based on the Alkire-Foster method, provides another tool in Stats SA`s ongoing efforts to measure poverty and deprivation in the country. The SAMPI was born out of the desire to develop a new product that could build onto the work started with the development of the Provincial Indices of Multiple Deprivation (PIMD) after Census 2001. Unlike the PIMD, the SAMPI has the advantage of being fully decomposable by demographic and geographic variables; this shows not only in what aspects the poor are deprived, but also reveals the interconnections among those deprivations.

Poverty and Inequality

Published: 10 yearly (after every Census)

Report