Child Poverty and Deprivation in Mali

Abstract

This study provides the first ever estimates of national child deprivation rates in Mali using the Multiple Overlapping Deprivations Approach (MODA) pioneered by UNICEF. Deprivations are defined according to the age of the child. A participatory national process led to the selection of four distinct age groups and a set of deprivation dimensions for each age group. The age groups are 0-23 months, 24-59 months, 5-14 years and 15-17 years. The younger age groups have 7 dimensions of deprivation while the older age groups have 6 dimensions. The national child deprivation rate is 50%, slightly higher than the national (monetary) child poverty rate of 46%. The deprivation rate is based on a threshold of 4 for children 0-59 months and 3 for children 5-17 years. The deprivation headcount is 60% in rural areas versus 16% in urban areas. The highest deprivation headcounts are found in Kidal (73%), Tombouctou (72%) and Mopti (68%). The headcount is 9% in Bamako. The overlap of children who are both poor and deprived is 29% of all children, hence not all children who are deprived are living in poor households as defined by the national poverty line. Only 58% of children who are deprived live in poor households. Similarly, only 62% of children in poor households are multidimensionally deprived. Consequently, policies that are targeted exclusively on monetary poverty will miss children who are deprived. Across regions in Mali the correlation between deprivation and poverty rates is uneven. The highest monetary poverty rate is in Sikasso (86%) where the child deprivation rate is around the national average. On the other hand, regions with the highest deprivation rates (Kidal, Tombouctou) have poverty rates of only 16% and 33% respectively. These patterns are related to the level of services available for families with children in each region and underscore the fact that low levels of poverty do not automatically translate into reductions in child deprivation. The relationship between being deprived and monetary poverty is strongest in rural areas for all age groups. An increase of USD 1 per person per day would reduce the probability of being deprived by 25 percentage points in rural areas. The specific dimensions most strongly linked with income are health for younger children and education for older children. Beyond income, maternal education is an important determinant of childhood deprivation, especially in rural areas. Children 0-59 months in rural areas whose mothers have attained secondary schooling are 21 percentage points less likely to be deprived; the comparable figure for older children 5-17 years of age is 20 percentage points.