Poverty and livelihood of coastal communities in Tanzania Mainland and Zanzibar

Abstract

This article discusses levels and forms of poverty among coastal communities in Tanzania. The objective of study from which this article is grounded was to explore and describe the impacts of global market on the livelihood of coastal communities along the Indian Ocean. A combination of sociological and economic paradigms of poverty analysis was adopted. The poverty analysis focused on three poverty indices namely, head count, poverty gap and poverty severity index. The analysis focused on levels of household expenditures per month by region (rural or urban district) as well as by main occupation of household head. The entry point for the analysis was the household expenditure per capita. Also determined was whether level of education and sex of household head influenced income and poverty levels. The poverty analysis was further narrowed down to household level in order to address the link between the global market and livelihood at the household level. To that end, the analysis focused closely on expenditure by sex, level of education and main occupation of the head of the household. In order to make comparison between currencies, readers should use $ 1 equivalent to TZS 165,342.57 published by Bank of Tanzania on 18 September 2014. The Findings suggest that poverty levels as measured by income are caused by underlying factors of non-income poverty such as lack of assets (mainly land), low level of education, accessibility to market, and poor and weak social safety network (such as offered by cooperative unions). Key words: Poverty, livelihood, globalization, coastal communities, coastal resources.