Belize’s Poverty Rate Drops Over Ten Percent, According to SIB’s Multi-Dimensional Index

Between September 2021 and September 2023, the percentage of Belizeans living in poverty reduced by just over ten percent according to the Statistical Institute of Belize. But what is poverty and how is it measured? The SIB’s Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index analyzes several factors for households to determine whether or not they are multi-dimensionally poor. Director General of the SIB, Diana Castillo Trejo explained that in 2021, 36.6 percent of Belizeans were considered multi-dimensionally poor, but in 2023, the number was down to 26. 4percent. 

Diana Castillo Trejo, Director General, Statistical Institute of Belize: “We collect information on households’ access to certain basic services, how they fare out  with respect to certain aspects of living conditions, employment situation and so on. We have 17 specific indicators that form the MPI. These indicators cover four dimensions of well-being, which would be health, education, living standards and employment. Each of these we give equal importance to them and so whether or not a household is considered to be multidimensionally poor just depends on how many of these accumulated indicators they are deprived in. Between September 2021, which was the first set of MPI results that we published, and September 2023 we have seen a reduction in the incidence of poverty. This is the percent of persons who are multidimensionally poor out of the whole population. So in 2021 that was 36.5, about one-third of the population, and in September 2023 this has gone down to 26.4, a little bit more than one-fourth of the population. So in terms of how many persons or what percent of the population is multidimensionally poor we have seen a notable drop there. However, when we look at intensity, which basically tells us how many of these accumulated deprivations a poor household has, there was very little change there. So in 2021 the intensity was 39.2% and in 2023 it has inched down just slightly to 38.4%. So gains with respect to the percent of persons who are poor but those who are poor are still experiencing poverty more or less to the same degree.”

Castillo-Trejo went on to say that access to the internet and sanitation were among the common factors of households deemed to be multi-dimensionally poor.

Diana Castillo Trejo, Director General, Statistical Institute of Belize: “We are definitely seeing fewer persons who are poor. So in terms of the intensity perhaps that one is a little bit slower to catch up but definitely there are gains in terms of the number of persons who are poor. There’s an improvement there. Now with respect to the areas in which we see persons experiencing poverty in or what indicators contribute to multidimensional poverty, access to internet is the largest one. We saw this in 2021 as well followed by improved sanitation and ownership of assets. Those are the three that contribute the most and then on the other end of the spectrum access to health and unemployment contribute the least, meaning that these are the indicators where we have the least poor households having a deprivation in these indicators. With respect now to gains from 2021 to 2023, we saw clearly that in terms of the indicators the reduction in multidimensional poverty was linked to lower unemployment, lower underemployment, lower food insecurity and improvements with respect to the use of unsafe cooking fuels.”

The SIB also noted that the Toledo district recorded the highest percentage of multi-dimensionally poor persons at 57.5 percent, while the Belize District registered the lowest at 8.6 percent. Meanwhile, Cayo, Belize, and Orange Walk saw the largest declines in the incidence of poverty, with reductions of 12.4 percentage points, 12.1 percentage points, and 10 percentage points, respectively.