Resource information
The Government of Cameroon has declared
poverty reduction through strong and sustainable economic
growth the central objective of its socioeconomic policy.
This paper uses available household survey data to assess
the performance of the economy with respect to this
objective over the period 1996-2007. The authors use
counterfactual decompositions based on both the Shapley
method and the generalized Oaxaca-Blinder framework to
identify proximate factors that might explain differences in
observed outcomes over time, across regions and households.
The concept of pro-poorness provides a basis for a normative
evaluation of these outcomes. The analysis of changes in the
size distribution of economic welfare reveals that formal
sector employment, access to credit, education, and urban
residence are characteristics that bring significantly high
returns to households. Employment in smallholder agriculture
has a negative impact on welfare across quantiles. Economic
growth was accompanied by significant poverty reduction
between 1996 and 2001. But poverty barely decreased between
2001 and 2007 due to very weak growth. Over the same period,
household investment in human capital took a serious hit.
Given the additional finding that the pattern of growth is
characterized by urban bias and regional disparity, the
overall assessment is that economic growth has been weakly
pro-poor in Cameroon. There is therefore a need to
re-examine and possibly reform the mechanisms governing the
allocation of public resources designed to support
individuals' efforts to improve their standard of living.
