Commissioned Report Reality Check Approach Sub-Report 1 Understanding Poverty from the Perspectives of People Living in Poverty: Indonesia

February 2015

Authors: Reality Check Approach Plus project team

This study examines poverty from the perspectives of those experiencing it themselves. By living with ordinary people in Eastern Indonesia, the Reality Check Approach study team heard about, experienced, observed and learned about poverty first hand. The report documents the views of more than 1,300 people through more than 1,200 hours of detailed conversations. Ordinary people easily identify and agree on who are the poorest in their communities. They also highlight the increasing importance of access to cash as a key determinant of well-being, noting that those who cannot earn cash, especially in areas where there is little opportunity for local informal cash earning, are particularly vulnerable. The dynamic nature of poverty resulting from crises but also from family life cycles is emphasised. When particular groups live as a minority in a given context they often experience exclusion and are more likely to have been left out of surveys and distribution of benefits. The study concludes that the current means to determine poverty are not considered by ordinary people to be consistent with contemporary experience and the poorest ‘families in need’ are not automatically getting social assistance.

The mission of the National Team for the Acceleration of Poverty Reduction (Tim Nasional Percepatan Penanggulangan Kemiskinan or TNP2K) is to coordinate poverty alleviation policies in Indonesia. As part of its tasks, TNP2K conducts and commissions research reports and studies with the objective of facilitating and informing evidence based policy planning (http://www.tnp2k.go.id).

This is a report of only part of the findings of the Reality Check Approach study carried out in June and July 2014. It provides the findings on poor people’s perspectives on poverty. Sub-report 2 provides findings on poor people’s perspectives on social assistance programmes.

This work is the product of the staff of the Reality Check Approach Plus Project. The findings, interpretations and conclusions are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Team for the Acceleration of Poverty Reduction, the Government of Indonesia or the Government of Australia.

Suggested citation: The Reality Check Plus project team. 2015. ‘Reality Check Approach Sub-report 1: Understanding poverty from the perspective of people living in poverty’. Jakarta: Effective Development Group in collaboration with Tim Nasional Percepatan Penanggulangan Kemiskinan (TNP2K)

Support for this publication was provided by the Australian Government through the Poverty Reduction Support Facility (PRSF)

You are free to copy, distribute and transmit this work for non-commercial purposes.

To request copies of the report or for more information, please contact the TNP2K Knowledge Management Unit (kmu@tnp2k.go.id). The report is also available on the TNP2K website.