Understanding the inconsistent relationships between socioeconomic factors and poverty incidence across contiguous poverty-stricken regions in China: Multilevel modelling

Abstract Understanding discrepancies in the effects of various socioeconomic predictors of poverty incidence across different contiguous poverty-stricken regions can provide new information for Chinese policymakers. However, no comprehensive statistical analysis exists. In this paper, we apply a multilevel model, together with systematic and high-quality poverty incidence data from China’s 13 poverty-stricken regions in 2013, to explore spatial patterns in county-level poverty incidence and to estimate the effects of seven selected socioeconomic predictors of poverty incidence. Our results showed that rural income, urbanization, education (gross enrolment ratio of senior high school students), grain production and irrigated land ratio had a significantly negative association with poverty incidence. Nevertheless, in different regions, some predictors had larger effects on poverty incidence than others. Targeted region-specific poverty-alleviation policies based on these findings could effectively support on-going poverty reduction efforts in China.