Calorie-based poverty line
Also called: Calorie norm · Topic: Poverty and Inequality: Measurement and Policy · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
A calorie-based poverty line is the money a person must spend to get a minimum number of calories a day. In India, the Alagh Task Force (1979) set the norms at 2,400 kcal in rural areas and 2,100 kcal in urban areas per person per day. Later years were updated only for prices, so the basket of goods stayed frozen at its 1973-74 level. The Lakdawala Expert Group (1993) kept this basket but made the lines state-specific. It updated rural lines with CPI-AL (Consumer Price Index for Agricultural Labourers) and urban lines with CPI-IW (Consumer Price Index for Industrial Workers).
Example
The Alagh lines were ₹49.09 rural and ₹56.64 urban per person per month at 1973-74 prices. The Tendulkar group (2009) dropped the calorie anchor because of the "calorie puzzle" pointed out by Deaton and Drèze. Real spending rose, but calorie intake fell, probably because people did less heavy manual work and ate a more varied diet. So a calorie anchor mis-measures poverty.
Don't confuse with
- Rangarajan (2014) normative basket: it also used calories (2,155 rural and 2,090 urban), but added protein and fat norms and essential non-food spending. It was never formally adopted.