Abstract:
Poverty is one of a multidimensional and complex phenomenon that have multidimensional
social matters on the earth. Along these lines the study was carried out at Ambo district of West
Shewa Zone in Oromiya Regional State with the main objectives to describe determinants of
rural household poverty in the study area. In order to accomplish this objective, the study made
use of cross-sectional household survey data collected from 150 sample households. The data
collected from the respondents were analyzed and discussed by applying FGT measure of
poverty i.e. poverty head count index, poverty gap and severity. Using cost of basic needs
approach; the study found that total poverty line (food and non- food poverty line) of the study
area was about 5606.443 birr per year per adult equivalent consumption. By using this poverty
line as bench mark the study indicated that 55 percent of the households were poor. The result of
the logistic regression model revealed that out of 16(sixteen) explanatory variables included in
the model, 9(nine) explanatory variables were found to be significant at 5% level. Accordingly,
family size, dependency ratio, ownership of oxen, were found to have positive association with
poverty of the household and statistically significant. Meanwhile sex, educational level, saving
remittance, Livestock ownership, and distance from market area were found out to have strong
negative association with the households’ poverty status and statistically significant at less than
1% and 5% level of significance. In line with, poverty reduction policies that are based on this
identified determinants of rural household poverty and targeted groups should involve in
development efforts that could address the identified problem to minimize the rate of increased
poverty severity from rural areas West Shewa Zon
