In 2002, East Timor was the youngest nation in the world. The country had recovered comparatively well after the 1999 disaster, thanks to the support of foreign donors and the direct administration by the United Nations (UN), but it remained very poor. At the time of independence, East Timor had the fourth lowest gross domestic product (GDP) per capita in East Asia, only slightly above that of Papua New Guinea, Laos, and Cambodia.1 It comes as no surprise that it was considered to be one of the least developed countries in the world. East Timor was ranked number 158 of 177 countries according to the 2002 Human Development Index (HDI): the lowest-ranked country outside sub-Saharan Africa.2 No less than 40 percent of all its inhabitants lived in poverty (spending less than US$0.55 per day). Consequently, the development strategy of East Timor emphasized poverty reduction. Education, health, agriculture, transport, and communications were the priority sectors, and expenditures related to poverty reduction accounted for almost 70 percent of the total budget expenditures. The fight against poverty was a major challenge in a country with a very small domestic tax base. Until late 2004, East Timor stood out as a nation that was heavily dependent on donor funds for bridging the gap between budget expenditures and revenues.
Poverty at Independence
Various surveys carried out around the time of independence aimed at getting a fuller picture of the living standard situation. In September 2000, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) released a short document with an āinitialā poverty assessment for East Timor.3 The idea was to identify the key issues that could be used in the process of developing a country assistance strategy. However, the assessment was marred by three important biases. First, the value of the householdsā own food production was not includedāa severe limitation in a heavily subsistence-oriented economy. Second, the survey was carried out before the rice and maize harvests, and finally, the coffee harvest was only in the early stage and the sample outside Dili was small. Together, this makes it difficult to make sense of the findings.
A more substantial effort to map poverty in East Timor had been launched in 1999, as a joint effort between the Timorese government, the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), United Nations International Childrenās Emergency Fund (UNICEF), and the United Nations Mission of Support in East Timor (UNMISET). The immediate background to the project was the destruction of the economy and the physical and social infrastructure that took place in September 1999, in the wake of the referendum on independence. The effort was divided into three separate components: a suco survey, a household survey, and a participatory potential assessment. The suco survey was completed between February and April 2001, and the final results were published in October 2001.4 The household survey was carried out between the end of August and November 2001, and the results were made available in 2003.5 Fieldwork for the participatory potential assessment, finally, took place between November 2001 and January 2002, and the final report was issued in May 2002.6
The Suco Survey
The suco survey was carried out in all 498 sucos of East Timor.7 Altogether, 1465 respondents were interviewed: 434 suco chiefs, 609 teachers, 77 health providers, 139 community leaders, and 59 aldeia chiefs, that is, people supposed to be knowledgeable about local conditions. The survey found that food availability was low on average, and that it varied substantially across the year because of the harvesting pattern. No less than 78 percent of all sucos reported that families did not have enough food in January. The December figure was only slightly lower: 70 percent, and both February (44 percent) and November (43 percent) were months of considerable stress. Maize is normally harvested between February and April and rice from April to October, so the critical period is between the end of the rice harvest and the beginning of the maize harvest. No less than 87 percent of the sucos reported that the rice harvest was used mainly for subsistence purposes. The figure for maize and cassava was only slightly lower: 80 percent.
The number of livestock owned also made a difference in terms of poverty. In all cases (buffaloes, cattle, horses, goats, and pigs), the numbers reported for 2001 were lower than those before the 1999 violence. Table
1.1 provides the figures for each category.
Table 1.1Livestock numbers in 1999 and 2001
| | Buffaloes | Cattle | Horses | Goats | Pigs |
|---|
1999 | 112,600 | 190,200 | 52,800 | 189,000 | 353,900 |
2001 | 72,200 | 98,700 | 34,600 | 70,700 | 198,500 |
The availability of basic infrastructure displayed severe deficiencies. Only 20 percent of all aldeias were electrified, as compared to 29 percent before the 1999 destructions, a modest figure. Electricity was available for an average of 6 days per week and 13 hours per day. Water in most cases (over 60 percent) had to be taken from rivers, streams, or wells, and only 7 percent of the sucos...
