Poverty is a major socio-economic problem in Mexico. At the national level, 36.3% of the population lived below the official poverty line in 2022. Although poverty rates varied across states, they have remained rather stable on average from 2000 to 2020. At the same time, social spending at the state level, in general, has maintained a relatively increasing trend in the last two decades. However, analysis of social spending and poverty at the subnational level is still scarce in Mexico. This study aims to analyze the impact of total and sectoral social spending on poverty reduction at the state level, from 2000 to 2022. This analysis uses novel data from state public accounts of the thirty-one states and Mexico City. The results of this study show that there is no significant relationship between total social spending and extreme income poverty and multidimensional poverty at the state level. However, extreme income poverty and healthcare and education spending showed a negative relationship. These results suggest that, on average, the social investment of states has had a rather meager effect in terms of poverty reduction in Mexico.

The Food Energy Intake (FEI) method is among the most widely used approaches for establishing income poverty lines, particularly in low- and middle-income countries where it is often used as a baseline to define official poverty lines. This method links poverty measurement to the consumption of calories and other essential nutrients, identifying households that lack the resources necessary to meet minimum nutritional requirements. However, due to data limitations, the construction of poverty lines based on the FEI method relies on a series of assumptions that are often left to the discretion of specialists, without adequate discussion regarding their appropriateness or potential implications. These assumptions can significantly influence the resulting poverty lines and, consequently, the poverty estimates derived from them. In this study, we focus on the Mexican official method of poverty measurement to explore an often overlooked step in poverty measurement: the treatment of extreme values in nutrient availability estimates constructed using household survey data. While this may initially appear to be a minor technical consideration, we demonstrate that the criteria used to identify and potentially exclude outlying observations exert a substantial influence on poverty metrics, which reveals weak fulfillment of the FEI assumptions, as well as important limitations in the expenditure data. This underscores the critical importance of adopting transparent, rigorous, and consistent methodologies for managing outliers, alongside a careful evaluation of other assumptions that are commonly overlooked during the poverty line construction process. We assess the sensitivity of poverty estimates in Mexico employing twelve different outlier-handling methodologies. For each method, we compute the corresponding poverty lines and poverty rates. Our findings reveal substantial variation in extreme poverty rates—ranging from 10.7% to 26.7%—solely attributable to the criteria adopted for the treatment of extreme values. Our analysis suggests that such sensitivity may originate in the decision to use income, rather than expenditure, as the underlying welfare measure in the implementation of the FEI method. We conclude that addressing the treatment of outliers is essential for ensuring consistent and reliable poverty measures, but a thorough revision of the method adopted by the Mexican government to measure poverty is essential.

PROSPERA es un programa de transferencias condicionadas del gobierno federal mexicano que atiende a la población en condición de pobreza, a través de acciones en las áreas de salud, educación y alimentación. El Programa transfiere recursos a las madres de familia a cambio de que las niñas y niños asistan a la escuela y a revisiones médicas. En esta investigación se explora la situación actual de las mujeres en zonas rurales en México y se sostiene que este mecanismo, si bien ha mejorado los niveles de vida en las zonas rurales, también ha representado una carga adicional de trabajo para las mujeres, e incrementado su pobreza de tiempo.

Importancia de la rendición de cuentas y las transferencias de bienes privados en la decisión del voto: el caso del FONDEN en México (2006-2013)

Agroecology offers a sustainable solution to the growing demand for food by mitigating environmental degradation caused by conventional agricultural practices. However, evidence on the impacts of public policies promoting agroecology remains limited. This study provides a comparative analysis of differences associated with the Estrategia de Acompañamiento Técnico (EAT), part of the Producción para el Bienestar (PpB) program, on the agroecological transition of producers in two municipalities in Mexico. The EAT promotes this transition through training and technical assistance, while PpB provides direct financial support. The analysis compared three groups of production units (EAT and PpB, only PpB, and without support), using soil quality indicators (pH, compaction, electrical conductivity, redox potential, and organic matter) and an assessment of agroecological status. The comparative analysis indicates that production units participating in the EAT tend to exhibit higher values in some of the agroecological transition indicators analyzed. Implementation challenges were identified, including labor shortages, logistical difficulties, limited understanding of agroecological benefits, and parallel policies promoting chemical fertilizers that counteract EAT's objectives. The study is relevant because it expands the evidence on the effects of public policies in agroecology, providing recommendations to enhance EAT, guide large-scale evaluations, and support the implementation of similar initiatives in other contexts.