The World Bank in cooperation with the Kosovo Agency of Statistics (KAS) has published the results of the "Consumption Poverty in the Republic of Kosovo in 2012-2017". This report is an update of Kosovo's poverty assessment published in April 2017. The poverty assessment in Kosovo is based on the results from Household Budget Surveys 2012-2017.

This publication provides data on absolute poverty in Kosovo in 2012-2017 where consumption is used as a measure of welfare or individual wealth. This report uses two poverty lines that are considered adequate to meet basic needs and an extreme poverty.

Based on the data of the Household Budget Survey (HBS) 2017, it is estimated that 18.0 percent of Kosovo's population lives below the poverty line, with 5.1 percent of the population below the extreme poverty line.

By comparing the data over the years, it can be observed that the poverty rate has dropped by about 5.9 points of percentage from 2012 to 2013 and then increased by 3.7 points of percentage from 2013 to 2014 and then dropped to a level 3.9 points of percentage in 2014 to 2015, then dropped to 0.8 points of percentage between 2015 and 2016 and again marked an increase by 1.2 points of percentage between 2016 and 2017. The rates of extreme poverty and poverty are higher in rural settlements.

The Gini coefficient shows that inequality in Kosovo has decreased from 2012 to 2013, has increased from 2013 to 2014 and then decreased in 2015 and 2016. However, in 2017, the trend returned and overall inequality grew. This means that during the entire period of 2012-2017, inequality decreased slightly. It is also worth noting that in the six-year period, inequality in urban areas was higher than in rural areas. Some reductions in inequality were observed in rural areas, but this was compensated by rising inequality in urban areas.

The highest rate of poverty was observed among households with seven and more members, with the exception of 2015 and 2016, where the poverty rate was higher among households with five members. Poverty rates were lower among households with three or less members.

The lowest poverty rate in 2017 is among households largely dependent on wages from employment in the public sector, remittances, own household business and agriculture. On the other hand, the poverty rate is highest among households, the main source of income being social assistance. Although the majority of the poor are concentrated in households whose main source of income comes from wages in the private sector (34.7 percent), about 11.8 percent of the poor report social assistance income as the main source of income in the household.