Journal of Applied Sciences1812-56541812-5662Asian Network for Scientific Information10.3923/jas.2014.2632.2640SiwarChamhuri AhmedFerdoushi Mohd IdrisNor Diana IdrusShaharudin Abdul GhaniAmelia Hazreena ZahariSiti Zalikha 1220141420In Malaysia, poverty reduction has become a major concern in the development policies during the last few decades. However, the rate of poverty is still high in several states of the country. This study aims to estimate the poverty rate at smaller areas such as districts in the state of Pahang, Malaysia through poverty mapping. The study also examines the association of poverty status of the households with their socio-demographic characteristics in the state. The data was obtained from the Implementation and Coordination Unit (ICU), Malaysia which collected the information through household survey in the 11 districts in Pahang from 2008-2011. Summary descriptive statistics were applied to analyze socio-demographic characteristics of the surveyed households. ArcGIS 10 was used for poverty mapping to show spatial distribution of poverty. The findings show that majority of the districts in the state experienced high rate of poverty (on average, 18.50%). However, the number of hard-core poor families were found to be substantially low in each of the district. Incidences of poverty in rural areas are significantly higher than that of urban areas of the state. The greatest portions (90.17%) of poor households are the Malays. It was also found that the households whose heads are economically inactive mainly suffer from hard-core poverty in both rural and urban areas of the state. The findings of this study provide an insight about poverty statistics at smaller area and socio-demographic distribution of the poor households that might be helpful for the government in formulating the policies to reduce poverty rate at district, state as well as national level.]]>Ali, H., L. Ahmad, S. Ahmad and N. Ali,200941329Chukwukere, O.A. and A.H. Baharuddin,20128111DSM,20102010EPU.,20032003EPU.,20092009EPU.,20102010EPU.,20132013Hasan, A.R. and S. Hashim,20012001Ali, H. and S. Ahmad,20095340351Ijaiya, G.T., M.A. Ijaiya, R.A. Bello and M.A. Ajayi,20112147154EPU.,20022002Mat, S.H.C., N.A.A. Bakar and A.Z.A. Jalil,20112011pp: 399403Matin, I. and A.S. Begum,20032003Muhamed, K. and S. Haron,20112011Nair, S.,20102010Othman, A. and F. Kari,20082008Ravallion, M., S. Chen and P. Sangraula,20072007Roslan, A.H.,200482537Sumner, A.,20122012SDSN,20122012Teik, K.B. and K.K. Jin,20102010Pages: 24Pages: 24World Bank,20092009World Bank,20102010