The Kyrgyzstan Multipurpose Poverty Survey (KMPS) was designed to be a nationally representative survey capable of measuring the standard of living in the Kyrgyz Republic2 during the second half of 1993. While the KMPS is based on the LSMS framework, it has some features which distinguish it from the standard LSMS; in particular it collects extensive nutrition data. The tradition of survey research in countries of the Former Soviet Union is not particularly strong. In the Kyrgyz Republic, the GOSKOMSTAT family budget surveys were not representative of the population in general, and the poor in particular. These surveys tended to focus on persons who work in enterprises and, to a lesser extent, pensioners. The KMPS represents a significant increase in the data available, and is a more suitable tool for monitoring the social and economic changes occurring in the Kyrgyz Republic. The 1993 KMPS was carried out under the direction of researchers from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Paragon Research International, Inc., and the Institute of Sociology of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The government of the Kyrgyz Republic has established an open access policy in regards to the data collected in the KMPS. The potential uses of this data set are quite broad given the multi-topic nature of the data and the fact that it was carried out at the national level.
