in uganda, the participatory poverty assessment (ppas) studies singled out the elderly as one of the groups worst hit by poverty and who are therefore chronically poor, others being the disabled, widowed, street kids, orphans, casual and unskilled labourers (kimberly, 2003). the summary ppa report goes further to show that chronic poverty as defined by the poor was a situation “where one survives marginally” and “with problems that follow you”, “living hand to mouth” and “in perpetual need due to lack of basic necessities of life and the means of production”. other aspects include lack of social support, feelings of negativity, frustration and powerlessness because “one has no source of life” (kimberly, 2003).

conditions of absolute poverty are associated with an absence of income security, inadequate family or social support and poor health combined with inadequate health care (heslop and gorman, 2002). in the ugandan situation, evidence from the ppa sites indicates that chronic poverty generally resolves around lack of productive assets, lack of access to such assets particularly land (kimberly, 2003). physical and social isolation together with insecurity are some of the factors that emerge from explanations of poverty as defined by poor communities themselves.

elderly people are more likely to spend much longer periods in poverty because of the low incomes, assets and savings, which is obviously linked to their sources of income. old age is characterized by lower incomes, which mainly stem form their exclusion from the labour market. other factors which operate to reduce their incomes include:

• lack of insurance policies or private pensions that mature in later years as is the case in uganda
• rapid depletion of the small savings made during the working years mainly because the incomes earned themselves were small and the impact of inflation on the savings which reduces their real value

in the absence of quantitative data in uganda that combines old age and various forms of well-being particularly income, qualitative information would shed more light on various aspects regarding definitions, perceptions and/or even causes of chronic poverty other than lack of income. on this basis, a qualitative study was undertaken targeting older persons in poor communities of the selected study sites in uganda, as later to be detailed out in the methodological section. the approach enabled us understand the hidden dimensions of chronic poverty among older persons and how it is caused and what they perceive to be the best ways of breaking the chronic poverty trap.