Identification and spatial analysis of urban poverty zones, Case study: Zahedan City

Urban poverty is one of the major issues and challenges of major cities, especially in metropolises of Iran. The phenomenon of poverty is a multidimensional issue and, due to its spatial nature, it is ‎specialized in the city and spreads in the form of poorer areas. Identifying and analyzing the ‎spatial distribution of the poverty is one of the ways to reduce its impacts on the cities. The main aim of this research is to identify and spatial analyze of urban poverty zones in Zahedan. In this research, the statistical census data of 1395 of Zahedan city and the economic, social, cultural and physical components have been used to identify and analyze poverty. Factor analysis method, density estimation model and Moran model in the GIS environment has been used to identify the poverty zones. The findings show that out of total of 4529 blocks, 537 (85.11%) very poor, 1532 (83.33%) poor, 1666 (78.36%) moderate, 752 (60.16%) wealthy, 92%) are very wealthy. In terms of geographic posation, most of poor and very poor areas are concentrated in the north and northeast parts of the city. As a result, there is a significant spatial difference in the distribution of poverty indicators in Zahedan.The findings of this study can help urban and regional policymakers and managers to implement appropriate solutions and allocate scarce urban resources in a desirable and purposeful manner. The future studies, can model the spread of poverty in cities using spatial analysis methods. The future studies, can model the spread of poverty in cities using spatial analysis methods.