Community Based Poverty Monitoring System in Nigeria: A Community Participatory Approach

A CBMS Draft Report

Submitted to

PEP-CBMS Network Angelo King Institute for Economic and Business Studies

De La Salle University Manila Philippines

(For the 8th PEP-CBMS Meeting in Dakar , June 12-18, 2010)

By

Dr Anthonia I Achike

Department of Agricultural Economics University of Nigeria Nsukka

And

Dr H.Eme Ichoku Department of Economics

University of Nigeria Nsukka

June 03, 2010

Abstract

Data requirements to monitor and evaluate progresses in poverty reduction are enormous. Originally, the National Living Standard Survey (NLSS) 2003/2004 was commissioned. The data obtained from this process is however limited to monetary measures of welfare which is grossly inadequate to monitor poverty in local communities of Nigeria. As a solution to this, the Core Welfare Indicator Questionnaire (CWIQ) was commissioned in 2006. Compared to the NLSS, the CWIQ is easy to administer and it covers a wider spectrum of core poverty indicators that were often overlooked in the NLSS. While the CWIQ is important and crucial, it hardly produced disaggregated data to be able to monitor poverty at the community level. Such data shortfalls make it difficult to design effective poverty targeting policies at the community levels. In this regard, the CBMS-Nigeria is proposed in order to generate and implement the Community-Based Monitoring System that is responsive to the needs of local communities. It is intended to be used to monitor the effect of the current global financial crises on the poverty status of local inhabitants and their coping strategies. The implementation of the CBMS-Nigeria will be enhanced greatly by the fiscal federalism structure of the country. The local communities can therefore be mobilized through the local governments. CBMS-Nigeria uses simple and easy to administer questionnaire on selected poverty indicators that are chosen in line with the development needs of the local communities and the deprivation suffered by the communities. The field site is Edem community with a population of 31000 and about 5000 households as at 2006. It is the largest community in Nsukka Local Government Area in the South eastern part of Nigeria. The results show that based on several indicators, many households lack several social and households facilities and infrastructures that make life rather burdensome. Large number of households lack access to clean water, health facilities, refuse disposal facilities and toilet facilities. The health profile of the community is very poor. Crude mortality rate is about 16/1000 and about 70% of households reported ill-health in the 6 month preceding the survey. Adult literacy rate is also low as less than 60% of the population can read and write in the two major languages spoken in the south-east of the country, Igbo and English. Households’ wealth, measured by possession of important household durable assets is low. For example, only 4% of households has fridge, about 34% has television while only 1.5% has computer. Furthermore, money income is very low as per capita income is only N25,000 or about $333 in PPP. In the phase of poverty and GFC, households adopt all manner of survival mechanisms. Some withdraw their children from school as they cannot cope with the financial demands of schooling. Some transfer their children from high-fee paying private schools to low few-paying public schools. More than half of households skip their meals both for adults and children, and this has important implications for children’s growth and development. Some households resort to low quality food. Some households reduced their level of drinks while most resort to using cheap household energy sources, in particular firewood. The labour market effects are also significant as some have lost their jobs while some experienced pay delays. All these suggest that households in the community are passing through difficult times and require government intervention.

Introduction/Background

Economic performance in Nigeria like in most countries dipped in the 1980s due to world

economic recessions. This necessitated the adoption of the Structural Adjustment Programme

(SAP) in many of these countries beginning from the mid-1980s. The SAP policy led to greatly

reduced public spending, retrenchment of workers and increased incidence of poverty more

especially among the rural population. As a result of the poor economic out turn, per capita GDP

in Nigeria fell rapidly. The country, ranked amongst the lowest in Human Development Index

(HDI) in the world during the 1980s and 1990s (Jones et al. 2004; NPC 2004; WDI 2003). Per

capita GDP fell to as low as $300 in the early 1990s. Head count poverty increased rapidly from

27% in 1980 to 70% in 1996 before declining to 54% in 2004 (Nigerian Bureau of Statistics

[NBS], 2004). There were rising levels of unemployment, interest rate, currency devaluation, and

huge external debt. The poor economic performance in the last two decades has refocused policy

interest on economic growth and poverty reduction as a central theme in development policy

documents and agenda in Nigeria.

Several policies and programmes have been initiated by successive governments at the national

and sub-national government levels aimed at addressing the problem of poverty in the country.

For example, between 1960 and 1985, the country embarked on several national rolling plans. In

1986, it switched over to the Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP). By 1994 the country

started the policy of Guided Deregulation, and since the return to democratic government in

1999, there has been a steady move towards market-oriented and private sector driven economic

policy. These have been articulated in the NEEDS and SEEDS documents of 2003/2004. The

government is also experimenting with three-year Medium Term Expenditure Frameworks

(MTEF). The present government of Jonathan Goodluck is a continuation of late Musa

Yar’Adua’s government that came into office in May 2007 and proposed a long term perspective

plan, Vision 2020 whose objective is to place the country among the top 20 economies of the

world by 2020. Many of these policies are designed to achieve economic growth and poverty

reduction within target periods.

While these development policies are being articulated, the global financial crises started

towards the end of 2008. The crises started in the world’s largest economy, the US, and quickly

spread to the rest of the global economy. There have been huge losses in investments,

particularly the stock markets in many countries, including Nigeria. A number of global financial

institutions have liquidated while others are being rescued by governments across countries and

continents. This financial crisis has suddenly set a new agenda for economic management and

damage control. Demand for goods and services have declined drastically, exports have plunged,

Inflation has soared in many economies, unemployment has gone to levels unknown to the

global economy since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Many countries have had to devalue

their national currencies in response to rapidly declining national foreign reserves. Several

actions are being taken at global, national, public, institutional and private various levels to

contain the damaging effect of the global crisis. For example, the group of twenty largest

economies, (The G20) met in Switzerland in April 2009 to approve action plans and pledge over

one trillion of dollars in rescue effort for collapsing world economy. The US government alone is

spending over a trillion in rescue effort. The crisis is already taking a toll on many households

particularly those in fragile economies of developing countries, and even developed ones.

Countries across the globe are also putting in place several measures to contain the impact of the

economic crisis on the welfare of households and citizens in general.

Nigeria is among the countries most vulnerable to the global financial crisis. There are several

channels through which global economic developments affect the country. The most important

ones include the trade, exchange rate, financial institutions, foreign investment, remittances, and

donor assistance.

Trade: Trade is perhaps the most important because Nigeria’s largest exports are crude oil and

unprocessed materials. Oil is critical to the Nigerian economy as it accounts for about 25% of the

national gross product and over 70% of foreign exchange earning. At the same time the quantity

exported and the prices it is sold depends on developments in global market. Negative

developments easily translate into reduced earnings and adverse implications for the national and

state government expenditures.

Exchange Rate: The CBN has recently devalued the national currency, the naira from N115 to a

dollar prior to the crises to about N145 to a dollar. This devaluation has meant higher import

prices. This has naturally fed inflation into the domestic economy.

Foreign Credit: Many of the Nigerian financial institutions, particularly the banks depend on

large global financial institutions for credit and technical assistance. The global financial crises

(GFC) has consequently meant reduced credit inflow into the economy, and many big

development projects have been delayed or cancelled altogether. Interest rates have also gone up,

implying that households and businesses are finding it more difficult to obtain loans.

FDI: Foreign investment inflow into the country has drastically reduced since the beginning of

the global crises. Reports from the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, indicate that significant

percentage reduction in inflow of different forms of FDI in the economy. The Nigerian Stock

Market has perhaps been the greatest casualty of this development as values of shares of most

firms have depreciated by more than 50% since March 2008.

Remittances: Remittances have been a major source of foreign exchange inflow into the

Nigerian economy. Prior to the crises the CBN reports annual inflow of foreign exchange

through remittances in excess of $10 billion. The report for 2008 is not currently available but it

is expected to be significantly reduced, and the figure for 2009 is expected to even reduce

further.

ODA: The level of overseas development assistance (ODA) that flows into Nigeria is relatively

small. However, even this is expected to shrink further given the economic situation in many of

the donor countries.

There have been complaints from several quarters, groups and individuals, and even the National

Assembly as evident from Nigeria news media that government response to the global crises has

been poor. While the national and state governments have had to revise their 2009 budget in

response to the expected decline in revenue from oil due to declining oil prices occasioned by the

global crises, little else has been done to cushion the effect of the crises on the welfare of the

population. Recently, the government proposed the sum of N250 billion (approximately $1.8

billion) to support the agricultural sector in order to make more food available to the population.

How this is to be implemented is not yet clear, much less its impact on household welfare both in

the short and long run. State and local governments are also investing resources on social

services in order to alleviate poverty and improve access to social services in communities. The

purpose of this study is to monitor the impact of all these developments on a specific community

as a case study of their impact on Nigerians.

Monitoring the Impact of Economic Developments

In developed countries with long tradition of tracking various welfare indicators in their

economy on regular basis, the task of tracking the effects of the global financial crises has been

relatively easy. This has helped greatly in monitoring economic developments in these countries.

Unfortunately, in many developing countries like Nigeria, tracking economic indicators and

welfare has been sporadic. National surveys are conducted often at irregular periods to obtain

information on welfare and economic development at a given moment in time. There are

sometimes no systematic efforts to collect welfare information on households at regular intervals

to aid the planning, monitoring and evaluation of the economy. Policies are often well intended.

Projects and intervention programs are executed but no efforts are made to monitor and analyze

their impact on the populations.

One of the biggest problems of the country has been the failure over the decades to effectively

implement policies as designed, monitor and evaluate performance in terms of measurable

impacts in outputs and outcomes, and ensure that these results feedback into policy. A few

sporadic attempts have been made to monitor how these policies impact on the living standards

of the Nigerian population. In the 1980 and 1990s, a number of waves of household surveys, the

National Consumer Surveys, were conducted at intervals once in a long while to obtain

information on household expenditure and assets, and access to social facilities. But these were

not consistent and the national representativeness of the data was in doubt. The first major

attempt at collecting comprehensive information on the living standards of Nigerians was the

baseline survey conducted in 2003/2004: the Nigerian Living Standard Survey (NLSS) which

was a partnership between the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the World Bank and

European Union (EU). The data obtained from this process are limited to monetary measures of

welfare which is grossly inadequate to monitor poverty in local communities of Nigeria where

incomes are often under reported or unobtainable due to the nature of the production activities.

Another major survey, the Core Welfare Indicators Questionnaire (CWIQ) survey was conducted

in 2006. While the CWIQ is important and crucial for estimating and measuring of poverty in

Nigeria, it hardly produced disaggregated data to be able to monitor poverty at the community

level. Such data shortfalls make it difficult to design effective poverty targeting policies at the

community levels. To date these two surveys remain the major attempts to provide information

on the welfare of Nigerians. They provide data required to analyze welfare at the national level

and only at specific points in time. They are often either conducted on irregular time basis or the

time span between one survey and another is very long to allow any meaning detailed analysis of

dynamics of welfare at micro-level of communities.

Rationale

While the big picture of welfare which these national surveys present is important, they leave

important information gaps that make effective policy formulation difficult. They are also not

very helpful in terms of policy implementation, monitoring and evaluation of impact of policy

changes. There is therefore the need to undertake community-level surveys that span a

reasonable period of time that provide information on the dynamic of poverty and the impact of

policies on welfare at micro-level. This is particularly urgent in the light of the on-going global

financial crises and its impact on households. Policy makers need to know, for instance, how

subsidies in agricultural inputs, or removal of subsidies on cooking gas or petrol impacts on the

welfare of rural populations. They may want to know how gains in economic growth and losses

due to global financial crises and the impact of reduced public expenditures are distributed and

how these impacts on the populations at the grass-roots. It is therefore of utmost importance that

a clear knowledge of the concepts of poverty, marginalisation and vulnerability and a concise

practical analysis of common critical variables that define, monitor and track poverty in the

society, especially at the community levels should be given priority attention. This will facilitate

effective identification, sensitization, mainstreaming and integration of the poor in various

development initiatives. This is, in essence, what CBMS-Nigeria proposes to achieve: to

generate and implement Community-Based Monitoring System that measures, monitors,

evaluates and tracks welfare changes at local communities in Nigeria using a case study. While

information about some of the impacts of the global financial crises and other economic

developments may be obtained at aggregate national levels their reach and depth in local

communities require special instrument. This is what this study tries to achieve.

Structure of the Local Government in Nigeria

The local government is the third and last tier of government in Nigeria. Aside from the

communities themselves, the local government is the nearest government to the people. Presently

there are 774 local governments in Nigeria, but the number of LGAs in each state varies from 8

in Beyelsa state to 44 in Kano state. Their populations also vary. With a national population of

142 million, an average a local government has a population of about 190000; and with a typical

Nigerian household size of 6, this gives about 32000 households.

A typical local government structure in Nigeria is presented in Figure 1. A local government has

the executive, legislative, and judicial arms of governance. The legislative arm is composed of

the elected government councillors. This body is responsible for making laws that govern the

local government. The Judicial arm is composed of customary courts which are responsible for

the interpretation of customary laws. The executive arm of governance is made up of the

chairman, some of the councillors as well as appointed advisers. The public service structure of

the local government is made up of the Head of Service (HOS), the Heads of various

departments, and other public servants. All these are responsible to the citizens of the various

communities that make up the local government. The structure of the local government also

entail that they perform primary functions that have direct impact on the lives of the citizens.

According the Nigeria’s 1999 constitution, the basic functions of the LGAs include:

(a) Economic development of the LGA

(b) The provision and maintenance of primary, adult and vocational education

(c) The development of agriculture and natural resources

(d) The provision and maintenance of health services.

Figure 1: A simplified Structure of the Local Government in Nigeria.

On account of its nearness to the people, the local government also provides a primary

organizational frame for implementing some social programmes either by the state or the federal

government. For example, poverty alleviation programmes, child immunization programmes,

and others. These are frequently executed using the local government structure as a vehicle.

Poverty alleviation is one of the departments in the Local Governments in Nigeria. This

department in addition to the local government programmes on poverty alleviation also

implements the national poverty alleviation programmes. The national accelerated poverty

eradication programme (NAPEP) has link with each local government. The state’s projects and

that of its local government on poverty alleviation may differ due to the natural and material

resources available but the aim is just the same. Besides, the federal executive council can

influence the amount and use of some of the funds available for all the local governments. The

Local Government Area

Judicial Arm Legislative Arm Executive Arm

Customary Courts

Chairman Local

Supervisory

Local Public Service

Heads of Departments

Head of Service

Civil Servants

Citizens

local government council of Nigeria is responsible for coordinating the activities of the local

governments and often meet with the federal executive council to discuss issues affecting the

local governments. The policy programmes and projects as well as their objectives are

determined by this forum. This is specifically with federal government programmes, however

each state exercises influence on the local governments under their jurisdiction and may have its

own special policy and projects.

Fiscal Relation with Other Tiers of Government

The constitution of Nigeria provides for three tiers of government: the federal, states and local

governments. As indicated above, there 36 states in Nigeria, and a Federal Capital Territory

(FCT) Abuja. There are also 774 LGAs. The constitution also provides for fiscal decentralization

among these tiers of government. The collection of the most important tax bases, including

petroleum tax, import and exercise duties, company tax, value added tax (VAT) is done at the

federal level. Revenue from these taxes bases are pooled and shared vertically among the three

tiers of government and horizontally among the 36 states and 774 local governments on rule-

based method. The current sharing formula allocates about 47% of total revenue to federal

government, 26% to states and 20% to local governments. The balance of 7% is used for national

emergencies, FCT Administration, Ecology and Derivation Funds.

Apart from these main tax bases which revenue is shared at national level, there also tax basis

assigned to each tier of government which constitutes its own internally generated revenue

(IGR). For example, the income tax of people employed by the state is exclusive to the state.

However, states are obliged to allocate 10% of their IGR to LGAs within its jurisdiction. The

LGAs then consolidate their revenue from their allocation at the federal, their share of the state’s

IGR and the revenue they generate internally from the less significant tax bases assigned to them

by the constitution in other to execute their development programmes. While the local

governments are significantly fiscally independent, they are also under laws made by the state

legislature. The LGAs prepare their own budgets based on expected revenue from the federal and

state allocations and their own IGR but their fiscal behaviour is also monitored and regulated by

the state government.

Governance at Community Level

Under the local government structure are the communities that make up the local government.

Again the number of communities that make up any given local government varies. The nature

and effectiveness of the communities as development agents also vary from one part of the

country to another and between urban and rural areas. In some parts of the country that inherited

feudalistic communal structure, particularly in the north of the country, the community chiefs

represent the rallying point for community action for development. In other parts of the country

without such feudalistic setup such as prevails in the south and some other parts of the north, the

town/village union governments are the rallying point for community development. They

complement the efforts of the local governments. In most cases, the towns or cluster of villages

constitute the Wards on which basis representatives are elected into the local government. The

town/village union governments are also democratically elected by the people within the villages

or towns.

While these town/village union governments are not formally included in the constitution of the

country, they provide very important vehicles for government development programmes.

Frequently, the local governments have to consult the town/village unions that make up the local

governments in critical economic and social development but particularly on security matters.

While the constitution does not assign any tax basis to the town unions for generation of revenue,

unlike local governments, the town unions often mobilize revenue from different sources

including donation, revenue yielding projects such as water-boreholes to execute their

development programmes. It is these town unions that often build schools, health centres and

artery roads in their communities and hand-over to local and state governments for staffing and

management.

Dimensions to Poverty:

A good community poverty tracking and monitoring mechanism will require all or most

identifiable dimensions of poverty to be explored. This is because, there is need to identify

indicators on which poverty can be measured and assessed especially at the community level.

From a pure income based approach, we may define poverty as being purely based on an

individual or household having less than a predetermined threshold of income at a given period

of time. The idea of multi-dimensionalism in poverty measuring has proved that neoclassical

uni-dimensional poverty measurement using household income is grossly limited and there is

need for inclusion of other dimensions of deprivation such as access to health care and basic

facilities, educational services, employment opportunities, and so on (Reyes and Valencia, 2003).

Borrowing from the Philippines model of the Micro Impact of the Macroeconomic Adjustment

Policy (MIMAP), the following indicators are often identified to capture poverty dimensions.

These include: Health, nutrition, housing, water and sanitation, basic education, income,

employment, peace and order. These and others that are directly linked to the community of

interest will be explored considerably.

Conceptual Issues

Because of the multidimensional nature of poverty, it becomes more challenging to measure it.

However, through decentralized; community based, and participatory approach the poor are

made equal partners in eliminating poverty and enabling themselves to change their fortunes.

But, some questions that readily come to mind are: who are the poor? What are the

characteristics of the poor? Is poverty a permanent or transitory status? How do we track poverty

over time? Is poverty in the mind? Can poverty status be empirically and unambiguously

measured in a generally acceptable form? Attempts to provide answers to these and other

questions have motivated this study and to various definitions of poverty.

The House of Commons Scottish affairs committee noted that poverty can be defined as absolute

poverty, relative poverty and social exclusion. Absolute poverty is the lack of basic resources

with which to keep body and soul together irrespective of the societal average, relative poverty

defines income or resources in relation to the societal average, while social exclusion is

concerned with the absence of the material needs to participate fully in accepted daily life. It is a

shorthand label for what can happen when individuals or areas suffer from a combination of

linked problems such as unemployment, poor skills, low incomes, poor housing, high crime

environments, bad health and family breakdown. These are important variables for identification

and tracking of the poor.

With reinforcing evidence in development literature, indicating that increasing income is not a

sufficient condition for positive social and economic change, and suggesting that the

combination of strong community organizations and favourable trading terms produce positive

development (Elaine Jones, 2002); care must be taken to put the poor people at the centre of

analysis – not investors and technical resources.

Problem Statement

Nigeria’s economic reform strategy has committed to a set of targets for key economic growth

and human development indicators from 2004-2007. Some of the targets with bearing on poverty

reduction and eradication are recapitulated in Table 1.

Table 1: Selected targets under NEEDS (2004-2007)

Target Indicator 2004 2005 2006 2007

Growth in real GDP (%) 5.0 6.0 6.0 7.0

Growth in non-oil sector (%) 7.3 8.5 8.3 9.5

Reduction in poverty incidence (%) 5.0 5.0 5.0 5.0

Growth in agricultural sector/rural development (%). 6.0 6.0 6.0 6.0

Growth in manufacturing sector (%) 7.0 7.0 7.0 7.0

Agricultural exports ($billions) - - - 3.0

Source: NPC (2004)

The Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) of Nigeria at all the levels of governance aims at

achieving value re-orientation, reducing poverty, creating wealth, and employment generation.

This will require enormous poverty statistics as well as other relevant data for monitoring and

evaluation. Reality on ground, however, is that the kind of data to be generated from both the

NLSS and CWIQ cannot suffice for poverty monitoring and tracking at the community levels

where majority of Nigerians economically operate. Mkpado (2007) noted the existence of

inadequate criteria for assessment of availability, usage and effects of interventions on social and

economic infrastructure for achievement of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) in rural

communities. This would also seem to be the case in respect of the impact of the global

economic crises on welfare. In this regard, community based monitoring systems that serve as an

avenue to collect requisite data at community levels will be invaluable, hence the need for this

study

Objectives

Effective public policy is based on timely and accurate data on the phenomenon of interest. In

this regard, the CBMS aims at providing timely and comprehensive data on poverty and welfare

statistics at community levels. It is believed that policy initiatives that target the grassroots will

be effective in combating the scourge of poverty. This is because pockets of poverty that exist in

the communities show that broad policies that do not take into account the specificities of the

communities is very unlikely to achieve its aim. On this ground, this community-based

monitoring system provides statistics that is intended to inform policy makers on a timely basis

about changes in welfare and living conditions at the community level.

Specifically, the CBMS-Nigeria aims to:

1. provide the local communities with a simplified and easy to collect poverty indicators

selected based on the local conditions so as to monitor community well-being;

2. Provide a framework for monitoring and evaluating the impact of the global financial and

economic crises on poverty in Nigeria.

3. produce community poverty monitoring reports based on the results of the Monitoring

system;

4. improve the capacity of data collection and processing at the local level through

community participation in the process of data collection;

5. provide the local government planning officers with current and comprehensive

information and summary statistics as policy inputs in the prioritization of poverty and

other intervention programs

6. provide accurate and timely data on which poverty alleviation strategies and schemes will

be effectively based.

Methodology

The CBMS-Nigeria survey involves the use of participatory research methodology. The survey

is based on a rural community- Edem in Nsukka local government area. In the first instance,

there was a census of all the households in the selected community/area of study. This provided

comprehensive information for poverty targeting at the household level in different communities.

Households in most rural communities in south-eastern Nigeria are contiguous in terms of

poverty spread. In order to obtain community perceptions and gaps that exist between the

expectations of the community and the activities of the government, it is important to know the

nature of policy directions of the government. This was also obtained in order to know the

community’s perception about the role and efforts of the government to their plight. Individual

household surveys involved eliciting poverty or welfare indicators from the

households/individuals.

Study Sites

Our preferred LGA for this study is Nsukka LGA. The choice of the area is on account of several

factors including the researchers’ familiarity with the culture, economic activities and

topography of the area. Furthermore, it exhibits almost all the characteristics of the typical LGA

in Nigeria: it is characterised by semi-urban and rural environment. Many of the communities are

poor, lack social facilities and the predominant occupations of the rural communities are farming

and petty trading. Ideally, we would have liked to sample all the households in Nsukka LGA.

However, this is a less feasible option under the circumstance. Nsukka local government has a

large population. According to 2006 national population census, the LGA has a population of

309,633; and with estimated average household size of 6 there are about 51,606 households in

the LGA. A complete enumeration of households in the LGA required a huge amount of

resources. The study therefore concentrated on Edem, a rural community within Nsukka LGA.

Edem is one of the largest communities in Nsukka. Its estimated population of about 31000 as at

2006 was proposed to translate to about 5000 households. In reality, this was found to 4700

households (CBMS-Nigeria, 2009). The choice of this community is based on its high level of

deprivation and poverty status characteristic of most Nigerian rural villages. It has also a fairly

stable population in terms of minimal migration and is also a homogenous community. Local

communities in Nigeria often lack access to safe drinking water as well as access to quality

health care services. Households in these community struggle to meet basic subsistence of life.

A census of all the households in the community was conducted. This provided comprehensive

information on the dynamics of poverty in the area that would feed into policy in the local

government and Enugu state at large.

Monitoring poverty statistics in this area provided valuable insights for the government and

policy makers more than it would have been in a relatively affluent community in the urban

centres. The survey was designed to be carried out in two rounds (one in 2009 and the other in

2010). The project execution was designed to be implemented over a period of approximately 24

months divided into two phases. Phase 1 (partly concluded) consisted of three components/ parts.

The first component comprised preliminary research activities including literature search,

training of field assistants, ordering and purchase of software, reconnaissance survey and census

of households in NPC enumerated sites, drafting of the survey instrument and pilot survey of 30

households outside the selected community. The pilot survey (report already submitted) helped

to establish the validity of the instrument before it was administered on the target community. In

the second part of phase 1, data was collected from all the households in the community. The

data collected were analayzed to ascertain the baseline information on community welfare

indicators. Result of the analyses is presented in this report. . The third part of phase 1 would be

a follow-up/cost route survey of the households to be conducted in 2011. This cost route survey

will provide the panel data required to monitor development in welfare and global financial

crises indicators over time, particularly in response to possible policy changes that may have

occurred within the period. Development in welfare of the households will subsequently be

compared with the baseline analysis. In CBMS-Nigeria survey, a household in period 1 is

considered same household in period 2 if the identification number is consistent and if at least

one member (preferably the head of household) of the household who participated in period 1 is

present in period 2.

Phase 2 would involve three components aimed at institutionalization of the project. It will

include the establishment of data base of the study in Edem community and the University of

Nigeria Nsukka, dissemination of findings/results of the study (i.e. outcome of phase 1) in

stakeholders’ workshops and replication of the study in other sites in the country following buy-

in by other interested agencies like National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) and the

Nigeria Bureau of Statistics (NBS). It is pertinent to note that the third component of phase 2

(replication in other sites in the country) is outside the budget of the CBMS. Our strategy for

sustainability is described below.

In summary, the first phase entails the following:

• Preliminary research issues which would lead to the development of the community

based poverty tracking system (CBPTS)

• Pilot testing of the CBMS design so as to determine its feasibility in the local setting

(testing the data collection instruments for validation using about 30 households outside

the selected community. Testing the data processing techniques

• Validating the data

• Survey of all households in the community (4,700 households)

• Analysis and report

• Cost-route survey of most of the households (4000) to monitor response of household-

poverty indicators to changes in policy

• Analysis and report

• Assessment of the capacity of local partners in implementation of CBMS programme.

• Assessment of the understanding of the processed information by the stake holders and

training on how to use the information

The second phase involves:

• establishment of data base

• Dissemination of findings of CBMS

• replication/expansion of CBMS in more sites in the country

Sustainability Strategy

One of the greatest challenges that was anticipated was the sustainability and institutionalization

of the project at the expiration of funding from PEP-CBMS. The survival and sustainability of

the project over the long time horizon depends on finding alternative ways to fund the project. In

this respect, we plan to enlist the assistance of local and international donors including the

National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the UNDP, the ADB as well as the state government, to

sustain the project. We would also market our project to Demographic and Health Survey

Intitutions, including research institutions abraod who need data from developing countries for

their analysis. Therefore, the longrun vision of this project is to make it a springboard for a

Demographic Surveillance System for Nigeria (DSS). Fees will be charged for researchers and

other organization who may want information from the study area, or who may want the

established survey infrastructure in the area.

Identification of indicators

The study conceived poverty as a multidimensional concept that entails a multidimensional

approach. It therefore requires that data be obtained on various dimensions of poverty. To

achieve this, a variety of indicators were tentatively identified. These indicators have been

demarcated into two groups. The first group was to capture CBMS core monitoring indicators

and the second group are indicators designed to capture the effect of global financial and

economic crises. These indicators have been largely adapted from those agreed on at the

workshop to the socioeconomic and cultural environment of the community under study and at

workshop on monitoring the impact of global financial crises.

The CBMS Core indicators for this study include:

• Demographic composition of household e.g. household size, number of males/females,

age of members, gender of household heads etc. Level of formal educational qualification

or Adult education qualification, number of years spent in formal and vocational schools

etc)

• Employment type, (civil servant, farmer, artisan, house wife only etc)

• Housing and shelter, ( type of house, number of persons per room, ownership status)

• Assets/income/expenditure, (sources, annual income, percentage of income gap,

percentage of annual income spent on food, housing, clothing and medication)

Social capital: participation in community activities (plurality of membership to community

associations, number of offices held in the 10 years) access to agricultural and other production

inputs (source of inputs, value of subsidy on inputs if any, access to improved farm

technologies). More details are summarised in the table below.

HEALTH AND

NUTRITION

DEFINITION FORMULA

1 Proportion of children

aged 0-5 years old who

died

Death occurred after birth up

to the age of 5 years. This

excludes fetal deaths.

Total number of children

aged 0-5 years old who died

in the last six months over

total number of children

aged 0-5 years old plus the

total number of child deaths

0-5 years old of the same

period

2 Proportion of women

who died due to

pregnancy related

causes

Pregnancy related death is

defined as the death of a

woman while pregnant or

within 42 days of

Total number of women

who died due to pregnancy

related causes in the last six

months year over total

termination of pregnancy,

irrespective of the cause of

death.

number of children less than

one year old plus total

number of women who died

due to pregnancy related

causes (for same period)

3 Proportion of children

aged 0-5 years old who

are malnourished

Children 0-5 who weigh one

or more standard deviations

from internationally

recommended weight or

height for children 0-5

Total number of children

aged 0-5 years old who are

malnourished over total

number of children aged 0-5

years old

WATER AND

SANITATION

4 Proportion of

households without

access to safe water

supply

Considered as safe water

supplies are community

water system, deep well and

artesian well whether own

use or shared with other

households.

Total number of households

without access to safe water

supply over total number of

households

5 Proportion of

households without

access to sanitary toilet

facilities

Considered as sanitary toilet

facility are water-sealed

flush to sewerage system or

septic tank whether own use

or shared with other

households and closed pit.

Total number of households

without access to sanitary

toilet facilities over total

number of households

EDUCATION

8 Proportion of children

aged 6-12 years old

who been out of

school in the last one

year preceding

interview

Primary school-eligible but

out of school

Total number of children

aged 6-12 years old who

droped out of school in the

last six months over total

number of children aged 6-

12 years old

9 Proportion of children

aged 13-20 years old

who dropped out of

secondary school in

the last six months

preceding the

interview

Secondary school-eligible

but out of school

Total number of children

aged 13-20 years old who

droped out of secondary

school over total number of

children aged 13-20years

old

INCOME

10 Proportion of

households with

income below the

poverty threshold of

N29, 850 for southeast

Nigeria as at 2008 (this

figure will be adjusted

to account for inflation

in 2009)

Poverty threshold is

estimated by inflating the

officially released poverty

threshold of the national

statistical agency for the

area using prevailing

monthly consumer price

indices (CPI) also from the

same agency for the

reference period of the

survey.

Total number of households

with income below the

poverty threshold over total

number of households

11 Proportion of

households with

income below the food

(subsistence) threshold

for the southeast in

2008 –N21760 (this

will be adjusted to

account for inflation in

2009)

Food (subsistence) threshold

is estimated by inflating the

officially released food

(subsistence) threshold of

the national statistical

agency using prevailing

monthly consumer price

indices (CPI) from the same

agency for the reference

period of the survey.

Total number of households

with income below the food

(subsistence) threshold over

total number of households

EMPLOYMENT

13 Proportion of persons

who are unemployed

Considered as members of

the labor force who are 15

years old above who are

employed and those who are

unemployed but currently

available for work and

seeking work; or not seeking

work due to the following

reasons: (a) tired/believe no

work available; (b) awaiting

results of previous job

application; (c) temporary

illness/disability; (d) bad

weather; and (e) waiting for

rehire/job recall.

Total number of labor force

who are unemployed over

total number of labor force

14 Proportion of persons

who are

underemployed

Total number of labor force

who are underemployed

over total number of labor

force

PEACE AND ORDER

15 Proportion of persons

who were victims of

crimes

Household member became

a victim of murder, rape,

abuse or physical injury

regardless of place of

occurrence of the crime

Total number of persons

who were victims of crimes

over total population

Household ownership of durable items

16 The number of listed

household assets

possesed by the

household

The assets owned by the

household such as TV,

bicycle, motorcycle,

pressing iron, etc possssed

by the household that are in

working condition

This will be used to

construct household asset

index.

The choice of these indicators for monitoring is based on National priorities in the Poverty

Reduction Strategy Paper of Nigeria (PRSP), the National Economic Empowerment and

Development Strategy paper (NEEDS) as well as the Local level Strategy paper (LEEDS). This

will bring out the frequently expressed dimensions over which deprivation occurs among the

communities, and will produce a multidimensional poverty profile.

Indicators of Impact of Global Financial and Economic Crises and Coping Mechanisms

The key indicators include:

Remittances:

• Number of overseas workers who have returned from work abroad since the last six

months.

• Proportion of income from remittances to the total household income in 2009 compared

to six months prior to this survey. Number of HHs who saw a decline in remittances

received since the last six months

• Number of HHs who experienced changes in schedule of remittances’ receipt since the

past six months

• Number of household members living in the cities but have returned to the village in the

last six months preceding the interview

• Number of household members whose businesses have folded in the las six months

preceding the interview.

Wage Employment:

• Number of employed persons who experienced wage cut since six months prior to the

interview

• Proportion of wage cut to total wage of employed member of the household

• Number of persons who lost their jobs since six months before this interview

• Number of those working but whose salaries and wages are delayed beyond month-end

Assets and Credits:

• Number of households with access to public health services

Proportion of HHs who lost savings as a coping strategy since six months ago.

Security

• Crime, Women and child abuse

Health

• Maternal and child health

Coping Mechanism Indicators

In the light of the global financial crises it is possible that many households experienced

economic hardship and are likely to adopt different coping strategies to deal with contrained

household budget. The following indicators have also been adapted from the general model to

reflect the coping strategies usually adopted by the communities in the southeast of Nigeria.

DIMENSION INDICATOR

1 HEALTH

AND

NUTRITION

Number of households who reduced the number of meals

Number of households who skipped meals

Number of households who combined meals (i.e, brunch)

Number of households who gave preference to children during meals

(parent/s ate less)

Number of households who concentrated expenditure on staple food

Number of households who cut back meat consumption

Number of households who ate less quality/less preferred foods

Number of households who purchased food on credit

Number of households who relied on help from friends and family for food

Number of households who ate same food for several days in a row

Number of households who modified cooking method (shifting to cheaper

cooking fuel, i.e, from LPG to charcoal)

Number of households who cut back on medical expenses

Number of households who cease to access medical services

2 EDUCATION Number of households who have withdrawn children from school

Number of households who have withdrawn female children from school

Number of households who have withdrawn male children from school

Number of households who transferred children from private to public school

Number of household who cut back on education expenses

3 INCOME Number of households who started a new economic activity

Number of persons below 15 years old who are working (not previously

working)

Number of households who borrowed money from informal sources in the last

six months preceding the interview

Number of households who borrowed money from formal sources in the last

six months preceding the interview

Number of households who received money from charity organization in the

last six months preceding the interview

Number of households who sold productive assets in the last six months

preceding the interview

4 OTHERS Number of households who cut spending on clothing

Number of households who cut back on transportation expenses

Number of households who cut back on communication expenses

Number of households who cut back on water expenses

Number of households who cut back on fuel expenses

Community Welfare Indicators

• Education: Distances to the nearest primary and secondary educational institutions in the

community

• Health: Distances to the nearest – hospital, maternity, dispensaries

• Power: Access to electricity – National grid and duration per day.

• Transportation: Distance to tarred road

• Communication: (GSM) number of service providers that cover the community

• Security in the neighbourhood: incidence of robbery, women and child abuse, number of

reported crimes, number of conflicts in the community per year, police coverage, rate of

occurrence of minor and major crimes etc)

• Social Services: Distance to the nearest public space – community hall/civic center

• Access to and satisfaction with government social services (types of government

services enjoyed e.g. healh facilities, education facilities, security, etc)

Effects of the global financial and economic crises could also be felt at the community level.

Obviousely, the clearest indicators to this in the selected community would be y in terms

irregular service delivery in the community. This would include for example, nonpayment or

irregular payment of teachers and health workers in the community education and health

institutions, the abandonment of public or community initiated projects etc.

Data collection Tools and analysis

For collection of data, a draft community score card as well as draft household questionnaire was

prepared by the CBMS-Nigeria team. These tools underwent refining as well as modifications

after consultation with the communities, other authorities as well as experienced PEP-CBMS

researchers.

The basic sampling unit for the pilot testing was the households in the selected community. For

the actual data collection, a complete enumeration of all the households, and hence all the

individuals, in the community was undertaken. All the households were surveyed in the first

instance. This would be followed up one year (12 months) after with a cost-route survey of the

same households to tract variations, fluctuations and response of households to policies vis-à-vis

the selected indicators.

In order to ensure that the skill for data analysis is passed on to the community and to ensure that

the exercise is sustainable, selected members of the community were taught the skill for data

analysis. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) and STATA Programme were used in

data analysis. Thus data processing will be the task of both our academic team members who

will guide and direct the activities and the trained local community members who will continue

even at the expiration of the project.

Importance of the CBMS information generated

Collecting basic data through surveys is crucial to keep track, analyze and evaluate the situation

and trend of poverty (Anh and Toan, 2003). The importance of the information generated from

the CBMS-Nigeria is enormous. These include assistance in development planning, program

design, and policy impact-monitoring related to poverty issues. It would ease the tracking of

poverty in a community based setting.

Policy Relevance and Information Dissemination strategy

To ensure that the results of the study feed back into policy, this study involved a close

collaboration between the community, Nsukka LGA authorities and the researchers. To achieve

this, there are representatives of each of the parties in the study team. The findings of the study

would be used to inform policy on poverty levels at different points in time for various

communities. It also highlighted appropriate poverty alleviation measures and indicators for

tracking and streamlining movements of households/communities out of poverty; so that at each

point in time, it would be possible to identify households that are below or above the poverty

benchmarks and hence device appropriate mitigation measures.

The study team organised feedback meetings for the participating communities and other

stakeholders. This provided forum for validation of findings. In addition, it ensured accuracy of

information; facilitated understanding, buy-in from stakeholders, ownership and participation of

the communities in identifying their poverty status and being part of the solution, hence ensuring

sustainability.

The findings of the research will be disseminated through stakeholders’ workshops, national and

international conferences. The results will also be communicated to the local communities

where research is conducted. It will also be disseminated among the team of CBMS researchers.

Intended Uses of the CBMS Data

- The data generated from the CBMS exercise will be used to inform policy both at the

local government and community level. For example, local government may want to use

it to monitor the impact of poverty eradication programs in the area. The community may

want to use it to monitor the impact of social welfare programs including health and

education.

- Following from above, the data may also be used for monitoring relative deprivation by

sub-communities, and thus, for resources distribution.

- The CBMS data will be used to further build capacity in monitoring of programs as the

local community will be engaged and informed of crucial aspects of program monitoring

based on available data.

- It will serve as reference point for replication of CBMS in other parts of the country

The data will also be available for professionals who may want to study the dynamic and

distributional efficiency of government programs.

Expected Capacity Building

The methodology of this study has assisted participants build capacity in analysing their poverty

status and proffering practical alleviation measures at different points in time. Hence, the

participating households are stakeholders in the definition of their destinies.

Also, training modules on data collection, processing, analysis and use of CBMS data was

prepared by the academic team members and used to train the enumerators who were drawn

from the participating local community, local government staff and graduate students of

University of Nigeria Nsukka. This has facilitated appreciation and use of CBMS information by

the local community and this gesture is expected to continue even after the expiration of the

project. CBMS survey also enabled the researchers especially those in training to have a hands-

on grip of the tools and software for poverty analysis.

The information can be used as criteria for setting poverty alleviation goals. This can be done by

identifying the gap that exist between internationally accepted criteria and values of measured

poverty indicators and setting targets which when met will reduce poverty. The local

governments can use the result as bench mark for selection of beneficiaries of poverty alleviation

packages. Presently selection of beneficiaries of poverty alleviation packages is subjectively

done without qualitative statistical procedure.

At the end of this study a database will be established within the host community under the care

of the community chief (traditional ruler) in order to ensure full ownership and sustainability of

the exercise. In addition, another data base will also be established within the Department of

Agricultural Economics, University of Nigeria. The collaborating institutions e.g. University of

Nigeria will aid establishment of the data base on poverty analysis, tracking and alleviation

measures. The, local government council of Nigeria, national accelerated poverty eradication

programme (NAPEP) and national bureau of statistics (NBS) and nongovernmental organization

interested in community welfare will have access to the database. The data base is supposed to

be a national facility. It is expected that NAPEP, NBS and national council of Nigeria will

sponsor and facilitate periodic updating of the database after buying into the research

methodology and results as disseminated. They will in addition encourage other communities

and local governments in the country to undertake similar self appraisal of their welfare. The

update will also involve collecting data from community monitoring exercises in other

communities and making them available to researchers and other interested users.

In summary, the process of carrying out this research has improved the ability of all participants

(individuals and institutions) to works as a group and as stake-holders in poverty alleviation.

Some Tentative Results The rest of this report presents the tentative results of our findings from the study of present state

of household welfare and the effects of the recent global financial crises on rural communities in

developing countries. At the beginning of the study the number of households in Edem was

projected to be about 5000. The actual enumeration of the households gave a total of 4710

households representing 94% of the initial projection. The results of the analysis are based on

this actual number and not on the initial estimates. The number of individuals in the households

in the community was 20977. The processes used and procedures undertaken are the subject of a

different report. What has been summarized under are therefore some tentative results from the

analyzed the data. The results are tentative in the sense that this is merely work in progress report

and further work will be undertaken to complete the analysis of this first phase of the study.

Demographic Distribution of the Study Area

Demographic distribution of a population provides a critical background for understanding the

social and economic behavior and trends in a community. This section considers the

demographic distribution of Edem community. It attempts to characterize Edem community in

terms of sex distribution, educational, health and occupational profiles.

Household Size

The average house size in the study area is 4.5. The smallest households were one-person

households while the largest household had 17 members. A household was defined as a unit of

people who live under one roof and operate a common budget and living arrangement. Children

aged 15 and below make up 36% of the entire population. The average household dependency

ratio (the ratio of children and retired adults to the working population (16-60 years) is 0.83. This

implies that one adult of working age takes care of about one dependent.

The Distribution of the Population by Age and Sex

Age and sex are important basis for social and economic differentiation in most societies but

particularly in traditional societies. Social responsibilities and economic responsibilities in

society and households are distributed generally by age and gender. Age is a particularly relevant

variable in economics of production. The age structure of population, for example determines the

proportion of the population that is the labor force, the proportion that is predominantly in

school, the proportion that is working and proportion that is retired and the dependency ratio of

the economy as well as the consumption and expenditure behavior of the population. Similarly,

in many traditional societies, sex remains a critical factor in economic and social relationship. It

is a basis for assignment of roles and distribution of resources not only in the society as a whole

but also in the component units including the household. In Edem community, like in many other

parts of the country, women are still denied entitlement to productive assets including land and

landed properties. Major community and even household decisions are still made solely by men

or dominated by them.

Table 1: Age and Gender Distribution of the Population

Total 7,472 4,694 1,302 1,806 3,617 1,501 474 20,866 2 3,775 2,127 544 594 1,458 753 222 9,473 1 3,697 2,567 758 1,212 2,159 748 252 11,393 sex 15 25 30 40 60 75 76 Total agecat

Table 1.1 shows both the age structure and sex distribution of the population of Edem

community. Children under age 16 make up about 36% of the entire population. The age group

16 to 25, makes up about 22.5% of the population. The age category 26 to 30 contributes about

6% to the total population. The critical age group 31 to 40 makes up 8.7% while the age group

41 to 60 has 17.3% of the population. The 61-75 age bracket contains about 7.3% of the

population while the age category 76+ has 2.3% of the population.

The sex variable shows that there are slightly less greater number of women among the under 16

age group this reverses in subsequent age categories until there is almost equal numbers of men

and women at age category 60-75.

It is difficult to explain this gender structure although the same pattern has been reflected in the

national population structure (See National Population Council Reports 1991 and 2006),

However, it is possible that marriage could partly explain this male-skewed distribution.

Table 2: The Distribution of the Population by Marital Status

1 Single 12,818 61.88%

2 Married 5,877 28.37%

3 Widowed 1875 9.05%

4 Divorced 116 0.56%

5 Co-habitation 28 0.14%

Total 20715 100%

Table 2 further shows the distribution of the population by marital status. As expected, single,

unmarried constitute 62% of the population while married constitute the rest. Within the married

category widowed constitutes about 24% of the category and about 9% of the entire population

while the divorced constitute about 1.46% of the married or 0.56% of the population. This low

percentage of divorcees indicates the stability of homes in the area and has also important

implications for children upbringing. In addition, the phenomenon of co-habitation is also very

low in the communities. Only 0.35% of couples (or 0.14% of the entire population) lives in co-

habitation which also indicates the low level of acceptability of this mode of marital partnership.

In terms of religious affiliation about 65% of the population is catholic, 15% is Anglican while

17% are Pentecostals while traditional religionists constitute about 2.16% of the population.

The stability of the population of this rural community is also reflected in the low level of

emigration and immigration into the community. Our study shows that about 15% of the

population has lived the community for 5 years or less. About 14% of the population has lived

there for between 6-10 years. About 26% has lived there for 10-20 years and about 46% has

lived there for more than 20 years. A total of 4173 (representing about 20% of the approximately

21000 population) claimed to have migrated into the area from other cities and villages. Among

the migrants, majority, about 75% of the immigrants came to the community from other rural

areas, while 24% immigrated from urban areas and 0.41% from abroad.

Educational Achievement of the Community

Education represents the level of enlightenment and capacityin a given community. Educational

attainment is relatively low in the Edem community. About 58% of the adult population above

15 years of age can read and write in both Igbo and English which are the dominant languages of

communication in the area. About 68% of 3670 school-age children attend public schools while

31.55% attend private schools.

Table 3: Educational Attainment of the Population

No school 2506 18.54%

Primary School 4345 32.15%

Junior Sec School 1987 14.70%

Senior Sec School 3424 25.33%

Tertiary 1103 8.16%

Table 3 shows the highest educational qualification of individuals who responded to the

questionnaire. 18.54% had no school qualification at all, 32% had primary school qualification,

about 15% and 25% respectively had junior and senior school certificate qualifications, while

about 8% had more than secondary education.

Occupational Status

The occupational distribution of the population is reflected in the question posed to individual

household members who were above 15 years of age. These household members were asked

about their main work status in the last 4 weeks preceding the interview. Figure 2 summarizes

the percentage distribution of the 12310 responses to this question.

Figure 2: Occupational Distribution of the Edem Community Population

About 10% of the population was unemployed in the 4 weeks preceding the interview reflecting

a relatively high level of unemployment. Only 1% of the population is employer of labor. Self-

employment is by far the most important occupational category in the population as about 48%

of the is self-employed. Regular employees, implying people who were employed either by

public or private sector constitute only 3% of the workforce, while casual employees constitute

about 1% of the population. Students and apprentices make up 29% of the work force while

pensioners and other constitute 1% each. In addition, only about 14% of the workforce is

employed in the public sector while about 86% is employed in the private sector.

Some important observations are important here. There is high level of informality in the

economy of the community which is reflected in the high level of self-employment among the

working population. Only 3% is employed either by the private or public sector employers. Most

of these employees in the private sector (defined as businesses operating under the ambient of

the household) comprise largely of teachers in private schools, private transport sector

employees, health workers, hospitality industry and others. This also has significant implication

for the level of income of households as most private employees generally receive remunerations

which are most times lower than the minimum national wage.

Secondly while some are indeed employed, there is high level of under-employment

phenomenon in the workforce. Many people with high educational qualifications do not have

jobs that match their level of skill. Such jobs, whether in the private or public are undertaken to

make ends meet while the worker is still searching for better jobs. Furthermore, most of the self

employed are actually employed in low income sectors including petty-trading, commercial

motorcycle riding, subsistent and small-scale farming, and other forms of artisanship. All this

will reflect the low income levels of households and significantly low level of economic and

social developments of the community. The informal nature of the community economy also

means that majority of the working population (90%) work on fulltime basis while only 10% is

engaged in part-time economic activities. Over 85% of the working population on full-time

employment work for between 6 and 10 hours a day while part –time workers put in on average

2 hours a day.

How satisfied are the workers with their work? To address this question working household

members were asked their level of satisfaction with their work with a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’

response. About 52% of the respondents stated they were not satisfied with their work while 48%

was satisfied. The main reasons for non-satisfaction include lack of alternative to the present job.

They are engaged in the current job simply because they do not have alternatives. About 23%

specifically stated that their lack of satisfaction is because of low income from their current jobs.

Further analysis shows however that there is low correlation between the sector of employment

and the level of job satisfaction. This correlation was found to be only 0.21 indicating that low

job satisfaction is not exclusive to either public or private sector.

The Health Profile of the Community

The survey questionnaire attempted to access the level of morbidity in the community using the

health questionnaire module. Household head were asked whether any member of the household

reported ill-health in the six months preceding the interview. While this seems to task the

memory of respondents in terms of remembering the last time a member was ill, it nevertheless

seemed long enough to capture a large number of households who could have reported ill but

would not have been captured if the recall period was reduced to 4 weeks preceding the

interview. About 13,300 individuals in households reporting ill health within the time frame and

representing 70% of individuals in the survey reported ill-health in the 6 months preceding the

survey. The balance of 30% did not report any ill-health within the period. The result s of this

module is further analyzed on the basis of gender and age which are two of the variables that

were expected to influence reporting of illness.

Table 4 shows the relationship between sex and morbidity distribution among the community

population. Of the over 10000 males for whom responses were available, about 7331 (or 71%)

reported ill-health in the 6 months preceding the interview. Only about 3000 did not report ill-

health. Similarly for the 8642 females for whom responses were available, 68% reported ill-

health.

Table 4: Gender and Morbidity Distribution

Total 13,234 5,723 18,957 2 5,903 2,739 8,642 1 7,331 2,984 10,315 female 1 2 Total1=male, 2= 1=Yes 2= No

This shows a very high level of morbidity in the population. However, a previous survey in 2000

in the same area (Ichoku 2000) but based on a shorter recall period (4 weeks preceding the

interview) reported morbidity rate of 34%. Thus, it is likely that the longer recall period in this

study has increased the rate of reported ill-health. The survey also seems to indicate that there I

no significant difference in the rate of reported ill-health between male and female populations in

the community.

Differences in morbidity based on age are reflected on Table 5. As expected, the age group 60+

recorded the highest number of reported illness (82%) while the age group 16-25 reported the

lowest rate of morbidity (66%). The age groups 31-40 and 40-60 reported similar rates of ill-

health of 72%.

Table 5: Morbidity Distribution by Age

Agecat Yes No Total % Morbidity

0-15 4491 2178 6669 67.34%

16-25 2765 1419 4184 66.09%

26-30 810 389 1199 67.56%

31-40 1222 471 1694 72.14%

41-60 2478 939 3417 72.52%

60+ 1534 341 1875 81.81%

Total 13301 5737 19038 69.87%

Malaria is the single most important burden of illness among the population. This is evident from

the responses to the question “What illness did – suffer?” The list includes 23 illnesses known to

be common in the tropics. They include: Tuberculosis, asthma, rheumatic heart diseases, high

blood pressure, measles, hepatitis B, kidney disorders, stroke, malaria, fever, HIV, diabetes

among others. However, malaria accounted for 60% of the burden of illness among this rural

community. Fever accounted for another 22% while rheumatic heart disease accounted for about

4% of total reported cases and indicates increasing significance of non-communicable diseases

(largely due to dietary changes) among the rural African communities.

Injury and cirrhosis of the liver account for 1.65% and 1.7% respectively, while violence-related

in injury accounts for only 0.04% of total burden of ill-health. The low level of violence-related

injury is also indicative of the low level of prevalence of violent crime in this rural community.

All the other diseases put together account for about 11% of the total burden of ill-health. Thus,

it is clear that for policy purposes, that most important policy target is to reduce the burden of

malaria ill-health in the population. This is critical because as noted above, most of the people

are self-employed, and if ill-health arising from frequent malaria bouts depreciates health which

is the greatest asset of the poor, then it is likely that the entire household will be thrown into

poverty, particularly if the bread-winner of the household is so afflicted.

Of the number that reported ill-health, about 96 reported seeking treatment while the rest did not

seek any treatment. Figure 3 shows the distribution of health seekers by type of health facility.

Evidently, by far the largest providers of health care are the private pharmacy/patent drug stores

which are found in every nook and cranny of the community. About 70% of health seekers

reported seeking health from this category of providers. The usual reason reasons offered for

this health seeking behavior is that they provide quick services with minimum waiting time.

They are also noted to involve informal interactions (Brieger et al 2004). Furthermore, since

malaria is the dominant health problem in the population, most households are familiar with

symptoms of malaria and therefore require minimum effort and expensive technology to

diagnose it. Patent medicine providers in spite of their low level of education (Goodman et al

2007, Brieger et al 2004) are able to diagnose the symptoms of malaria and make appropriate

drug recommendation.

Figure 3: The Distribution of Healthcare Seekers by Facility

In addition, and perhaps most importantly, patent medicine stores are treat at cheaper rate since

they do not have to pay expensive bills for capital and high skilled health human resources as

would be the case for example, in a hospital. The next most important healthcare providers in

terms of number of patients visits is the private for-profit health facilities (private hospitals and

clinics). They account for about 13% of health facility visits. They is also a proliferation of these

private health facilities arising from the health sector deregulation in Nigeria which started in the

mid-1980. Although they are relative more expensive than the public health facilities, people,

even the poor still patronize them because of the relative ease of access to skilled human

resources. The owner-operator physicians make extra efforts to attract health seekers otherwise

they are driven out of business by competitors.

Only about 5% of those who sought healthcare visited the public health facilities. The reasons of

this low patronage include low geographic accessibility. There are few public health facilities in

the community and other nearby communities. There is also the problem of long-waiting time in

public health facilities, as well as rudeness of the staff to health seekers in public health facilities.

The figure also indicates that a large number of health seekers indulge the habit of self-

medication. Self medications include both herbal cure and self-prescription and use of orthodox

medicine. This often involves a household sending a member to purchase a given drug without

prescription of any qualified health personnel on behalf of a sick household member. It could

also involve the use of herbal cure which has been learned from others or by experience of use in

the household to treat a reported illness. However, the dangers associated with such health

seeking behavior can be quite very high. It may lead to delays in seeking appropriate medical

intervention and increase fatalities from unknown diseases. There are very few mission hospitals

in Nsukka area, yet they are usually highly rated on account of quality treatment they provide

their clients. Their services are also relatively cheaper than their for-profit counterparts. The

influence of traditional healers have also waned considerably as most people now than before

seek cure in orthodox medical facilities. However, they still dominate in the treatment of certain

categories of diseases including orthopaedic cases, suspected spiritual attacks and unidentified

illnesses.

Some households require assistance in times of ill-health because of the unpredictable nature of

ill-health itself, and more so because of the dominance of out-of-pocket health financing in the

country. Without such financial protection many households could be impoverished. This study

found that of the population that reported ill health, about 15% received one form of assistance

or the other. Furthermore, about 85% received financial assistance from neighbors or relations.

About 7% received free medication. About 1% and 4% received assistance in the form of

transportation and feeding respectively.

Mortalities in the Community

High morbidity rates signal high levels of mortality in any population. Mortality incidence in the

community was captured by a question to the household head requesting information on any

incidence of deaths in the household. The household head was asked: Did any member of this

household die in the last 6 months? A total of 174 deaths comprising 94 males and 80 females

were reported in the community within the time frame under consideration. This represents

0.82% of the total population that died in 6 months which translates to approximately 16 deaths

per 1000 in a year in crude death rate.

Table 6: Distribution of Mortalities by Age

Total 174 174 75 41 41 60 75 75 40 23 23 30 4 4 25 18 18 15 13 13 agecat 1 Total anydth

Table 6 shows that the highest number of death 75 representing 43% of total deaths occurred in

the age category 60-75. This is followed by 41 (or 23.56% of total deaths) in the age category 75

and above. The age category, probably due to narrow class boundary has the least number of

deaths of 4.

Access to Public Utilities

In order to evaluate accessibility to basic public infrastructure and utilities, households were

asked about the distance from their house to the nearest public infrastructure include health

facilities, schools, and tarred road. Table 7 reflects the responses to the question. This table

indicates that in general there is reasonable access to social infrastructure. The average distance

to the nearest primary school is 1.15km, with standard deviation of 1.03km, minimum reported

distance of 0km, and maximum reported distance of 8km.

Table 7: Access to Social Infrastructure

Utility Average Distance Std Dev. Minimum Maximum

Primary School 1.15 1.03 0 8

Distance Sec Sch 1.86 1.46 0 12

Hospital 2.8 2.57 0 14

Maternity 1.68 1.85 0 14

Patent Med Store 0.98 1.2 0 12

Tarred Road 2.1 1.82 0 9

Community Centre 0.92 1.28 0 13

Daily market 3.02 3.47 0 15

The mean distance to the nearest secondary school is nearly 2km with standard deviation of

1.46km, minimum of 0km and maximum of 12km. The mean distance to the nearest hospital is

2.8km with standard deviation of 2.57. Similarly the average distance to maternity is 1.68 with

standard deviation of 1.85. As mentioned earlier, patent medicine stores are found in every

corner of the village. The mean distance to a patent medicine store is less than a kilometer while

the average distance of households to tarred road is 2.1km with standard deviation of 1.8. The

average distance to the community centre is also less than a kilometer and maximum distance of

13 km. Average distance to a daily market is 3.02km with a standard deviation of 3.47.

Table 8: Access to Critical Household Utilities

Water Sources No. of Households %

Spring 2610 56.14

Dug-well 405 8.71

Borehole 1217 26.18

River 337 7.25

Harvested rain 65 1.4

other 14 0.3

Total 4648 100

In addition, about 71% of the households were connected to the national electric grid lines and

the rest survive without electric energy.

The following tables however, indicate poor access to critical household facilities. Majority of

households (56%) depend on spring water which may not actually be a clean source of water as

they are unprotected and exposed to contamination by flood water and reptiles. Dug well is not a

common source in the community. Less than9% of households use dug well while borehole

water is accessible to only 26% of households. About 7% of households still depend on small

rivers for their daily need.

Figure 41: Distribution of Households Access to Toilet Facilities

Figure 4, shows the appalling state of access to descent household toilet facilities. Majority of the

households (58%) indicated that they still defecate in the bush which exposes the entire

population to high level health risks. Under such conditions, sources of water may be exposed to

contamination and the risk of other infectious diseases and in fact epidemic is very high. Only

about 37% of households use pit toilets while only 6% of households use flush toilets.

Figure 5: Households Refuse Disposal

Figure 5 shows that most households (82%) in Edem community disposes their refuse in the

farm while a few others (14%) dispose it in the bush. Only very few households (2%) seemed to

be served by official refuse collectors.

Income and Wealth of Households

There is general agreement in the literature that both income and expenditure pose peculiar as

measures of household permanent income. Not least because of the difficulties in collecting

accurate information on these variables particularly in developing country contexts. The common

trend in the literature since the 1990s has been to construct asset index to facilitate the ranking of

households according to their income levels. This is usually done using factor or principal

component analysis which facilitates the assignment of weights to various household durable

assets. However, the results from such endeavors have often proved abortive as they often yield

counter-intuitive results (Bingenheimer, 2007). An important question that could be raised

against the construction of such artificial index is what exactly does the wealth index represent,

the present or future flow of income, and who determines their value?, the researcher or the

communities themselves? (Ichoku 2010). It has also been noted that such indices face further

challenges in dualistic economies such as characterize many low income countries particularly in

Africa. A value of an asset in one sector of the dualism may be different from its value in the

other. For example, how does one rank a household that possesses modern electronic gadgets in

the monetized modern sector of the economy (but without land) vis-à-vis a traditional

households without modern gadgets but with large expanses of farmlands?

In view of these challenges, recent developments have tended to use community evaluation of

assets to rank households within the community (Adato et al 2007; Rew et al 2007). This is

different from a priori research-determined household assets weights. Nevertheless, this study

adopts a very simple additive approach to asset index. Relying on the principle of non-satiety

(that is, that it is better to have more than to have less, we simply tabulate the percentage of

households that own a given asset as against those that do not have them. Ownership of listed

assets by households in the community is presented in Table 9.

Table 9: Ownership HH Durables Assets

Assets % of HH

owned

Assets % of HH

Owned

Television 34.04% Fridge 4.43%

Radio 52.36% Vidset 22.88%

CD-player 24.07% Gas-cooker 1.48%

electric gen 13.92% Kerosene Stove 17.66%

Bicycle 20.49% Computer 1.58%

Motorcycle 28.24% Air-conditioner 1.06%

Car 4.94% Wheelbarrow 72.89%

Satellite Dish 2.39% Clock 75.16%

The list assets are those that were in working condition as the moment of the interview. The

commonest assets owned by the largest proportion of households are wall clock and wheel

barrow. Households often decorate their living apartments with wall-clocks and to enable them

keep time of their engagements. Wheelbarrow is an essential household possession for moving

things such as water, farm products, construction materials, and even refuse. It is therefore and

essential household asset and households that do not have it have to borrow from neighbors for

to perform these tasks. The next most common durable asset owned by households in the

community is radio which is owned by 52% of households. Television is owned by only 34% of

the households while motorcycle a common means of movement in the community is owned by

about 28% of households. Ownership of car is very limited and is owned by only 4% of

households in the community. Modern communication equipments such as communication

handsets (gsm) is owned by about 44% of the population. Other modern communication devices

including cable television, video sets are also finding their way into the rural communities.

Electric power supply is the community and in Nigeria as a whole, is generally unstable.

Households often need to provide electricity generators in their homes to substitute for national

electric supply. This study indicates that about 13% of the households possessed such electric

generating machines. Surprisingly, kerosene stove and gas-cookers are still not generally in use

in most households (barely 17.6% and 1.5% respectively). The implication is that most

households in the community still rely on wood as source of household energy with its severe

implications for the environment and health of household members themselves.

As noted above the possession of these assets do not necessarily help to rank households because

they are limited to the modern sector of the economy. A household may still all these items but

live in a rented apartment or may not have a piece of land or own live-stocks which are highly

valued by the community; and thus, from the perspective of the community that household is not

rich although from the perspective of assets included in the survey the household be ranked very

high.

Income

Income is traditionally the single most dominant indicator of household standard of living.

However, several limitations of this variable as a measure of standard of living have been

generously acknowledged in literature. One such limitation is its tendency to fluctuate over time

and its lack of depth in capturing the other critical dimensions of household well-being such as

level of education, and health. However, these limitations have not stopped its use as a critical

proxy ranking households. This study required households to list their various sources of income

both in cash and in kind in the 6 months preceding the interview. The suggested common sources

include; farm crop income, livestock, forestry activities, wholesale and retail trade,

manufacturing activities, hospitality industry, transport, construction, etc. It also includes

incomes from salaries and wages, remittances from household family members, friends and

relations in other towns and cities in Nigeria and abroad, transfer payments from retirement

benefits, pensions and gratuities, rents from non-agricultural lands, buildings, spaces, and other

properties. It also includes interests from banks deposits, dividends from investments, imputed

value of owner-occupier houses and any other sources. The incomes from these different sources

and from different household members were aggregated to arrive at each household’s total

income.

The information from the field data suggests that the average household’s income in the 6

months preceding the survey was N53184 per household which translates to about $710 per

household in purchasing power parity. The per capita income is N12841 or about N2140 per

person per month which is also equivalent to average per capita income of about N25680. When

we compare this with the official poverty line of N21,608 per capita in 2004, it becomes clear

that majority of the people are living in poverty. This poverty dimension of the community will

be explored in the next stage of this analysis because it is critical to understanding the required

policy interventions in the community.

The Effects of Global Financial Crises on Households in Edem

The global financial crises started in full bloom about mid 2009 when the housing market in the

US started to unravel and the consequent financial crises spread across the globe. The effects of

this financial crisis have resonated in the remotest villages and hamlets across the globe. It has

impacted on the wellbeing of both the rich and poor. This section attempts to describe the effects

of GFC on Edem community. We tried to capture these effects by including several modules in

the questionnaire that evaluate household behavior changes in response to this development.

Household economic adjustment mechanisms in the face of declining welfare economic

expectations following the crisis include reductions in children’s school expenditure or even

withdrawal of children from school as some households cannot afford the cost schooling

anymore, reductions in household food expenditures, declining remittances , loss of jobs and

delays in the payment of wages and salaries.

Effects on Children’s Education

This household survey shows that a total of 242 school children in Edem were withdrawn from

school by the parents in response to increasing financial difficulties in the 6 months preceding

the survey. Of this number about 109 (or 45%) were girls while remaining were boys. That more

boys than girls were withdrawn from school is not at all surprising because in south-east Nigeria,

there is a high tendency for boys to finish school and join the relations or family friends in

trading or to engage in apprenticeship. Families tend to encourage girls to go to higher school

because they must prepare for marriage and family life and education is a very important

component of this preparation.

The main reasons households offered for withdrawing their children from school range from

inability to cope with school demands (58%) to declining family income (26%) and increased

school fees (6%). While school fees may not have increased dramatically as a result of the GFC,

it is possible that many households and experiencing the adverse effects of the crises are

increasingly finding it difficult to retain their children in school. Also within the time frame

under consideration, about 143 representing 3.3% of school age children were transferred from

private to public schools. This adjustment behavior is also predicated on the fact that private

schools usually charge more fees than public schools. Thus part of a household cost-saving

measure may be to transfer children from the high fee paying schools to low fee-paying public

schools.

Effects on Employment

On occupation and employment, it was found that household members in 0.31% of the surveyed

households lost their jobs in the last six months preceding the survey for reasons different

reasons including low pay (59%), sickness (32%) or inability of firms to pay (6%). Only on case

reported loss of jon because of folding up of the firm. The industry that reported most loss of

jobs was the mining industry, and since the community had no mining industry, this is likely to

refer to employers in the coal mining industry in the Enugu which is the state capital. There were

also reported cases of loss of job in the manufacturing industry (10% of all reported cases).

Finance (3.3%), real estate (17%) and health/education services (3.3%) also recorded loss of jobs

within the period. In addition to outright job losses, some workers in the community also

reported pay-cuts in the 6 months preceding the interview. About 13 workers reported

experiencing pay-cuts. Again the highest percentage of pay-cut occurred in the mining industry

(56%), real estate (16%) and manufacturing (10%). Industries such as wholesale and retail trade,

transport, ICT and utilities did not report any pay-cuts. The major industry reason for pay-cuts

was that business reduced.

Other survival strategies of firms during periods of economic down-turn is delays in payment of

workers’ salaries and wages as industries begin to experience cash-flow problems. This study

reports 68 cases of workers experiencing pay delays in the six months preceding the interview.

Again mining industry recorded the highest percentage (38%) of people experiencing pay delay.

About 29% of reported cases of pay delay emanated from the real estate industry, while

wholesale and retail trade reported only one case of pay-delay.

Another adaptation behavior of households in times of economic down-turn is to mobilize

children (<16) into commercial activities. This phenomenon, otherwise known as child-labor,

while augmenting household’s income exposes children to risks and compromises their

education and future. The survey data however, shows that only 4 households in the community

engaged in this practice in the 6 month s preceding the interview.

In times of food scarcity, households adopt different kinds of coping mechanism to manage their

food supply. One such method is to reduce the number of meals members take per day. Such

coping mechanism are usually expressed in local parlance as either 1-1-1, which stands for three

square meals per day. The first 1 implies that breakfast is taken, otherwise it would be 0 (zero),

the second 1, implies that launch is taken, otherwise it is 0. The third 1, implies that supper is

taken, otherwise it is 0. This generates series of meal formulas as shown in the second column of

Table 10. The survey noted that households had meal formulae for adults ranging from: 1-1-1 to

0-0-1. About 46% of households still maintain regular 3-square meals per day. The adult meal

formula, 0-1-0, implies that the household took only one meal (lunch) per day. Only 2% of

households adopted this adult coping behavior. The two dominants eating habits in the

community are the 1-1-1 and 1-0-1. About 47% of households reported the meal formula 1-0-1,

that is breakfast and supper without lunch.

Table 10: Adult and Children Food Coping Mechanism

Meal Formula Children Adult

1 1-1-1 48.43% 46.48%

2 0-1-0 6.37% 2.21%

3 1-0-1 41.21% 47.25%

4 0-1-1 1.24% 2.53%

5 1-1-0 0.13% 0.09%

6 0-0-1 1.50% 1.01%

7 1-0-0 1.12% 0.45%

While under-nourishment is bad for adults, it can be a disaster for children as it has severe

implications for their growth and development. The adaptive feeding behavior in adults is also

replicated for children in most households in the community as shown in 3rd column of Table 10.

The study shows that in rare cases both children and adults are unable to afford breakfast, and

launch and make do with only supper at night. Another extreme coping mechanism is 1-0-0

which implies that the household takes only on formal meal, breakfast, and nothing is available

for the rest of the day. It is however, difficult to say whether these adaptive mechanisms were in

response to pre-existing difficult economic condition on an adaptation method in response to the

difficult economic condition brought about by the GFC. It is possible that some households were

already skipping meals before the GFC but the number of households engaged in these adaptive

changes has increased since the onset of GFC.

Comparing the children and adult meal skipping behaviors, it seems that most households adopt

uniform food adaptation method for both adults and children. For example, while 48% of

households adopt 1-1-1 method for children 46% of households adopt same for adults. While

41% of households adopt 1-0-1 for children, 47% adopt if for adults.

Other household coping mechanisms in the face of food shortages include buying foods of lower

quality, or preparing food without meat or fish. It also includes using less desirable energy

sources in cooking such as fire wood instead of kerosene or gas. The survey results data shows

that 56% of households eat more garri which, though a staple household diet is usually

considered not as qualitative as other local foods in the same class. Similarly about 46% of

households report cutting down on drinks, just as 67% of households reported taken credits to

buy food. About 97.8% of households reported using firewood for cooking while only about

2.1% reported using kerosene as source of household cooking energy. Only 0.07% reported

using gas energy in the last 6 months preceding the interview.

Impact of GFC on Remittances

On the effects of global financial crises and coping mechanisms at both individual and household

levels the study found that some households in the community had relations living abroad

(outside Nigeria). Remittances have been a major sources income for some households in

Nigeria, like in many other developing countries. Migration of skilled, and sometimes, unskilled

relations abroad is often considered to be associated with improved economic well-being since it

is assumed that the migrated worker will always ‘think home’. However, when people who have

migrated abroad or to some other wealthier cities in the country experience economic hardships,

it often impacts on their ability to remit money home for other household members and relations.

This section examined the impact of the global financial crises on the regularity and volume of

remittances from other countries abroad and other cities in Nigeria to family members living in

Edem community.

Conclusion

This study has been designed to monitor the welfare of a rural community in Nigeria in phases..

The report provides some tentative results from the first phase of the study. The method adopted

is primary field enumeration of households, interviews and discussions with households and

community members. The results show that based on several indicators, many households lack

several social and households facilities and infrastructures that make life rather burdensome.

Large number of households lack access to clean water, health facilities, refuse disposal facilities

and toilet facilities. The health profile of the community is very poor. Crude mortality rate is

about 16/1000 and about 70% of households reported ill-health in the 6 month preceding the

survey. Adult literacy rate is also low as less than 60% of the population can read and write in

the two major languages spoken in the south-east of the country, Igbo and English. Households

wealth, measured by possession of important household durable assets is low. For example, only

4% of households has fridge, about 34% has television while only 1.5% has computer.

Furthermore, money income is very low as per capita income is only N25000 or about $333 in

PPP.

In the phase of poverty and GFC, households adopt all manner of survival mechanisms. Some

withdraw their children from school as they cannot cope with the financial demands of

schooling. Some transfer their children from high-fee paying private schools to low few-paying

public schools. More than half of households skip their meals both for adults and children, and

this has important implications for children’s growth and development. Some households resort

to low quality food. Some households reduced their level of drinks while most resort to using

cheap household energy sources, in particular firewood. The labor market effects are also

significant as some have lost their jobs while some experienced pay delays.

All these suggest that households in the community are passing through difficult times and

require government intervention. The critical role of this monitoring exercise is to provide actual

facts and figures on the state of rural households for informed policy. We hope that the second

phase of this study will help to establish trends in the welfare of this typical Nigerian rural

community and firm up some of the tentative conclusions made in this report.

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