Distr.
GENERAL
E/ECA/PSD.4/30 ISIRC/RES REP/1
20 January 1986
Original: ENGLISH
ECONOMIC COMMISSION FOR AFRICA INTERNATIONAL STATISTICAL INSTITUTE
Fourth Session of the Joint Conference on African Planners, Statisticians and Demographers
Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, 3-12 March 1986
CONTRIBUTION OF WORLD FERTILITY SURVEY PROGRAMME
TO KNOWLEDGE ABOUT POPULATION DYNAMICS IN AFRICA
Paper prepared by the ISI Research Centre for presentation at the Fourth Session of the Joint Conference of African Planners, Statisticians and Demographers. This document is also available as an ISIRC Research Report.
1. introduction
Demographic data collection at the national level in Africa initially took
the form of single round censuses and household surveys, typically
restricted in substance to life-time summaries (e.g. children ever-born and surviving) and to recent vital events (e.g. births and deaths in the preceding 12 or 24 months). The widespread defects of the data obtained by these means led to the development of an array of ingenious methods of adjustment which came to dominate demographic analysis in Africa. The defects also evoked the alternative response that better data collection was needed rather than reliance on posto facto adjustments. In particular the view arose that single round enquiries were irredeemably unsuited to yield reliable results and that longitudinal designs (dual recording of events by "independent" methods or repeated follow-up surveys) provided the only feasible way of collecting demographic data of high quality. However, the record of longitudinal surveys in Africa and elsewhere did not match the high expectations (Blacker 1977).
The World Fertility Survey programme thus occurred at a time when no satisfactory ways were apparent of gathering reliable demographic data in Africa. Nor indeed was the WFS initially seen as a possible solution. The top priority of the programme, epitomized by its core questionnaire for women in the reproductive age range, was fertility determinants rather than the measurement of vital rates. Where such rates were needed, the WFS
1 The World Fertility Survey was a major programme of internationally
coordinated survey research executed by the International Statistical Institute in collaboration with the United Nations and the International Union for the Scientific Study of Population, with financial support primarily from United Nations Fund for Population Activities and United States Agency for International Development. During 1973-84, 42 developing and 20 developed countries, including 13 from Africa, participated in the
programme.
Since 1984, computerized data-sets and technical materials resulting from the programme are maintained and serviced from a central location by the ISI Research Centre to ensure that full exploitation of the data collected continues.
This paper has been prepared on behalf of the ISI Research Centre by Mr. J.G. Cleland, Head of ISIRC Dynamic Data Base.
Page2.
revertedtothetraditionalhouseholdsurveywithmuchsimpler
butanenlargedsamplesizewhichwouldprecedethemoredetailed
ofwomen.
relativeneglectofconventionaldemographicestimationchangedasthe
matured,partlyunderpressurefromparticipatingcountriesand
forotherreasons.Confidenceinthequalityofdatagrewasdidthe
toprocessandanalyzethedetailedbirthhistoriesofthe
survey.Itwasrealizedthatthesamplingstabilityofestimates
fromsmallsamplesofwomencouldbegreatlyincreasedby
eventsandexposureoverseveralyears(Little,1982).Thenet
oftheseshiftswasanincreasingemphasisontheestimationfrom
historiesoflevelsandtrendsnotonlyoffertilitybutalsoof
mortalityatanearlyreportingstage,whicheclipsedinterestin
oftheWFSenlargedhouseholdsurveys.
thispaper,thecontributionstodemographicknowledgeofbothtypesof
-individualandhousehold-arediscussedbutthemainfocusison
former.ThoughAfricanparticipationintheprogrammecamelaterthan
otherregions,inordertoavoidoverlapwithcensusactivities,
timehasnowelapsedsincethecompletionofmostsurveysinthe
topermitabalancedjudgementonthecontributionoftheWFS.With
objectiveinmind,thedistinguishingfeaturesoftheWFSare
itsimpactondemographicknowledgearediscussed;itscostsand
relativetoalternativesareassessed;andfinallythe
forfuturedemographicresearchinAfricaareidentified.
oftheWFSapproach
WFSprogrammewasunusualinmanyrespects.Itsinternationalyet
centralizedinstitutionalcharactersetsitapartfrommostother
ofsuchgeographicalspread.Thesubstantivecoverageofthe
wasalsomuchwiderthanpreviousnationalattemptsatdemographic
collectioninAfrica.Inthissection,however,discussionis
toconsiderationsofoperationalphilosophyandsurvey
Page 3.
in terms of operational philosophy, two features of the WFS distinguish it most sharply from other similar enterprises in Africa: the determination (and the means) to capture data of the highest possible quality; and the equal determination to ensure that all surveys were completed, fully analyzed and archived for future access.
The pursuit of quality is illustrated at every stage of survey preparation and implementation. Samples were skilfully designed and care was taken in the development of adequate sampling frames, though it is clear that appreciable defects still remained (Marckwardt, 1984). The training of interviewers was lengthy, typically three weeks in duration, which is far longer than normal practice, even tak ing into account the unusual length and complexity of the instruments. Fieldwork was carried out in small teams, allowing constant quality control of output. The ratio of supervisory to interviewing staff was exceptionally high, usually in the region of 1 to 3. Concern for quality extended to data processing and reporting. Elaborate manual and computer editing procedures were routinely implemented, perhaps to an excessive extent (Pullum, Ozsever and Harpham, 1984}. Comprehensive and well documented analysis files were constructed and detailed tabulation carried out.
Of equal importance to the stress on quality was the insistence that all surveys were completed. Perhaps the greatest achievement of the WFS is the fact that 41 of the 42 surveys started in developing countries were finished. Each has yielded a substantial report of methodology and findings. Most have generated a large number of published in-depth studies, through the late-comers to the programme (concentrated in Africa) have yet to accomplish this stage (see Table 1) . Each has left a lasting legacy in the form of complete and documented files, now available with the ISI Research Centre for further work subject to countries' permission. This record contrasts vividly with the low completion rate for earlier African demographic surveys and perhaps constitutes the most convincing argument for strong international or regional coordination of future survey
programmes.
in terms of survey implementation, the major departure from previous practice was the use of specially recruited and trained female interviewers who administered verbatim questionnaires translated into the main local languages. The substitution of female for male interviewers, dictated largely by the personal and potentially embarassing nature of the core questionnaire, proved to be a resounding success. Sceptics who had warned that young women would not be able to stand the rigors of fieldwork in rough terrain proved to be wrong. Loss of staff during fieldwork rarely jeopardized the orderly progress of the work (Harpham, 1986}. While in certain West African societies, such as Ghana, male interviewers can be used, the experience of the WFS suggests that female staff should be preferred for future detailed fertility surveys.
The WFS core instrument is an extreme example of a verbatim questionnaire, where (in theory if not in practice) the interviewer is able to read out each question exactly as printed. Adherence to this principle added considerably to the length of questionnaires though it also facilitated the task of the interviewer in conducting a complex interview. Different routing patterns for different types of respondent were necessary, sign posted by skips and filters, and alternative wordings of questions had to be printed. In Kenya, for instance, the questionnaire contained a total of 201 questions, of which the average respondent was required to answer 124, or 62 per cent.
The efforts made to translate survey instruments into local languages is indicated in Table 1. Each version had to be developed, pre-tested and printed - a very time consuming and expensive operation. Moreover, interviewers, used to reading only the colonial linguae francae, often had to be trained to read their own mother tongue.
It is clear from this brief description that WFS surveys in Africa were unprecedented in many regards. A high level of technical expertize, financial expenditure and divergence from the routine operations of national statistical offices is also implied. The key issue, which is discussed in subsequent sections, is whether the gains justified the exceptional efforts.
Page 5.
TABLE 1
Some Characteristics of WFS Surveys in Africa
Year of fieldwork
Achieved sample sizes:
households individual
women
Linguistic versions of
individual
In-depth analysis projects
Benin Cameroon
Ghana
Ivory Coast Kenya
Lesotho Nigeria Senegal
Egypt
Mauritania Morocco Sudan(North) Tunisia
1981-2 1978 1979-80 1980-1 1977-8 1977 1981-2 1978
1980 1981 1980 1978 1978
20,000*
37,900*
6,000 3,800 8,900 18,200*
8,600 18,000*
10,100 14,800*
17,100*
12,000*
5,700
4,000 8,200 6,100 5,200 8,100 3,600 9,700 4,000
8,800 3,500 8,800 3,100 4,100
7 14 10 11 10 1 7 4
1 4 1 1 1
questionnaire completed or underway a by end 1984
1 6 12 3 38 10 1 14
30 4 2 9 3
Expanded household sample used.
Source WFS Final Report, International Statistical Institute, 1986
3. Contribution of the WFS to Demographic Knowledge
Any assessment of WFS's contribution to demographic Knowledge in Africa must start with a consideration of two factors: the existence and reliability of alternative sources of data; and the reliability of WFS estimates themselves.
Undoubtedly, the WFS was a major source of unique information in several respects: much of the information collected in WFS African surveys had never or very rarely been collected previously at the national level. This is true, for instance, for the data on breastfeeding, post-partum abstinence and amenorrhoea, contraceptive knowledge and use, fertility desires and marital dissolution and re-marriage. On these topics the WFS is an unrivalled source of information, the importance of which will be discussed later.
As regards the more traditional concerns of demographic enquiries, fertility and mortality, there was considerable inter-country variation in the availability of national data prior to WFS. At one extreme, Kenya and the Ivory Coast both held large scale demographic enquiries shortly before the WFS: a single round household survey in the case of Kenya {the NDS of 1977) and a multi-round survey in the case of the Ivory Coast (the EPR of 1978/9). At the other extreme, countries such as Nigeria, Cameroon and Benin had not collected direct, national level information on fertility and mortality for some twenty years prior to the WFS. Intermediate between these two groups are such examples as Senegal and Ghana who conducted demographic surveys in the early 1970's, and Lesotho and Sudan who included relevant questions in their population censuses of 1976 and 1973, respectively. In the face of this diversity, sweeping generalizations are inappropriate; yet it is fair to conclude that the WFS survey constitutes the sole up-to-date source of information on vital rates of populations of many of the thirteen African countries considered in this paper.
Even in settings where WFS is sole source of recent demographic information, its contribution to knowledge depends critically on the quality of data obtained.
This issue of quality confronts us with an immediate problem, namely how to validate survey estimates. The obvious means of validation is to compare WFS estimates with external sources. These need not be contemporaneous with the survey; one of the benefits of the respective birth histories collected in the individual survey is that reconstruction is possible of fertility and childhood mortality at specified intervals in the past.
TiT^
Page 7.
Such comparisons have been made for a number of WFS surveys in Africa. With few exceptions, analysts have concluded that the often substantial discrepencies observed stem from defects in the external source rather than the WFS. Owusu (1984), for instance, compared the 1971 Supplementary Enquiry (SE) with the 1978/9 WFS survey (GFS). While lifetime fertility appears to have been reported equally well on both occasions, the SE total fertility rate (TFR) of 5.9 is markedly lower than the GFS estimate for 1969-71 of 7.0; the balance of evidence indicates that the WFS estimate is nearer the truth. In Senegal similar results were obtained; the TFR of 7.4 births, reconstructed from WFS for the years 1970-71, is much more plausible than the estimate of 6.4 births derived from the 1970/1 Enquete Demographique National (Senegal, Ministere de l'Economie et des Finances, 1981). For the Ivory Coast, a discrepancy in current fertility levels between the WFS survey (a TFR of 7.2 for the preceding three years) and the Enquete Demographique a Passages Repetes of 1978/9 (unadjusted and adjusted rates of 6.4 and 6.8) was also resolved in favour of the former (Cote d'lvoire, Ministere de l'Economie et des Finances, 1984). Comparisons in other countries of WFS with census data have usually shown major deficiencies in the latter.
In view of the absence or lower quality of independent sources, evaluation of WFS data has had to take the form of internal checks of consistency and plausibility. Despite the considerable technical advances in the analysis of retrospective event histories, which have been stimulated by the WFS programme, it would be false to claim that definitive conclusions can always be reached about the reliability of estimates. While major errors in the data, such as appreciable omission of births by older women or major shifts in the dating of births, usually can be detected, the absence of such biases, while reassuring, can not be conclusive. At best the verdict can be 'not proven guilty1 rather than a positive assertion of innocence.
A cautious judgement on the quality of WFS data is needed particularly in Africa, because many of the detailed country-specific evaluations are not yet complete. With this caveat in mind, we may conclude nevertheless that direct estimates of current fertility from WFS surveys have generally
proved to be sound. The great advantage of the birth-history based measurement of current fertility over the abbreviated household survey approach is not that it necessarily reduces reference period error, but that annual irregularities in numbers of births can be examined and smoothed or averaged to yield more robust and convincing estimates. Only when there are very severe systematic biases in the reporting of birth dates or ages of infants or young children (or omission), has the estimation of current fertility proved problematic. Applications of P/F ratio techniques, indexed by age and by duration of motherhood, for African countries where fertility is unlikely to have undergone radical change, suggest that, with the possible exception of Sudan (North) and Mauritania, TFR's averaged for the preceding five years are reliable (Goldman, Rutstein and Singh, 1985).
The same sanguine verdict cannot be passed on fertility trends estimated from WFS birth histories. The results for many African surveys have been affected by a combination of misdating and omission of distant births, which often produces a false impression of a rise in fertility followed by a decline (see Table 2). While fertility increases in the 1960's cannot be ruled out, it appears almost certain that the apparent trends in Kenya, Nigeria, Mauritania and Sudan (North) are the facts of poor data (Henin, Korten and Werner, 1982, Morah 1986, Rizgalla 1985). In other countries, however, birth history trends have proved resilient to a battery of evaluative tests, to an extent that comes as a major surprise to many African-orientated demographers, hitherto sceptical or dismissive of the value of collecting detailed retrospective data. For instance the Cameroon survey, despite regional variations in quality, portrays with reasonable reliability a rising level of natality, in response to declines in pathological sterility (Santow and Bioumla, 1984). In Senegal, fertility-correlated age misreporting is detected but there are no grounds for doubting the constantly high level of fertility that has pertained since the early 1960's (Gueye, 1984). The WFS surveys in Ghana and Morocco provide evidence of small recent declines in fertility, which are probably genuine.
^ r^*" T" -*"Jf'f^^
Page 9.
TABLE 2
Current Fertility Levels and Trends
TFR for five year period prior to survey
Fertility cumulated up to age group 30-34 for five-year periods prior to survey
0-4
Period
5-9 10-14 15-19
Benin Cameroon
Ghana
Ivory Coast Kenya
Lesotho Nigeria Senegal
Egypt
Mauritania Morocco
Sudan(North) Tunisia
7.0 6.3 6.3 7.3 8.2 5.6 6.4 7.1
5.3 6.2 5.9 6.1 5.7
4.7 4.3 3.9 4.9 5.2 3.7 4.3 4,9
3.8 4.2 3.9 3.9 3.5
4.5 4.2 4.1 5.0 5.5 3.6 4.1 4.8
3.9 4.9 4.5 4.9 3.9
4.5
3.9 4.2 4.8 5.7 3.6 3.4 4.9
4.7 4.6 4.8 4.7 4.5
4.5 3.6 4.2 4.6 5.1 3.5 3.6 4.9
5.1 4.2 5.0 4.3 4.6
(Source: Goldman, Rutstein and Singh, 1985).
One of the most important advances in descriptive demography over the last decade has been the increased ability to decompose fertility into its direct or proximate determinants. The charting of these determinants at a national level in Africa has been one of the major contributions of the WFS programme. The WFS developed for the African region an innovative set of questions, termed the FOTCAF module, in an attempt to measure the impact on fertility of such factors as sterility, age at menarche and menopause, coital frequency, temporary spousal absence, lactational infecundity, post-parturn abstinence, and terminal abstinence, in addition to contraceptive practice and marriage which were measured routinely in all
The analytic yield of this module has been mixed. The measurement of sterility, menarche and menopause and temporary spousal separations has not been very succesful. Few countries chose to incorporate recommended questions on coital frequency, and the results concerning terminal abstinence (ie. the permanent cessation of sexual relations) suggest that this factor is in any case not as significant as some previous researchers had found.
The findings on contraceptive practice have tended merely to confirm what was already widely believed. In the sub-Saharan countries and in Sudan (North) and Mauritania, large proportions of women appear to be unaware of any method and their levels of use are negligible. However, it would be short-sighted to claim that the collection of these data was a waste of resources, because they provide an invaluable benchmark against which change can be measured in future surveys. A growing number of African governments are actively promoting family planning and the so called
"contraceptive revolution1 has already started in such countries as Zimbabwe and Botswana. The need to monitor progress in this sphere of government activity will grow and the WFS legacy will undoubtedly prove
important.
The real success of the FOTCAF module has been the measurement of the post-parturn variables: breastfeeding, amenorrhoea and sexual abstinence.
Prior to the WFS, a number of localized studies in West Africa had revealed the important impact of these factors on birth spacing and hence on the level of fertility; but national data of high quality had been lacking. The WFS findings in Table 3 confirm the birth-spacing importance of post-partum abstinence in much of sub-Saharan Africa. In such countries as Benin, Cameroon and Ivory Coast, an extra four to five months of protection against conception is added to the protection already afforded by prolonged breastfeeding. In Lesotho, the anti-natal effect is much greater, while in Kenya and the Arab-speaking societies it is trivial, by comparison.
The contrast between Africa and other regions in the relative contribution of the major proximate determinants to the restraint of fertility is clearly seen in Table 4. The role played by post-partum insusceptibility in Africa is much greater than that of non-marriage (ie. postponement of first
TABLE 3
Page 11,
Some Proximate Determinants of Fertility
For cohort aged 20-24 estimated mean age at:
first first marriage birth
(1) (2)
Mean durations (months)of: Percent practicing
'contraception' Breast- Amenorrhoea Abstinence Insuscept post other feeding
(3) (4) (5)
-ibility
(6)
parturn abstinence
(7)
methods
(8)
Benin Cameroon Ghana
Ivory Coast Kenya
Lesotho Nigeria Senegal
Egypt
Mauritania Morocco Sudan(North) Tunisia
19.1 17.8 18.9 17.9 19.5 19.1 17.5 17.3
19.7 16.8 20.6 18.8 22.7
20.0 19.6 20.4 19.6 19.9 20.9 ■ 20.0 19.4
21.7 20.8 22.5 20.7 24.8
19.2 17.5 17.9 17.5 16.9 19.1 19.2 17.7
16.3 15.6 14.2 15.8 14.0
11.9 11.8 12.4 10.4 9.9 9.6 10.4
-
8.9 8.8
_
10.8 6.9
15.5 13.9 10.0 13.1 2.9 15.0 14.1
17.2 15.9 14.6 14.7 10.3 16.5 N.A.
44 30 25
34 10 33 34
2.6 1.6
11.2 7.4
8 3 10 3 7 5 2 4
25
1 20 5 42
Notes Cols 1&2
Cols 3-6
Cols 7&8
The estimates are based on fitting the Coale-McNeil nuptialily
model. Source: Trussell and Reinis (1984).
Means are calculated using the 'current status' method.
Insusceptibility is defined as a state of amenorrhoea o£
post-partum abstinence. Source: Singh and Ferry (1984).
The percentages are based on currently married women aged 15-44 Women who report post-partum abstinence and current use of a contraceptive method are classified under the former condition.
Source: Population Information Program (1985).
TABIiE 4
The percentage of the overall reduction from totally
unrestrained fertility (the Total Fecundity Rate) to the observed TFR, which is due to each of the three main proximate determinantsAfrica America Asia
Non-marriage
34 41 36
Contraception
7 41 23
Post-parturn insusceptibility
59 18 41
(Source: Casterline, Singh, Cleland and Ashurst, 1984).
marriage plus dissolution) or contraception, and much greater than its role in Latin America and the Caribbean or in Asia. Such results have encouraged alarmist views about potential future rises in African fertility as modernization (particularly urbanization and education) erodes traditional customs of prolonged lactation and abstinence. Such erosion does indeed occur, as may be seen in Figures 1 and 2, but it is usually counterbalanced by the anti-natal effects of increased birth control and postponement of marriage and motherhood. The net results of these conflicting forces may be seen in Figures 3 and 4. Both in sub-Saharan and North Africa, urban fertility tends to be lower than rural fertility; and the fertility of women with seven or more years of schooling is inevitably lower than that of less educated couples. However, it is intriguing to note that in five of the eight sub-Saharan African countries, women with one to three years of schooling record the highest levels of fertility. (Incidently, such 'inverted U' shaped covariation in fertility with level of education has also been observed in certain non-African countries) . Thus a very modest exposure through the educational system to new ideas and ways of life is conducive to an increase in fertility, but more prolonged exposure (or residence in an urban setting) sets in motion a decline. On balance, the possibilities of major surges in fertility in Africa do not appear to be great, except in countries such as Cameroon and Zaire where fertility has been suppressed by pathological
sterility.
This short glimpse of results on fertility determinants illustrates the richness of the data and the new insights that the WFS programme has made possible. A reversion in future data collection to a reliance on the sparse data afforded by censuses and household demographic enquiries would be most regrettable. The future course of fertility in Africa must surely be monitored by surveys that can take account of the determinants as well as
the outcomes.
Figure 1.
an duration of post-partum insusceptibility, for major ban (MQ), other urban (OU) and rural populations (R)
Figure 2.
Mean duration of post-partum insusceptibility according to educational level of women (0, 1-3, 4-6, 7+ years schooling)
t c>
IS
Major Urban
KEY
BJ Benin CM Cameroon GH Ghana
CI Ivory Coast KE Kenya
Other Urban
LS Lesotho NG Nigeria SN Senegal EG Egypt MR Mauritania
Mean duration
(months)
Rural
MA Morocco SD Sudan (North) TN Tunisia
0 years
\
LS
BJ GHCM
CI KE SB TH
1-3 years 4-6 years 7+ years
Source Singh & Ferry 1984
Urban (MU), Other Urban (OU) and Rural Populations (R)
1-
6- 6- 4- 3-
Rfwcb:5outh of the Srhurb
* --Ou
■i-MU
er cm
TR
4-ou MOgh
00MO
r I
Moft ou
KE IS HCU SM
9"
6- 7- 6- 5- 4- 3- 3- 1 o
--0U --HU
--OU MU
-OU -»-M0
Mfl
Key: see figures 1+2
schooling)
1-
6- 5- 4- 3- a- I-
1-3 o
--4-6
7+
■O -1-7+
■pl-3
4-6
■7+
l-3
CM —i—GH —I—CX
■4-60 ^
1-3 -7+
o1-3
-1-7+-
NQ
9- 8- 7-
6 5 4
a i o
O
■1-5
■7+
1-3
•4-6
Mfl
Source Ashurst, Balkaran and Casterline 1984
Page 15.
Thus far the discussion of the WFS's contribution to demographic knowledge in Africa has been confined to fertility and its determinants. No balanced account, however, can ignore the topic of childhood mortality; as is now generally recognized, the contribution of the programme to the study of mortality has been a great and largely unanticipated bonus, perhaps even exceeding the contribution to fertility estimation. As noted by van der Walle and Kekovole (1984), the assessment of mortality levels and trends in Africa has been more 'haphazard1, because the assumption of stability, while reasonable for fertility, is untenable for mortality. Thus mortality estimates become more quickly outdated than those for fertility.
Of course, as is the case for fertility, the quality of information on childhood mortality from WFS birth histories varies considerably from country to country. In a few surveys such as Sudan (North) and Mauritania (Rizgalla, 1985; Cheikh, 1984), there is evidence of substantial omission of dead children. In these and most surveys, ages at death are not reported with precision, leaving doubt as to the age pattern of mortality in the first five years of life. But, generally, the data appear to be of surprisingly high quality and confirm beyond doubt widespread and substantial mortality declines in Africa in the last 20 years (see Table 5). The view that appreciable omission of dead children by older mothers is inevitable has been shown to be false. While dating of events remains a major problem in African demographic enquiries, good coverage is more amenable to high standards of execution.
The birth history approach to childhood mortality estimation has several advantages over indirect estimation based on household surveys and censuses. The former data are not necessarily superior in coverage (indeed, the proportions of dead children reported in WFS household surveys are no lower than in the individual surveys - see Timaeus, 1986) , but their analytic potential is far greater. Differential mortality according to mother's age, birth order and birth spacing can be examined only with birth histories. Some of the most striking and policy relevant results of ithe WFS programme have been in this area.
The contribution of WFS to the study of health has been limited, though useful descriptive indices of preventative health care have been obtained in a number of African surveys and more detailed data were collected in Morocco. It is now clearer than at the start of the WFS programme thatbirth history surveys provide ideal opportunities for the gathering of information on this topic. This is so because much of the data needed for the analysis of health determinants (such as date of birth, survivorship, age at death and sex of child together with family characteristics such as birth spacing, birth order and household amenities) is already routinely collected. It is very much to be hoped that future WFS-style surveys will build upon the beginnings made in the WFS programme.
TABLE 5
Probabilities of Death before age five per 1000 births
(5q0) for five-year periods prior to survey,
confined to births occurring at maternal ages 20-29
Period
0-4 5-9 10-14 15-19
Benin Cameroon Ghana
ivory Coast Kenya
Lesotho
Nigeria Senegal
Egypt
Mauritania Morocco
Sudan(North Tunisia
196 181 117
159 135
166 152 251
182 189 134 129 102
240 192 124 226 148 177 136 270
231 166 154 123 126
254 238 158 246 157 188
184 294
241 163 173 140 138
277 258 147
289 193 169 204 268
266 228 188 142 186
^
Page 17
4- Implications for Future Demographic Enquiries in Africa
A sketch of the substantial benefits of the WFS programme in Africa has been provided in the previous section. In this section, the other side of the coin - the costs - are first discussed, before the implications for future data collection are outlined.
Perhaps the most frequently voiced . criticism of the WFS is its high financial cost. The whole programme absorbed about US$49 million, or an average of $1.2 million per completed survey. However, such calculations of average survey costs are seriously misleading, because an appreciable
proportion of the total sum was spent on methodological and substantive
analysis (the results of which are contained in WFS Scientific Reports, Comparative Analyses and Technical Bulletins), which should not be added tothe costs of individual surveys. Nevertheless, WFS surveys were not cheap.
A detailed analysis of the first 30 surveys concludes that the average expenditure (excluding technical assistance but including the contribution of the countries themselves) was about $300,000 at 1984 prices, of which two-thirds was met by external donors (Cleland and Verrall, 1986) . The largest component (36 per cent) was fieldwork, followed by the salaries and allowances of central staff (21 per cent). Such is the dearth of reliable information on the costs of surveys in developing countries that it is impossible to compare this figure of $300,000 with comparable surveys,
though we suspect it is not exceptionally high.To these operational expenditures must be added the costs of technical
assistance provided by WFS staff and consultants, both on site and at the
London headquarters. It is this aspect of the WFS programme that is extravagant. On average, 1210 person-days (ie. between four and five person-years) of technical assistance was devoted to each African survey,spanning preliminary negotiations to the completion of the main country
report (Vaessen and Jemai, 1986). Data processing and report-writing
account for the majority of this input. The average per country outside the
African region was of course significantly lower.What accounts for this excessive amount of external assistance? Undoubtedly the extremely rigorous and complex procedures adopted by WFS, particularly with regard to data processing and reporting, combined withCthe relative weakness in these areas of many statistical offices in Africa is the major cause. Contributory factors include lax control of staff time by the WFS, pressure to finish the last African surveys before the termination of the programme in 1984 and the use of long term resident advisors in several African countries.
A further indirect cost of the WFS approach concerns the length of time taken to complete surveys. While operations up until the end of fieldwork typically progressed at a satisfactory pace, data processing and the completion of the main report took an average of 34 months, far longer than planned (Scott and Vaessen, 1986) . Though key findings were often made available more quickly (and a few African countries issued separate short preliminary reports} , this delay is clearly unacceptable, because it seriously retards the incorporation of results into government policy formation and programme evaluation.
A final 'cost' of the WFS operation stems from in its idiosyncratic nature.
The special recruitment of female interviewers and their deployment in mobile teams cuts across integrated survey programmes, which typically rely on permanent male enumerators who live close to selected sample areas. Thus the execution of a WFS style survey requires exceptional efforts in terms of organization, finance and logistics, and does not leave a permanent
legacy commensurate with the efforts. Often the staff so expensively
recruited and trained cannot be absorbed at the end of the survey as full time members of the statistical office.in conclusion, the costs of the WFS, broadly defined, are considerable but
so, as we have already demonstrated, are the benefits. The direction for
future demographic surveys in Africa is to reduce the costs, without jeopardizing the essential benefits.Page 19.
This worthy objective can be achieved, we believe, by the following changes:
simplification of instruments
. relaxation of the perfectionist standards of data editing exploitation of new computer technology
production of shorter and simpler reports.
Let us consider briefly each of the suggestions.
There is no doubt that the questionnaires used in WFS African surveys can be drastically pruned for future use with little loss of useful information. At least one-third of the contents of the WFS core questionnaire does not justify its retention and the POTCAF module is even more amenable to compression. Equally clearly, WFS's insistence on the removal of all detectable errors in data did not justify its cost. Almost identical results would have been obtained from structurally sound but otherwise lightly edited data files. New micro-computer technology has the potential of further streamlining the data processing stage. The
integration of data entry and basic editing using interactive video
terminals should prove vastly more efficient than the reiterative batch editing employed in most WFS Surveys. Finally, WFS reports were too detailed and complex and placed a huge burden on the analytic skills of statistical office staff. A much simpler reporting strategy should be adopted for future surveys, though this should be followed by more specialized analysis both within and outside the national executing agencies.These changes would go a long way towards making periodic WFS-style surveys a feasible proposition for most African countries. To be sure, external
financial and technical assistance will still be required in many instances
but on a more modest scale than that provided under WFS auspices.An explicit mention of those aspects of WFS surveys which should be
retained is perhaps as important as the identification of areas in which
simplifications and savings can be made. A continued emphasis on data
collection of the highest possible quality is indispensable. This priorityimplies the continued use of verbatim questionnaires translated into major local languages, prolonged training of field staff, a high ratio of supervisors to interviewers and strict quality control. Any major relaxations of these features, in our opinion, would be a false economy.
Of course we do not suggest that detailed birth history surveys of the WFS
type represent the sole means of studying the f'uture course of fertility
and mortality in Africa. For explanatory as opposed to descriptive purposes, other more intensive approaches, including longitutional enquiries and small scale local studies, are necessary. At the other extreme, however, a major limitation of the WFS approach concerns the relatively small sample sizes that have been imposed as much by logistical constraints as by financial considerations in surveys of WFS type. Sample sizes of 5,000 to 10,000 are not amenable to fine geographical breakdowns.Yet, for many policy purposes, such disaggregation is indispensible. In the future, one way to achieve larger sample sizes without losing control over quality would be to conduct the survey in a phased manner, cumulating results over an extended period. Simplified birth history surveys administered to large samples may also become feasible in Africa, but this
possibility is beyond present resources.
Despite this limitation, we believe that WFS-type surveys, conducted at intervals of about five years, represent a better investment in most settings than traditional demographic household enquiries. A well conducted series of such surveys is a particularly desirable goal, because, in this situation, the analyst is better able to disentangle genuine trends from possible biases. Building on the exceptionally rich, experience accumulated through the World Fertility Survey Programme in Africa and elsewhere, the ISI Research Centre is ready to provide interested developing countries the
needed technical, training and analytical support in executing surveys of
this type.
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Page 21
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