Migration Household Survey 2009

A. Fieldwork in the Different Zones - Matters Arising

The fieldwork was originally scheduled to be completed between September 7 and September 30, 2009. It actually began on 14 September but significant changes in the methodology warranted that the teams be withdrawn from the field while the sample and implementation strategy was re-drawn (see above, the evolution from Procedure A to Procedure B to Procedure C). Following this and the adoption of the new sampling framework, the teams headed back to the field on the 5th of October, with a mandate to finish within three weeks, but the difficulties associated with getting to some of the sample communities were greater than anticipated, leading most of the teams to spend far more time in the field than was projected.

For states in the South East - Imo, Ebonyi and Abia states - led by Chioma Onwumelu, the interviews were ultimately conducted on a total of 405 households: 106 non-migrant households, 160 households with internal migrants, and 139 households with international migrants. (Details are found in Annex A.) These households were selected from a sampling frame near evenly distributed between the population living in urban and rural areas. The number sampled represents approximately 24 percent of the 1679 households listed by teams in the selected sample states of the zone. Almost all targeted households responded. A few cases required the intervention of the supervisor with the help of community authorities to encourage sample households to respond. Given the different teams' understanding of the local language and socio-cultural terrain of each region, only in rare cases were there challenges in communication between the team and respondents. Cooperation and understanding within the team was appreciably high. For example, when the team in Imo finished earlier than those in Abia and Ebonyi, they agreed to be posted to those states to assist with the work at no extra cost to the project. This was also due to the sterling leadership of the regional coordinator who had meetings with the teams before they departed to the field. During the meetings, each field worker was brought to see the success of the region as the success of his own state and therefore the success of his/her own fieldwork, creating both collegiality and collective responsibility. This proved invaluable at the different stages of changes in the field methodology described above, when exchanges of information among teams enhanced overall performance of teams in the region.

Despite this, the team confronted a number of challenges. For example, in some instances there was difficulty in obtaining correct information in sections of the questionnaire seeking personal (particularly financial) data. Understandably, many households were apprehensive about divulging information relating to household finances. In some cases, letters of introduction and identity cards issued to the enumerators and supervisors were not sufficient to convince these households; it took lengthy pleas and oaths from the fieldworkers to convince them to respond, even though most teams had already met with traditional local community heads and paid for publicity using town criers. In a few others when practicable, inferences were made from information on daily expenditures and what could be gleaned from the residence and its contents to estimate weekly or monthly expenditures.

Accessibility of some selected communities was also an issue, particularly in Ebonyi state where infrastructure is weaker than in the other states of the region, making it difficult to access some enumeration areas. Ezillo community in Ishielu Local Government (of Ebonyi State) was originally selected but involved in tribal wars so had to be dropped and replaced by another community with Oriuzo in Ezza North from the sample in order to not jeopardize the security of interviewers. Some areas were not easily accessible by car so interviewers had to use motor bikes or trek very long distances.

In the four states of the South South - Akwa Ibom, Edo, Delta and Rivers - led by Eric Onyebalu, a total of 1,642 households were listed out of which 523 or 32% were interviewed (see details for each state in Annex A). The teams were directed by the supervisor to first conduct physical identification of the enumeration areas. Thereafter, they had comprehensive listings of the households in the first set of enumeration areas (this was before the 50 percent increase in Local Government and Enumeration area coverage). Like the team in the South East, the South South team also demonstrated high mutual respect for one another which made it possible to overcome the many challenges they faced. Adherence to the provisions of the codes of conduct and mutual desire to resolve differences in team members' perceptions of the work proved critical in keeping them together and yielding regular progress.

Given that the communities and enumeration areas selected for the project in the states were randomly chosen, they were far apart, leading to significant logistic problems. In a number of cases, sample communities were not covered by mobile telephones, raising difficulty in communication between teams and the supervisor(s), on the one hand, and among the teams, on the other. Some of the states in the South South (the Niger Delta area) are volatile because of activities of militants. So security was a major concern in this zone. There were also challenges with transportation emanating from swampy neighbourhoods. At one point, a sample EA (and consequently the Local Government, Uvwie) had to be replaced with another one (Isoko South) on account of the combined challenges of security and navigability. Fortunately, the survey took place in the dry season, reducing logistic difficulties so interviews were successfully held in the rest of the LGs and EAs.

As in the South East, many respondents were not comfortable with some questions on personal incomes and family finances. The teams therefore had to use tact to extract relevant responses. To this end, examples cited and instances from role playing helped significantly to deal with such challenges in the field. Meanwhile, following the understanding that international migrants should be oversampled, the team most often employed their knowledge of the local environment and the reconnaissance listings to explore means of reaching households with international migrants. As all teams were required to deliver soft as well as hard copies of the responses, the South South team spent a lot of time following the end of fieldwork to translate responses on papers into soft copies. The reason for this is that it was not possible for them to key in data from the questionnaires at night due to the rigorous work of interviews. After observing the difficult work for the first few days, the regional supervisor excused the teams from the task of daily keying in responses. Fortunately, the team was also as diligent after the fieldwork to use the first couple of days in filling out the soft copies of the instruments. Overall, the fieldwork in the region was a success.
Sample states in the North included Kano, Katsina and Zamfara (in the Northwest), Bauchi and Yobe (in the Northeast) and Niger (in the North Central) geopolitical zones. Given the much lower out-migration rate in this part of the country, analyses on this study often treat them as a homogenous group. Fieldwork in the three regions was coordinated by Uchenna Amaeze. Much more than other parts of the country, the Northern countryside is characterized by states with large land masses and great distances between towns and communities. Some are so far apart that moving from one sample EA to the next could mean several hours' drive, requiring a relocation of the entire team and materials. Invariably, the result was a lag in work that could be up to three days before teams could settle down well enough to resume listing and interviewing in a new EA. As in other parts of rural Nigeria, some communities in the sample were not accessible by motor vehicle, so teams had to severally use motorbikes in areas not accessible to cars.

Teams in the North also experienced additional challenges with the relatively lower rate of literacy in sample areas. In some EAs, the use of local consultants notwithstanding, it took an unusually long time to finish a single interview as the interviewers had to spend a lot of time explaining to respondents the information they were asked to supply and why. This resulted in longer interview completion times, return visits to households for reconfirmations. Otherwise, respondents were generally very co-operative, not unconnected to the fact that most interviewers working in the region were from the region and had considerable experience in conducting surveys there. The teams also made things easier by paying prior courtesy calls to the local authorities and chiefs, who then introduced them to the community, soliciting that the people give them maximum co-operation.

The teams in the North also showed tremendous understanding given the myriad challenges that cropped up during the exercise. Five members of the team (independently and at different times and in different states) were involved in serious road accidents as they travelled through their designated EAs; one required medical attention and had to be replaced, others took a few days off, after which they were able to return to their work. Being far from project headquarters and far from one another in remote and hard-to-reach communities made it difficult for the regional supervisor to reach each team on time when the sampling methodology changed from Procedure A to B to C. Therefore, a number of the teams in the North simply went ahead with the original Procedure A listing, as against the changing procedures in other regions. In fact, by the time Procedure C was being implemented in Southern States, most teams in the North had already finished the interviews (see sections IVB, C below).

The Southwest sample consisted of three states besides Lagos - Osun, Oyo and Ondo. The fieldwork there was coordinated by Franklin Agbai. Anticipating a tedious and painstaking survey, the team quickly had a review meeting in Ibadan following the conclusion of training. Despite this, the supervisor was continually stretched as he attended to the diverse needs of teams for intervention on gray areas of the work and unexpected experiences with respondents and communities. Teams had to continually invent ingenious means of dealing with challenges, including household members (especially younger ones) asking for tips before allowing the administration of questionnaires, team members being mistaken for government workers on prying missions despite producing identity documents, etc. Fortunately most of the interviewer were young or could pass for students. So where convenient and could ease interaction with households, enumerators who were affiliated with universities in one way or the other would produce identity cards to that effect instead identity card and introduction letter from Zibah Consults.

Owing to the stress of the daily interviews, again it was not practicable to input data from the interviews on a daily basis as hoped. Teams were therefore allowed to wait till the end of the field work to start the data input process. However, team leaders and where possible the supervisor prior to that had to crosscheck the entries in the hard copies each day to ensure that mistakes were corrected while the team was still within reach of the respondents. Teamwork among the members of the region was appreciable. Owing to the high workload, Oyo had to engage one extra interviewer while Lagos engaged two more. They were trained in the field and in the listing and interviewing procedures. It is noteworthy that the work in Lagos was perhaps the most intensive of all the states in the country, given the double sampling of the state, leading to large number of local governments that had to be covered. Consequently, the team in Lagos first concentrated on listing households in the first set of local government areas assigned to them before beginning interviewing. They put in very commendable efforts to cover the work in good time.

The experiences of the different teams provide important lessons for the design and administration of future surveys. As one of the supervisors noted, time pressures led to insufficient work on design issues and experimentation before the actual fieldwork. The result was the need to later make costly changes after the teams were already in the field. This required more work of supervisors to ensure that not only were agreed-upon standards maintained by every team, but that this was done in a consistent manner. Communication problems led to significant avoidable cancellations and repetitions of procedures in the field. Any deficiencies in the time for adequate planning lead to costly adjustments in the field. This makes it imperative to conduct thorough and detailed preparatory work before going out to the field. Of course, no amount of preparatory work can completely eliminate chance occurrences in the field, but it minimizes them and enhances pre-emptive reaction to them. In particular, challenges came with the changes in sampling methodology. The changes in the sampling procedure, the coverage and selection of sample areas (states, local governments and enumeration areas) when teams were already in the field and had started fieldwork negatively affected the fieldwork. It took time to cascade the new instructions to the teams in the field, including pointing out the differences between the old and new methodologies and explaining the rationale behind the changes.

Dealing with the question of confidentiality and by extension obtaining sensitive information from respondents remains a continual challenge in household surveys of this nature. The Project Team would not say that it found the magic wand but it is proper to assert that understanding cultural sensitivities and winning the confidence of respondents is critical to obtaining meaningful results. The Nigerian survey recorded only one non-response from all teams. This was possible because every supervisor was made to appreciate the need to seek the approval and assistance of traditional local leaders. Consequently, local publicity including town criers backed by the traditional ruler and his chiefs helped secure the cooperation of the respondents. In one instance, the team was treated to a feast by the chief, who then gathered the sample households for interviewing. To a large extent then, not only was the sampling easy, but there were greater grounds for placing faith in the information obtained. On the other hand, in many urban areas, particularly in the south where the traditional governance institutions have been weakened, as in Lagos, Ibadan and other urban areas, teams had to resort to appeals, diplomacy and persuasion to obtain results from sample households.

A significant number of supervisors and interviewers appealed for reduced and more focused questions in the instrument. But the project management team in Nigeria made it clear it did not have the latitude for such significant changes as the project was continent-wide and had to be made comparable to other countries. So, changes were limited to minor adjustments in wording that contextualized the questions for Nigeria and yielded a better understanding of each question. While this procedure sufficed for the present project, the demand for greater clarity in the instrument (which we verified did not simply stem from the desire for reduced work) indicates the necessity of more extensive deliberations with potential participants in fieldwork before commencement of the survey in the future. While participants cannot be allowed to decide the contents of the instrument, it might help to have an outline of targeted outcomes and then have a wider audience make inputs into the nature of questions to yield better results in each country.

B. Modifications to the Initial Sampling Procedure in the Last Stage (Sampling Households)

As the fieldwork progressed, it was found desirable to make adjustments. The pilot study of two local government areas in two states - Enugu and Kogi - had showed the incidence rate of international migration to be about 10 percent (5 households out of 50 interviewed), 64 percent for internal migration (32 households) and 26 percent for non-migrant households (13 households). However, in the course of the actual fieldwork, some early household listings in states in the South (East) indicated that the relative number of households with international migrants was higher than observed in the pilot, with a few extreme cases being in excess of 20 percent. So it was decided that it would be excessive to list as many as 100-150 households to select 34. To address this, the number of households to be listed by teams was reduced to between 50 and 100, and the number to be interviewed pegged at about 20 for each EA, but including specific guidelines on how to oversample households (hhs) with international migrants relative to others, and households with internal migrants relative to those with no migrants. This took into account the expected relative prevalence of the three types of households. Thus it was decided, in a new Procedure B, to select a maximum (to reduce clustering effects, from large clusters) of 10 households with migrants in each sample EA. This meant that if there were fewer than 10 listed, all would be sampled and accepted to be interviewed, while in the few cases expected to have more than 10, the 10 would be selected randomly, keeping the maximum at 10. In stratum 2, the maximum would be fixed at 7, recognizing that most sample communities would have a tenth or more of their households with an out-migrant in the past 9 years to some internal destination. Then for stratum 3, we set a minimum of 3 non-migrant households and a maximum of 12. Thus in an EA with many out-migrant households, the maximum numbers of households with international migrants and internal migrants selected in the sample would be 10 and 7, leaving 3 non-migrant households to sum to 20. If there were a shortfall in the number of households with international migrants, the number in stratum 3 would be increased. For example, if 60 households were listed in an EA, one having an international migrant, 5 having internal migrants, and 54 having non-migrants, then the sample would comprise 1 international migrant household, 5 internal migrant households, and 12 non-migrant households, for a total of 17 households in the EA. If there were 0 international migrant households, 10 internal migrant households, and 60 non-migrant households, the numbers sampled in the three strata would be 0, 7 and 12, for a total of 19. The understanding was that there would usually be a higher number of households with no migrants than internal migrants and almost always a larger number of internal migrants than international migrants leading to higher sampling fractions for the latter in each case. Even with this, the total number of households with internal migrants in the final sample interviewed was still expected to be larger than the number with international migrants because the latter were far rarer. But generally, the difference would be less with this Procedure B than with the earlier Procedure A. Note this meant there would always be a range of 0 to 10 households to be interviewed in stratum 1, 0 to 7 in stratum 2 and 3 to 12 in stratum 3. Where there were no households in strata 1 and 2, the number in stratum 3 could be increased in each EA. This procedure was named Procedure B to distinguish it from the original procedure (termed Procedure A, explained earlier).

But after reducing the number of households to be selected per EA to 20, a new challenge emerged namely; the overall number of questionnaires to be generated given the total number of enumeration areas and the number of households within each enumeration area to be interviewed would yield less than the desired 2000 households. Thus, it was decided to increase the range of households to be interviewed in each household stratum and peg the number of households to be interviewed per EA at a maximum of 25 instead of 20. For households with international migrants, the maximum number was accordingly increased to 12, with the number of internal migrant households increased from 7 to 10. The minimum of 3 was retained for households without migrants, with the maximum increased to 25. This modified procedure was termed Procedure C, to distinguish it from the first and second procedures (A and B) for sampling outlined earlier.

Thus, household sampling was carried out using 3 different procedures, depending on when the EA was covered, in the search for an optimum oversampling process to identify the (relatively rare) sample households with recent out-migrants to international destinations. Procedure A involved sampling about 34 randomly selected households from a list of 100 to 150 households in each sample enumeration area. The number of enumeration areas completed with this depended on the speed of the team in each state (see discussion below in sections IV B, C). Most enumeration areas in the North were sampled using procedure A: all in Bauchi, Kano, Katsina, Niger and Yobe. Only Zamfara did not use A, and used B instead. Under procedures B and C (see discussion below in section IV B, C), between 50 and 100 households were listed in each sample EA, from which about 20-25 were selected by team leaders in the field using the supervisor sampling sheets.

In addition to the adjustments in household listing and sampling procedures, the number of local government areas in sample states was increased by 50 percent across the two strata of (high and low migrant) states. This had to be done in a manner that maintained the ratio of 2:1 in favour of households in the high stratum states to ensure oversampling of this group. This implied adding one local government area in each of the sample states in the South and adding one local government area for three of the selected six states in the North. For the latter, consideration was given to the existing coverage of the three geopolitical zones in the region i.e., North West, North Central and North East. Given its huge population, Kano State in the North West was automatically selected to have an additional Local Government from among Kano, Katsina and Zamfara in the zone. Niger state was the only state in the North West included in the sample, so was also selected to have an additional LG. Finally, Yobe was selected from between Yobe and Bauchi from the North East.

For the south, it was agreed that as many states as budgetary constraints could allow for should have an additional LG. Eventually, with prudent resource management, it was possible to add one LG to every state in the sample in the high stratum South (including 2 in Lagos to reflect its double sampling). Except where impracticable, the new set of LGs was again to be drawn from the original NBS list, but this was not possible on two occasions. The first was in Ebonyi State, where one of the communities selected was involved in communal clashes with a neighbouring community. The second was in Delta state where one of the selected communities was prone to activities of militants, crisscrossed by creeks, and had difficult swampy terrain. On both occasions, the supervisor for the region was allowed to randomly select another LG which did not necessarily have to be in the NBS list but which increased equitable coverage across the senatorial zones of the state.

C. Listing and Sampling in the States
As noted in the previous section, there were eventually three procedures for listing and sampling for the teams. The points of communication of these changes for the teams determined the relative number listed and sampled in each enumeration area. As at the time of the transition from Procedure A to Procedure B, a number of teams had completed a certain proportion of interviews, while other teams, which undertook to complete all the listings first, with the intent to sample households and begin interviews afterwards, were still able to adapt to Procedure B to sample households. Teams in the second group were instructed to not bother re-listing, but instead to adjust the numbers in the three lists to be sampled from. For those teams that were both listing and interviewing, the speed of each team determined the point at which it was instructed to change household listing and sampling procedures. The same issues arose at the time of the second change, from Procedure B to C, though the adaptations necessary were much less since the listing aspects were identical.

Within the ambit of each procedure, teams were given a range of number of households to list and sample. For example for all the Procedures (A, B and C), there was a range of about 50 households between the maximum 150 and 100 or 100 and 50 that enumerators could list. Likewise, a recommended maximum number was given for sampling. Ultimately, the number listed by each team depended roughly on the proportion of households with international migrants. For areas with low incidence of international migrants, more households were listed, to increase the probability of finding the population of interest, i.e., households with international and internal migrants (where the latter was also rare). In places where out-migration rate was high, only around 50 households were listed since the population of interest was more easily available for sampling. The ultimate number listed or sampled by each team depended in part therefore on the prevalence of international migrants being encountered during listing.

As such, in nearly all states in the south, listing and sampling proceeded with a combination of procedures. For example, Abia, Delta, Ebonyi, Imo, Ondo, Osun, Oyo and Rivers worked with a combination of procedures B and C, since the first change from procedure A to B happened while they were still listing. Thereafter, Procedure C was introduced when the additional Local Governments were added. In contrast, all the Northern States, where the LGs and EAs to be covered were fewer in number, the listing had proceeded quickly with procedure A partly due to the very low proportion of households with migrants (international and internal). All states in the North (except Zamfara) therefore used procedure A, which involved listing more households. The team in Lagos had also started with Procedure A in the first set of EAs, and was still doing listings when the announcement for the change from procedure B to C was made. So the sampling switched from Procedure A directly to Procedure C, leaving them without any EA sampled with procedure B. Edo state was also listing when the first change was made and therefore finished up its listing within the framework of the newly adopted procedure (B).

The above scenarios produced a wide range of listing and sampling procedures across states, but all consistent with the specified methodologies. The number of households listed ranged from 660 in each of Ondo and Osun (Lagos had 1084, but this is because it was sampled twice) to 102 in Zamfara (having only one Local Government and two EAs). Likewise the number interviewed ranged from 150 in Akwa Ibom to 70 in Katsina and 49 in Zamfara. The average proportion of households interviewed relative to those listed is shown in the last column as 30 percent.