Safety Nets Project Impact Evaluation 2012
Baseline Survey
Niger, 2012
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Reference ID
NER_2012_SNPIE-BL_v01_M
Producer(s)
Patrick Premand
Metadata
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Mar 09, 2023
Last modified
Mar 09, 2023
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Identification
Survey ID Number
NER_2012_SNPIE-BL_v01_M
Title
Safety Nets Project Impact Evaluation 2012
Subtitle
Baseline Survey
Translated Title
Enquête de Référence du Projet Filets Sociaux au Niger 2012
Country/Economy
| Name | Country code |
|---|---|
| Niger | NER |
Study type
Other Household Survey
Series Information
The following study is the baseline survey for the Niger Safety Nets Project and the impact evaluation of its cash transfer component.
Abstract
Niger is one of the poorest countries in the world and faces severe challenges in early childhood nutrition and development. More than 50 percent of Niger's population is food insecure, with 22 percent of the population suffering from chronic food insecurity (per capita consumption of less than 1,800 kcal/person/day) in any given year. Human development indicators are particularly alarming for children. The prevalence of chronic malnutrition as measured by stunting (low height-for-age) is estimated at 50 percent, which makes Niger the second worst affected country in Sub-Saharan Africa.
While Niger has had institutions and programs aimed at reducing food insecurity, most programs have provided only ad hoc emergency assistance. The effect of these programs in reducing chronic food insecurity has been limited, particularly since they have been channeled towards short term emergency assistance following acute crises. To provide more sustainable approach to addressing chronic malnutrition, the World Bank Niger Safety Nets project aims to establish and support an effective safety net system in order to increase access of poor and food insecure people to cash transfer and cash for work programs. The project contributes to building a comprehensive, permanent, and efficient safety net system that can address chronic food insecurity in Niger. In addition to system-building activities, the safety nets project includes a cash transfer for food security component, as well as a cash-for-work component. The cash transfer component is the core building block of the Niger social protection system. It combines a cash transfer program, as well as a parenting training intervention that serves as an accompanying measure to the cash transfer.
Geographical targeting is used to select the poorest regions and communes to participate in the cash transfer program. The cash transfer program will be implemented in several phases in 5 regions (Dosso, Maradi, Tahoua, Tillabery, and Zinder) that present the highest concentration of poverty in Niger and where 95 percent of the country's poor population lives. The first phase of the project targets the regions of Dosso and Maradi, including 40% of the country's poor population. Within these regions, departments and communes eligible to the cash transfer program are selected through local stakeholder meetings with commune chiefs and regional leaders, who select communes to target based on available information from poverty maps and the levels of chronic vulnerability through a participatory process. As such, the eligible communes are chosen by local stakeholders as being the most disadvantaged areas.
As part of the impact evaluation of the Niger Safety Nets Project, the Government of Niger contracted the National Statistical Agency to conduct a baseline survey in 6 communes participating in the first phase of the cash transfer program. The communes covered by the baseline survey include Tibiri and Guecheme in the region of Dosso, as well as Sae Saboua, Guidan Sori, Gangara and Tchadoua in the region of Maradi. The survey was implemented in 2012 with technical support from the World Bank.
While Niger has had institutions and programs aimed at reducing food insecurity, most programs have provided only ad hoc emergency assistance. The effect of these programs in reducing chronic food insecurity has been limited, particularly since they have been channeled towards short term emergency assistance following acute crises. To provide more sustainable approach to addressing chronic malnutrition, the World Bank Niger Safety Nets project aims to establish and support an effective safety net system in order to increase access of poor and food insecure people to cash transfer and cash for work programs. The project contributes to building a comprehensive, permanent, and efficient safety net system that can address chronic food insecurity in Niger. In addition to system-building activities, the safety nets project includes a cash transfer for food security component, as well as a cash-for-work component. The cash transfer component is the core building block of the Niger social protection system. It combines a cash transfer program, as well as a parenting training intervention that serves as an accompanying measure to the cash transfer.
Geographical targeting is used to select the poorest regions and communes to participate in the cash transfer program. The cash transfer program will be implemented in several phases in 5 regions (Dosso, Maradi, Tahoua, Tillabery, and Zinder) that present the highest concentration of poverty in Niger and where 95 percent of the country's poor population lives. The first phase of the project targets the regions of Dosso and Maradi, including 40% of the country's poor population. Within these regions, departments and communes eligible to the cash transfer program are selected through local stakeholder meetings with commune chiefs and regional leaders, who select communes to target based on available information from poverty maps and the levels of chronic vulnerability through a participatory process. As such, the eligible communes are chosen by local stakeholders as being the most disadvantaged areas.
As part of the impact evaluation of the Niger Safety Nets Project, the Government of Niger contracted the National Statistical Agency to conduct a baseline survey in 6 communes participating in the first phase of the cash transfer program. The communes covered by the baseline survey include Tibiri and Guecheme in the region of Dosso, as well as Sae Saboua, Guidan Sori, Gangara and Tchadoua in the region of Maradi. The survey was implemented in 2012 with technical support from the World Bank.
Kind of Data
Sample survey data [ssd]
Unit of Analysis
- Households
- Individuals
- Children aged 6-59 months old
- Individuals
- Children aged 6-59 months old
Version
Version Description
v01; cleaned, anonymized datasets
Scope
Notes
Household Questionnaire:
- Socio-demographic characteristics of household members
- Education
- Health and reproductive health
- Employment
- Non-agricultural enterprises
- Lodging characteristics
- Household items
- Food and non-food expenditure
- Food consumption
- Essential family practices
Child Questionnaire:
- Child characteristics
- Health and nutrition
- Parenting
- Anthropometry
- Socio-demographic characteristics of household members
- Education
- Health and reproductive health
- Employment
- Non-agricultural enterprises
- Lodging characteristics
- Household items
- Food and non-food expenditure
- Food consumption
- Essential family practices
Child Questionnaire:
- Child characteristics
- Health and nutrition
- Parenting
- Anthropometry
Coverage
Geographic Coverage
The baseline survey covers 151 clusters of villages in 6 communes from the regions of Dosso and Maradi:
- Tibiri and Guecheme in the region of Dosso,
- Sae Saboua, Guidan Sori, Gangara and Tchadoua in the region of Maradi
- Tibiri and Guecheme in the region of Dosso,
- Sae Saboua, Guidan Sori, Gangara and Tchadoua in the region of Maradi
Universe
The universe for the survey includes all villages in the 6 communes from the regions of Dosso and Maradi. With the villages, a listing exercises was undertaken. The sampling frame for the sampling of households including all households in the households, minus ineligible households (defined by program documents as those with self-reported income higher than a pre-set threshold).
Producers and sponsors
Primary investigators
| Name | Affiliation |
|---|---|
| Patrick Premand | World Bank |
Funding Agency/Sponsor
| Name | Abbreviation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Cellule Filets Sociaux, Gouvernement du Niger | CFS | Funded baseline survey data collection |
| World Bank Strategic Impact Evaluation Fund | SIEF | Funded part of the baseline analysis |
Other Identifications/Acknowledgments
| Name | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|
| Niger National Statistical Agency (INS) | Gouvernement du Niger | Collected Baseline Data |
Sampling
Sampling Procedure
The communes covered by the baseline survey include Tibiri and Guecheme in the region of Dosso, as well as Sae Saboua, Guidan Sori, Gangara and Tchadoua in the region of Maradi. In these communes, over 500 villages were eligible for the first phase of the Cash Transfer Program, many more that the project could serve. Given the difficulty to find transparent targeting criteria to prioritize villages within communes, the project team decided to implement public lotteries to select beneficiary villages among all equally eligible villages. Within commune, a randomization procedure is used to select beneficiary villages through public lotteries in presence of village chiefs, commune authorities and program staff. Prior to performing the randomization, small villages were grouped into clusters containing at least 150 households. The randomization was performed by clusters, and stratified to ensure an equal probability of selection for nomadic and sedentary villages. In addition to selecting villages to benefit from the cash transfer project, a number of control villages were also drawn to be sampled at baseline. Since the baseline sample of clusters for the evaluation is obtained through randomization among all clusters of villages selected communes, it is representative of these communes. The final evaluation sample includes 151 clusters (244 villages).
Prior to the baseline survey, a listing exercise was undertaken in all villages in the evaluation sample. Based on this household listing, screening criteria were applied to exclude ineligible households, defined by program documents as those with self-reported income higher than a pre-set threshold. Approximately 20% of households were deemed ineligible based on these criteria. The listing of households eligible to the cash transfer program constitutes the sampling frame for the baseline survey. It is representative of households eligible for the cash transfer program at the commune level. Therefore, the evaluation sample is representative of eligible households in communes eligible to the cash transfer program. The evaluation sample was drawn by taking a random sample of 30 eligible households from the sampling frame in each cluster.
The sample size was established through power calculations for the impact evaluation of the Niger Safety Nets project. Specifically, the baseline sample size was chosen in order to be able to identify minimum detectable effects of 0.25 standard deviations with a power of 0.9, requiring at least 50 clusters with 10 potential beneficiary households in each treatment arm (on average, one third of sampled households were expected to be chosen to receive the program after the baseline was completed and a targeting mechanism applied). This sample size also allows identifying minimum detectable effects of 0.22 standard deviations with a power of 0.8. All power calculations were undertaken with intra-cluster correlations of 0.05, as well as with a standard significance threshold of 0.05. These are the power calculations that were undertaken when planning the baseline data collection.
Prior to the baseline survey, a listing exercise was undertaken in all villages in the evaluation sample. Based on this household listing, screening criteria were applied to exclude ineligible households, defined by program documents as those with self-reported income higher than a pre-set threshold. Approximately 20% of households were deemed ineligible based on these criteria. The listing of households eligible to the cash transfer program constitutes the sampling frame for the baseline survey. It is representative of households eligible for the cash transfer program at the commune level. Therefore, the evaluation sample is representative of eligible households in communes eligible to the cash transfer program. The evaluation sample was drawn by taking a random sample of 30 eligible households from the sampling frame in each cluster.
The sample size was established through power calculations for the impact evaluation of the Niger Safety Nets project. Specifically, the baseline sample size was chosen in order to be able to identify minimum detectable effects of 0.25 standard deviations with a power of 0.9, requiring at least 50 clusters with 10 potential beneficiary households in each treatment arm (on average, one third of sampled households were expected to be chosen to receive the program after the baseline was completed and a targeting mechanism applied). This sample size also allows identifying minimum detectable effects of 0.22 standard deviations with a power of 0.8. All power calculations were undertaken with intra-cluster correlations of 0.05, as well as with a standard significance threshold of 0.05. These are the power calculations that were undertaken when planning the baseline data collection.
Deviations from the Sample Design
During implementation of the baseline survey, some issues were found with the listing. Indeed, the listing also included households who were registered to pay taxes in the village, even if they physically were located elsewhere. For that reason, a list of replacement households was provided to the field teams. Replacement of households not physically located in the village was subject to strict guidelines and quality control. Overall, 14.5% of households in the original sample ended up being replaced as they in fact were paying taxes in the village, but where in fact located elsewhere (often in urban areas).
Response Rate
The original sample included 4514 households. The actual sample includeD 4332 households, a completion rate of 95.6%.
Data Collection
Dates of Data Collection
| Start | End |
|---|---|
| 2012-04 | 2012-06 |
Data Collection Mode
Face-to-face [f2f]
Supervision
The coordination team included two survey coordinators at INS. The supervision team from the World Bank and Safety Nets project included a child development specialist, a field coordinator, and two quality controllers. The supervision team also worked in collaboration with local project offices. Thorough quality control procedures were put in place, with systematic verifications of questionnaires by enumerators and supervisors. Additional verifications, including household visits, were undertaken by the coordination and quality control teams continuously over the full survey period.
Data Collection Notes
The baseline survey data collection was undertaken by the National Statistical Agency (INS), with technical support from the World Bank and the Safety Nets Project staff. The baseline survey for the impact evaluation was collected over a two-months period between April and June 2012. Preparatory activities took place between January and April 2012, including survey pre-testing and training of enumerators. Data entry took place following the survey took place between July and October 2012.
Prior to the baseline survey, a listing exercise was undertaken in all villages in the evaluation sample. Based on this household listing, screening criteria were applied to exclude ineligible households, defined by program documents as those with self-reported income higher than a pre-set threshold. Approximately 20% of households were deemed ineligible based on these criteria. The listing of households eligible to the cash transfer program constitutes the sampling frame for the baseline survey.
Household and child survey teams were following each other in the different clusters. Child survey teams collected the data from households that had already been visited by the household survey team, who were responsible for refer children eligible for the child survey to the child survey teams. To ensure a smooth transition between the two teams, the household survey teams pre-filled information on the location and identification in the child questionnaire, before passing them to the child survey team.
Child survey teams were responsible for collecting data for all children identified by the household survey team. The household survey listing provided the sampling frame of the child survey. 6965 children were originally identified by the household team as between 6 and 59 months old, and referred to the child survey team. In case of doubt as to whether a child was over or under 5, household teams were instructed to also refer the child to the survey team. In practice, this happens for some children under 6 months old, as well as for many children reports as being 5 years old. In total, 7226 children were referred to the child survey team. The child survey team was thoroughly trained to establish ages. Upon further verification, 924 children were older than 59 months on the day of the interview, and 169 children less than 6 months old.
Data collection for the child survey was undertaken through interviews with the main caregiver of the child, in the household. Anthropometric measurement and cognitive tests were undertaken in presence of the caregiver. Field teams for the survey included 6 household survey teams and 6 child survey teams. The household survey team included one supervisor and three enumerators. The child survey team included a supervisor, an enumerator, a test administrator, and a person in charge of anthropometric measurement.
Prior to the baseline survey, a listing exercise was undertaken in all villages in the evaluation sample. Based on this household listing, screening criteria were applied to exclude ineligible households, defined by program documents as those with self-reported income higher than a pre-set threshold. Approximately 20% of households were deemed ineligible based on these criteria. The listing of households eligible to the cash transfer program constitutes the sampling frame for the baseline survey.
Household and child survey teams were following each other in the different clusters. Child survey teams collected the data from households that had already been visited by the household survey team, who were responsible for refer children eligible for the child survey to the child survey teams. To ensure a smooth transition between the two teams, the household survey teams pre-filled information on the location and identification in the child questionnaire, before passing them to the child survey team.
Child survey teams were responsible for collecting data for all children identified by the household survey team. The household survey listing provided the sampling frame of the child survey. 6965 children were originally identified by the household team as between 6 and 59 months old, and referred to the child survey team. In case of doubt as to whether a child was over or under 5, household teams were instructed to also refer the child to the survey team. In practice, this happens for some children under 6 months old, as well as for many children reports as being 5 years old. In total, 7226 children were referred to the child survey team. The child survey team was thoroughly trained to establish ages. Upon further verification, 924 children were older than 59 months on the day of the interview, and 169 children less than 6 months old.
Data collection for the child survey was undertaken through interviews with the main caregiver of the child, in the household. Anthropometric measurement and cognitive tests were undertaken in presence of the caregiver. Field teams for the survey included 6 household survey teams and 6 child survey teams. The household survey team included one supervisor and three enumerators. The child survey team included a supervisor, an enumerator, a test administrator, and a person in charge of anthropometric measurement.
Data Collectors
| Name | Abbreviation | Affiliation |
|---|---|---|
| Niger National Statistical Agency | INS | Gouvernement du Niger |
Questionnaires
Questionnaires
The baseline survey included two separate instruments: 1) a household survey and 2) a survey for children aged 6 to 59 months old.
The household survey instrument builds on the comprehensive 2011 Niger LSMS-ISA survey instrument, in order to ensure consistency and comparability of core poverty and human development indicators with the nationally representative survey. The survey for children aged 6-59 months builds on the MICS questionnaire. The child questionnaire also included a cognitive test to measure cognitive development among children below 42 months. At the time of data documentation, the cognitive test is being validated by a team of psycho-metrician and will be added to the next round of data documentation.
The household survey instrument builds on the comprehensive 2011 Niger LSMS-ISA survey instrument, in order to ensure consistency and comparability of core poverty and human development indicators with the nationally representative survey. The survey for children aged 6-59 months builds on the MICS questionnaire. The child questionnaire also included a cognitive test to measure cognitive development among children below 42 months. At the time of data documentation, the cognitive test is being validated by a team of psycho-metrician and will be added to the next round of data documentation.
Data Processing
Data Editing
The data was digitized by the National Statistical Agency (INS) in Niger, following a double-blind data entry protocol implemented in CSPRO.
Other Processing
The data is documented in three files:
- A household-level file: includes household-level data from the household survey
- An individual-level file: includes individual-level data from the individual survey
- A child-level file: includes child-level data from the child survey
All data is in a wide format.
The identifiers are the following:
- Household-level identifier: hhid
- Individual level identifier: pid
The individual-level identifier can be used to merge the individual-level data and child-level data.
The household-level data can be used to merge the household-level data with the individual-level data or child-level data.
The data is fully anonymized.
The code of the cluster (sampling unit) is ‘UNIT’. It is unique within commune.
- A household-level file: includes household-level data from the household survey
- An individual-level file: includes individual-level data from the individual survey
- A child-level file: includes child-level data from the child survey
All data is in a wide format.
The identifiers are the following:
- Household-level identifier: hhid
- Individual level identifier: pid
The individual-level identifier can be used to merge the individual-level data and child-level data.
The household-level data can be used to merge the household-level data with the individual-level data or child-level data.
The data is fully anonymized.
The code of the cluster (sampling unit) is ‘UNIT’. It is unique within commune.
Access policy
Contacts
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Patrick Premand | World Bank | ppremand@worldbank.org |
Confidentiality
The data has been anonymized.
Access conditions
For the internal staff catalogue (the Microdata library):
- Licensed access through March 2018.
- Public use access starting in March 2018
For the external public catalogue:
- No access until the July of 2016
- Licensed access through March 2018
- Public use access starting in March 2018
- Licensed access through March 2018.
- Public use access starting in March 2018
For the external public catalogue:
- No access until the July of 2016
- Licensed access through March 2018
- Public use access starting in March 2018
Citation requirements
Use of the dataset must be acknowledged using a citation which would include:
- the Identification of the Primary Investigator
- the title of the survey (including country, acronym and year of implementation)
- the survey reference number
- the source and date of download
Example:
Patrick Premand, The World Bank. Niger Safety Nets Project Impact Evaluation, Baseline Survey (SNPIE-BL) 2012. Ref. NER_2012_SNPIE-BL_v01_M. Dataset downloaded from [URL] on [date]
- the Identification of the Primary Investigator
- the title of the survey (including country, acronym and year of implementation)
- the survey reference number
- the source and date of download
Example:
Patrick Premand, The World Bank. Niger Safety Nets Project Impact Evaluation, Baseline Survey (SNPIE-BL) 2012. Ref. NER_2012_SNPIE-BL_v01_M. Dataset downloaded from [URL] on [date]
Access authority
| Name | Affiliation | |
|---|---|---|
| Patrick Premand | World Bank | ppremand@worldbank.org |
Disclaimer and copyrights
Disclaimer
The user of the data acknowledges that the original collector of the data, the authorized distributor of the data, and the relevant funding agency bear no responsibility for use of the data or for interpretations or inferences based upon such uses
Copyright
(c) 2014, The World Bank
Metadata production
DDI Document ID
DDI_NER_2012_SNPIE-BL_v01_M_WB
Producers
| Name | Abbreviation | Affiliation | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| Development Economics Data Group | DECDG | The World Bank | Documentation of the DDI |
Date of Metadata Production
2014-09-22
DDI Document version
Version 01 (September 2014)