Note No. 26 August 1996 Kenya: Participatory Poverty Assessment A Participatory Poverty Assessment (PPA) was undertaken by the World Bank in collaboration with the Government of Kenya to complement previous statistical studies of poverty in Kenya. While the PPA confirmed many findings of the Welfare Monitoring Survey (WMS), it also revealed significant new data concerning poverty, female-headed households, access by the poor to water, education and health facilities, and challenges facing indigenous self-help networks. These findings have important implications for targeting poverty alleviation programs. Objectives Choosing Methods, Establishing Credibility Many community level studies are dismissed as an- The Kenya Participatory Poverty Assessment (PPA) ecdotal because the findings are not seen to be general- was undertaken between February and April 1994 to izable beyond the particular community, and thus of complement statistical studies of poverty. It had three little policy significance. To overcome this, sampling primary objectives: first to understand poverty from the issues were discussed and communities selected in dis- perspective of the poor and those providing services to cussion with senior officials from the Directorate of Plan- them; second, to initiate a process of dialogue between ning and the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS) of the policymakers, district-level providers and the poor; and Government of Kenya. The PPA was linked to the Na- third, to address the issue of the "value added" of the tional Welfare Monitoring Survey (WMS) which used a PPA approach to understanding poverty. sample of 12,000 from the national cluster sampling framework. Based on findings from the just completed Methodology WMS,fiveofthepoorestdistrictsinKenyawereselected. Within each district, five "clusters" were chosen ran- To ensure that PPA findings were relevant to domly using maps available at the CBS. The final PPA policymaking and had credibility, the methodology sample was 3,500 people from 35 clusters or villages used in Kenya was developed in consultation with key fromsevendistricts,andasmallsampleoffemale-headed stakeholders both in-country and in the Bank. To take households from two Nairobi slums. maximum advantage of information that was already available and to narrow the focus of the study, stake- To address specific issues, eleven data collection holders were asked to specify what questions they methods were used. Several focused on the same issues wanted answered by the PPA. to crosscheck information and to probe issues in depth. ThemethodswereacombinationofSARAR(Self-Esteem, The key questions which emerged were: What are Associative Strengths, Resourcefulness, Action Planning the perspectives of the poor on poverty? What are their and Responsibility), Participatory Rural Appraisal and indicators of poverty? What are the long-term trends? brief household level questionnaires. Methods included What causes poverty? What is their expectation for the mapping, wealth ranking, seasonal analysis, trend and future? Are female-headed households poorer? If so, price analysis, focus group discussions, key informant why? How do the poor cope with poverty? What roles interviews, problem identification, gender analysis, un- do formal and informal groups play? What are the key derstanding health seeking behavior and incomplete sen- problems and priorities of the poor? Do the poor have tences completed by school children. access to basic services, education, health and safe drinking water? Why do they not use services? What Each team also held a day long district level work- are the perspectives of the district officials regarding shop to understand poverty from the perspective of the poverty? key decisionmakers and also to brief officials about the This note is based on the paper entitled "Learning from the Poor: A Participatory Poverty Assessment in Kenya," written by Deepa Narayan and David Nyamwaya. For more information call Deepa Narayan (202) 473-1304. Box 1 Comparison of Findings of Poverty Between PPA and WMS Statistically, the findings of the PPA and the 1992 Welfare Monitoring Survey (WMS) based on an established poverty line were strikingly similar. In three of the five districts in which cluster sampling was closely followed, the results were nearly identical. In two districts -- Kitui and Kwale -- the PPA method recorded much higher levels of poverty than did the WMS. However, these two districts had both been severely affected by a drought which had occurred since the WMS, and thus, it is possible that the rising level of poverty in these two districts resulted from new conditions. District Welfare Monitoring Participatory Poverty Survey - 1992 Assessment - 1994 (% of population poor) (% of population poor) 1. Bomet 64.7 64 2. Busia 67.6 68 3. Nyamira 54.0 54 4. Kisumu* 39.1 57 5. Kitui 58.0 76 6. Kwale 50.0 62 7. Mandera na 85-90 * Cluster sampling procedure not closely followed. nature of the study. The in-country work was financed the worsening situation over the past decade. A fairly by the British Overseas Development Administration typical statement was that, "Ten years ago we had a (ODA) and a contribution from UNICEF. The study crop in the field, well-stocked granaries, a cow. Today, team was coordinated by the African Medical and Re- because of land subdivision, inflation, drought, the high search Foundation (AMREF), a nongovernmental or- price of seeds and fertilizers, we have small and patchy ganization. The field research team consisted of 35 re- yields,thegranariesareempty,thecowshavebeensold, searchers, primarily sociologists and anthropologists and sometimes to survive, we depend on government who could speak the local language. Teams of five to relief food." seven people spent two or three days in each village. The urban team was comprised of three people. The Perceptions of the Poor study team was trained intensively for two weeks in Village residents and the poor had very specific per- instrument development and field testing. ceptions of poverty -- who was poor and the reasons for their poverty. People become poor over time, they Data Analysis said, due to land division among sons, soil erosion and The data were analyzed using systematic content drought, falling productivity and rising prices, old age analysis and gradual aggregation of data based on and physical disability, and by being orphaned. When themes from the household, group, village, district to people were asked to list the major problems they faced, national levels. more than three-quarters of the poor reported that their most important challenge was either lack of food (46 Key Findings percent) or lack of money (30 percent). What is Poverty? Who are the Poor? In many districts, sharp differences were noted be- Poverty was widespread in the seven districts stud- tween the district leaders' understanding of the inten- ied. Poverty, as defined by the study's participants, sity and spread of poverty in their areas and the per- had increased and become pervasive. Estimates of the ceptions and experiences of village people and the poor. percentage of each district's population that was While interviews with village people showed a high "poor" or "very poor" ranged from 54 percent to 85 degree of awareness about poverty and who the poor percent. are, district leaders tended to give textbook descriptions of poverty, and the poor were viewed as an amorphous In order to survive or minimize risk and survive, group. This gap was seen by the poor as an important thepoorreportedthattheydiversifiedtheirincome. The factor in blocking programs which might otherwise be nature of their income-generating activities -- includ- providing assistance to them. ing small-scale subsistence farming, peddling, manual labor, illicit brewing, welding and cobbling, and small- District officials linked poverty with illiteracy, scale business -- varied by region depending on the whereas village people said the poor were often edu- opportunitiesavailable. Manyrespondentsspokeabout cated. The negative stereotypes most commonly used by district officers were that the poor are lazy, idle, to afford the escalating fees to maintain this basic edu- drunkards, criminals, prostitutes, poor thinkers and un- cational infrastructure. Study participants recom- caring about the future. By contrast, village people de- mended bursaries targeted to the poor to assist them in scribed the poor as religious and hard-working, deeply meeting their cost-sharing payments. worried about their security and future. While a few villagers viewed the poor as lazy, the majority said a Analysis of household data showed that (depend- poor person who was lazy was unlikely to survive and, ing on the district) between 32 and 63 percent of poor in fact, must combine multiple survival activities "to households had one or more children who had dropped barely keep afloat." out of primary school because of an inability to pay school fees. When poor parents had to make a choice How the Poor Perceive their Future about who would stay in school and who should be In every village, households that were identified as withdrawn, daughters were almost always the first to poor by the community at large were interviewed in go. Overall, more than twice as many of the poor felt private. The final question asked dealt with their vi- that girls should be withdrawn from school before boys. sion of the future. Overall, 85 percent of the poor felt that their situation would worsen in the future. The Access to Water percentage increased to 97 percent in some villages. While the WMS did not identify access to drinking water as a significant problem, the PPA found that ac- How Does Someone Become Poor? cess to water was a major challenge facing the poor. In The process of impoverishment is understood by particular, the study found that: in all districts except villagers as having two dimensions. First, almost ev- one, poor people reported access to safe water as a prob- erywhere poverty is seen as an intergenerational phe- lem; in all districts the water problem became acute nomenon: "Poverty is inherited. If you are born to a during the dry season; where demand was high and poor father, he cannot educate you and cannot give community groups had the capacity (skills, technical you any land or very little land of poor quality. Every and business management), local groups managed generation gets poorer." simple water systems effectively without government support; and successful water user groups branched But becoming poor is also understood as a process into income production activities, some of which fed that can happen to anyone over time. Primary factors back into water systems to expand the system or for cited include land subdivision, soil erosion, low pro- repairs. ductivity, rising prices, reduced government services and having many children. Sickness, physical disabil- Access to Health ity, old age and being orphaned were other routes The study found that the poor were health con- through which families or individuals plunged into scious and engaged in a variety of health maintaining poverty. strategies. However, they visited government health facilities only when they were desperate and often as a Inflation In all districts, people linked growing poverty with increasing prices, and compared current prices to those of ten and two years previous. According to village Box 2 people, prices had risen substantially on a continuous Trend Analysis as Perceived by Poor People basis over the past decade, and dramatically so in the During the PPA, community groups were asked what previous two years. During the period 1984-1992, for changes they had seen in the last 10 years and in the last example, prices of sugar and cooking oil, two basic com- two years. People spoke at length about the deteriora- modities, increased 20-25 percent per year on average tion of the overall situation, and in which areas of life it in all districts. From 1992 to 1994, these increases aver- was worse than others. Following is an example of aged 100-150 percent per year, indicating a significant changes people reported in several key areas of their acceleration in the trend. life. Each zero (µ) represents one stone; thus, villagers reported that there was twice as much tree cover in 1984 Cost-Sharing as there was 10 years later. While cost-sharing has been credited with bring- ing about slow improvements in Kenya's educational Changes Between 1984-1994 and health systems, the study showed that it had also Item 1984 1994 begun to deprive the poor of education and health care. 1. Livestock per family mmmmmm m Under the cost-sharing program, parents must main- 2. Water availability mmmmmm m tain the schools and provide blackboards and chalk, 3. Cost of education mmmm mmmmmm desks and chairs, roofs and walls, and playgrounds. 4. Tree cover mmmm m m In most schools visited, however, parents were not able 5. Food availability m m mmm last resort. This was not because they did not believe in rights to land -- which has important implications for the curative powers of health providers, but because targeting poverty alleviation programs -- was not cap- their experience with health facilities had been so dis- tured by the WMS. mal over the past few years. Problems cited by the poor included distance, "unofficial fees," lack of drugs and The Role of Harambee and rude health personnel. Indigenous Networks The poor, and especially the very poor, are difficult Poverty and Female-Headed Households to reach through centralized government services, par- Overall, 25 percent of the study population was cat- ticularly when the quality of service is inadequate and egorized as very poor. In the poorest category, there when cost-sharing is involved. Like all societies, Kenya were over twice as many female-headed households has indigenous social networks which form the basis (44 percent) as male-headed households (21 percent). of resource and labor exchanges and reciprocity. In While 59 percent of the male-headed households over- every village visited, there were at least five, and some- all were considered poor or very poor, this was true for times as many as 17, associations. This suggests that 80 percent of the female-headed households. The pat- nationwide, there are about 300,000 such groups in the tern of greater poverty among female-headed house- rural areas. The social capital embodied in these infor- holds was true for every district and for all 35 villages. mal networks binds a group of people together and fu- In two districts, more than 95 percent of the female- els development. Under normal circumstances, these headed households were classified as poor or very poor. informal associations play a disproportionately impor- tant role in the lives of poor people who are constrained In every district, women identified food as the most in every way except by their labor. The PPA study immediate and pervasive problem. In some villages, found in particular that: female heads of households consistently limited the number of meals eaten to cope with the ever-present · The indigenous self-help system of "Harambee" is lack of food. One-third of the female-headed house- stressed, and the informal safety nets of the poor holds in one village had only one meal per day (the are breaking down in the absence of timely support remaining two-thirds had two). Some women resorted from the outside. to begging for food, others relied on brewing alcohol, · There are a large number of strong indigenous self- despite being harassed by police. Women often traded help groups but they either do not reach the poor or their labor for food. In another village, community are under capitalized and therefore cannot meet membersobservedthat"mostofthepeoplewhoworked the needs of their potential clients. on the farms of the well-to-do in exchange for food were · NGOs and church groups, with a few exceptions, women." are providing welfare support to the poor rather than supporting the poor in building strong self- Women's limited control of land was an issue in all help groups. districts. Despite the fact that legally women have ac- cess to land, when divorce or death of the husband · The potential of women's organizations as income occurs, customary law takes over and women are gen- producing groups is largely untapped. erally deprived of land. The issue of ownership and Box 3 A Women's Self-Help Group Even in the harsh circumstances of Mandera -- a dry semi-desert district which has reported the harshest environment of any of the areas studied, and which is isolated from markets and city centers -- women's groups persist in their efforts. In Arda Kalacha, a village in which everyone was categorized poor or very poor, a women's group came into being seven years ago to assist needy people, initiate harambees (public fund-raising events) and help the poor pay for school fees. The group has 30 members. Despite inadequate and short rains, women undertake small-scale farming during the two brief rainy spells and walk 18 kilometers to the nearest trading center to sell their produce. A few years ago, the group invested in poultry raising; for several years they sold eggs successfully at the trading center. Recently, a disease wiped out a majority of the hens, but the group did not disintegrate. After a while, the women collected resources to start goat herding, but these were also killed, this time in the drought of 1992. The few that survived were sold. Rather than giving up totally, the group then resorted to buying stock for petty trading; they now sell sweets, cigarettes and biscuits in the community. Despite their very limited resources, they continue to extend help to the most destitute in the community who are unable to participate in or contribute to the group's efforts.