The Ethiopia Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic, household-level panel data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and generating a clearer understanding of the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology. ESS is a long-term project to collect panel data. The project responds to the data needs of the country, given the dependence of a high percentage of households in agriculture activities in the country. The ESS collects information on household agricultural activities along with other information on the households like human capital, other economic activities, access to services and resources. The ability to follow the same households over time makes the ESS a new and powerful tool for studying and understanding the role of agriculture in household welfare over time as it allows analyses of how households add to their human and physical capital, how education affects earnings, and the role of government policies and programs on poverty, inter alia. The ESS is the first panel survey to be carried out by the CSA that links a multi-topic household questionnaire with detailed data on agriculture.

The Ethiopian Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study- Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic panel household level data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology. The specific objectives of the ESS are: Development of an innovative model for collecting agricultural data in conjunction with household data; Strengthening the capacity to generate a sustainable system for producing accurate and timely information on agricultural households in Ethiopia; Development of a model of inter-institutional collaboration between the CSA and relevant federal and local government agencies as well as national and international research and development partners; and Comprehensive analysis of household income, well-being, and socio-economic characteristics of households in rural areas and small towns. The ESS contains several innovative features: Integration of household welfare data with agricultural data; Creation of a panel data set that can be used to study welfare dynamics, the role of agriculture in development and the changes over time in health, education and labor activities, inter alia;. Collection of information on the network of buyers and sellers of goods with which the household interacts; Expanding the use of GPS units for measuring agricultural land areas; Involvement of multiple actors in government, academia and the donor community in the development of the survey and its contents as well as its implementation and analysis; Creation of publicly available micro data sets for researchers and policy makers;

Abstract

The Ethiopian Rural Socioeconomic Survey (ERSS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study- Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic panel household level data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

The specific objectives of the ERSS are: - Development of an innovative model for collecting agricultural data in conjunction with household data; - Strengthening the capacity to generate a sustainable system for producing accurate and timely information on agricultural households in Ethiopia; - Development of a model of inter-institutional collaboration between the CSA and relevant federal and local government agencies as well as national and international research and development partners; and - Comprehensive analysis of household income, well-being, and socio-economic characteristics of households in rural areas and small towns.

Geographic coverage

Rural and small towns

Analysis unit

• Household
• Person/ individual
• Community

Sampling procedure

The ERSS sample is designed to be representative of rural and small town areas of Ethiopia. The ERSS rural sample is a sub-sample of the AgSS while the small town sample comes from the universe of small town EAs. The ERSS sample size provides estimates at the national level for rural and small town households. At the regional level, it provides estimates for four regions including Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray.

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units , which are a sample of the CSA enumeration areas (EAs). For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. The AgSS EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For small town EAs, a total of 43 EAs were selected. In order to ensure sufficient sample in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray), quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one "other region" category.

The second stage of sampling was the selection of households to be interviewed in each EA. For rural EAs, a total of 12 households are sampled in each EA. Of these, 10 households were randomly selected from the sample of 30 AgSS households. The AgSS households are households which are involved in farming or livestock activities. Another 2 households were randomly selected from all other households in the rural EA (those not involved in agriculture or livestock). In some EAs, there is only one or no such households, in which case, less than two non-agricultural households were surveyed and more agricultural households were interviewed instead so that the total number of households per EA remains the same.

In the small town EAs, 12 households are selected randomly from the listing of each EA, with no stratification as to whether the household is engaged in agriculture/livestock. Households were not selected using replacement. Thus, the final number of household interviewed was slightly less than the 3,996 as planned in the design.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The survey was administered using five questionnaires: household, community, post-planting agriculture, ost-harvest agriculture and livestock questionnaires.

The household questionnaire collects information on basic demographics; education; health (including anthropometric measurement for children); labor and time use; partial food and non-food expenditure; household nonfarm income-generating activities; food security and shocks; safety nets; housing conditions; assets; credit; and other sources of household income. The household questionnaire, when relevant, is comparable to the Welfare Monitoring Survey (WMS).

The community questionnaire gathered information on access to infrastructure; community organizations; resource management; changes in the community; key events; community needs, actions and achievements; and local retail price information.

Post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires were completed in those households with at least one member of the household engaged in crop farming using owned or rented land The post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires focused on farming activities and solicit information on land ownership and use; farm labor; inputs use; GPS land area measurement and coordinates of household fields; agriculture capital; irrigation; and crop harvest and utilization.

The livestock questionnaire interviews were implemented in households where at least one member was engaged in livestock rearing. The livestock questionnaire collected information on animal holdings and costs; and production, cost and sales of livestock byproducts.

Cleaning operations

Most of the interviews were carried out using paper and pen interviewing method. The completed paper questionnaires were sent to the CSA headquarters in Addis Ababa. The questionnaires were first checked by editors for completeness and consistency. The editors checked completeness (taking inventory) and cross-checked the questionnaires with the EA codebook. Questionnaires with inconsistent responses or with errors were corrected by contacting the branch offices or, in some cases, by sending the questionnaires back to the field. Checked questionnaires were keyed by data entry clerks at the head office using CSPro data entry application software.

Computer assisted personal interviewing (CAPI) was implemented, as a pilot, in 33 of the 333 EAs using SurveyBe data collection software.

The data cleaning process was done in two stages. The first step was at the CSA head office using the CSA's data cleaning staff. The CSA data cleaning staff used the CSpro data cleaning application to capture out of range values, outliers, and skip inconsistencies from the batch error reports. Once the errors were flagged in the batch error report the hard copy of the original questionnaire was retrieved and checked if the errors were at the data collection, editing, or entry level. Editing and entry level errors were corrected at the head office. Field level errors were communicated with the branch offices in the regions. The second level of data cleaning was done using Stata program to check for inconsistencies.

Response rate

A total of 3,969 households were interviewed with a response rate of 99.3 percent.

Abstract

The Ethiopian Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study- Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic panel household level data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

The specific objectives of the ESS are:

• Development of an innovative model for collecting agricultural data in conjunction with household data;
• Strengthening the capacity to generate a sustainable system for producing accurate and timely information on agricultural households in Ethiopia;
• Development of a model of inter-institutional collaboration between the CSA and relevant federal and local government agencies as well as national and international research and development partners; and
• Comprehensive analysis of household income, well-being, and socio-economic characteristics of households in rural areas and small towns.

The ESS contains several innovative features:

• Integration of household welfare data with agricultural data;
• Creation of a panel data set that can be used to study welfare dynamics, the role of agriculture in development and the changes over time in health, education and labor activities, inter alia;.
• Collection of information on the network of buyers and sellers of goods with which the household interacts;
• Expanding the use of GPS units for measuring agricultural land areas;
• Involvement of multiple actors in government, academia and the donor community in the development of the survey and its contents as well as its implementation and analysis;
• Creation of publicly available micro data sets for researchers and policy makers;

Geographic coverage

The Ethiopia Socioeconomic Survey 2013/2014 (ESS2) covered all regional states including the capital, Addis Ababa. The majority of the sample comprises rural areas as it was carried over from ESS1. The ESS2 was implemented in 433 enumeration areas (EAs) out of which 290 were rural, 43 were small town EAs from ESS1, and 100 were new EAs from major urban areas.

Analysis unit

Households, individuals and communities.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

ESS is designed to collect panel data in rural and urban areas on a range of household and community level characteristics linked to agricultural activities. The first wave was implemented in 2011-12 and the second wave is implemented in 2013-14. The first wave, ERSS, covered only rural and small town areas. The second wave, ESS, added samples from large town areas. The second wave is nationally representative. The existing panel data (2011/12-2013/14) is only for rural and small towns. Large towns were added during the second wave and, so far, there is only one round. The planned follow-up ESS surveys will continue to be nationally representative. The ESS sample size provides estimates at the national level for rural and small town households. At the regional level, it provides estimates for five regions including Addis Ababa, Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray.

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units, which are a sample of the CSA enumeration areas (EAs). A total of 433 EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. For small town EAs, a total of 43 EAs and for large towns 100 EAs were selected. In order to ensure sufficient sample in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray) and Addis Ababa, quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one "other region" category.

During the second wave 100 urban EAs were added. The addition also included one more region to the sample, Addis Ababa. In each EA 15 households were selected. The addition of urban EAs increased the sample size from 333 to 433 EAs or from about 3,969 to 5,469 households.

The second stage of sampling was the selection of households to be interviewed in each EA. For rural EAs, a total of 12 households are sampled in each EA. Of these, 10 households were randomly selected from the sample of 30 AgSS households. The AgSS households are households which are involved in farming or livestock activities. Another 2 households were randomly selected from all other non-agricultural households in the selected rural EA (those not involved in agriculture or livestock). In some EAs, there is only one or no such households, in which case, less than two non-agricultural households were surveyed and more agricultural households were interviewed instead so that the total number of households per EA remains the same.

In the small town EAs, 12 households are selected randomly from the listing of each EA, with no stratification as to whether the household is engaged in agriculture/livestock. The same procedure is followed in the large town EAs. However, 15 households were selected in each large town EA.

Households were not selected using replacement. Thus, the final number of household interviewed was slightly less than the 5,469 as planned in the design. A total of 3,776 panel households and 1,486 new households (total 5,262 households) were interviewed with a response rate of 96.2 percent.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The survey was collected using five questionnaires: household, community, post-planting agriculture, post-harvest agriculture and livestock questionnaires.

The household questionnaire collected information on basic demographics; education; health (including anthropometric measurement for children); labor and time use; partial food and non-food expenditure; household nonfarm income-generating activities; food security and shocks; safety nets; housing conditions; assets; credit; and other sources of household income. The household questionnaire, when relevant, is comparable to the Welfare Monitoring Survey (WMS).

The community questionnaire gathered information on access to infrastructure; community organizations; resource management; changes in the community; key events; community needs, actions and achievements; and local retail price information.

Post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires were completed in those households with at least one member of the household engaged in crop farming using owned or rented land The post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires focused on farming activities and solicit information on land ownership and use; farm labor; inputs use; GPS land area measurement and coordinates of household fields; agriculture capital; irrigation; and crop harvest and utilization.

The livestock questionnaire interviews were implemented in households where at least one member was engaged in livestock rearing. The livestock questionnaire collected information on animal holdings and costs; and production, cost and sales of livestock byproducts.

Cleaning operations

The interviews were carried out using paper and pen interviewing method. However, a concurrent data entry arrangement was introduced in this wave. In this arrangement, the enumerators did not wait until all the interviews were completed. Rather, once the enumerators completed some 3 to 4 questionnaires, the supervisors collected those completed interviews from the enumerators and brought them to the branch offices for data entry, while the enumerators are still conducting interviews with other households. Then questionnaires are keyed at the branch offices as soon as they are completed using CSPro data entry application software. The data from the completed questionnaires are then checked for any interview or data entry errors using a stata program. Data entry errors are checked with the data entry clerks and the interview errors are then sent to back to the field for correction and feedback to the ongoing interviews. Several rounds of this process were undertaken until the final data files are produced. In addition, after the fieldwork was completed the paper questionnaires were sent to the CSA headquarters in Addis Ababa for further checking. Additional cleaning was carried out, as needed, by checking the hard copies.

Response rate

Response rate was 96.2 percent.

Abstract

The Ethiopia Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic, household-level panel data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and generating a clearer understanding of the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

ESS is a long-term project to collect panel data. The project responds to the data needs of the country, given the dependence of a high percentage of households in agriculture activities in the country. The ESS collects information on household agricultural activities along with other information on the households like human capital, other economic activities, access to services and resources. The ability to follow the same households over time makes the ESS a new and powerful tool for studying and understanding the role of agriculture in household welfare over time as it allows analyses of how households add to their human and physical capital, how education affects earnings, and the role of government policies and programs on poverty, inter alia. The ESS is the first panel survey to be carried out by the CSA that links a multi-topic household questionnaire with detailed data on agriculture.

Geographic coverage

National Coverage. ESS2 and ESS3 covered all regional states including the capital, Addis Ababa. The majority of the sample comprises rural areas as it was carried over from ESS1. The ESS2 and ESS3 were implemented in 433 enumeration areas (EAs) out of which 290 were rural, 43 were small town EAs from ESS1, and 100 were EAs from major urban areas.

Analysis unit

Households Communities

Universe

ESS uses a nationally representative sample of over 5,000 households living in rural and urban areas. The urban areas include both small and large towns.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units, or CSA enumeration areas (EAs). A total of 433 EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. A total of 43 and 100 EAs were selected for small town and urban areas, respectively. In order to ensure sufficient sample size in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray) and Addis Ababa, quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one “other region” category. A more detailed description of the sample design is provided in Section 3 of the Basic Information Document provided under the Related Materials tab.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face [f2f]

Research instrument

The survey consisted of five questionnaires. These questionnaires are similar with the questionnaires used during in the ESS1 and ESS2 with revisions based both on the results of the ESS2 and also on identified areas of need for new data (see Section 7 of the Basic Information Document provided under the Related Materials tab). The household questionnaire was administered to all households in the sample. The community questionnaire was administered to a group of community members to collect information on the socio-economic indicators of the enumeration areas where the sample households reside.3 The three agriculture questionnaires consisting of a post-planting agriculture questionnaire, post-harvest agriculture questionnaire and livestock questionnaire were administered to all household members (agriculture holders) who are engaged in agriculture activities. A holder is a person who exercises management control over the operations of the agricultural holdings and makes the major decisions regarding the utilization of the available resources. S/he has technical and economic responsibility for the holding. S/he may operate the holding directly as an owner or as a manager. Hence it is possible to have more than one holder in single sampled households. As a result we have administered more than one agriculture questionnaire in a single sampled household if the household has more than one holder.

Household questionnaire: The household questionnaire provides information on basic demographics; education; health (including anthropometric measurement for children); labor and time use; saving; food and non-food expenditure; household nonfarm income-generating activities; food security and shocks; safety nets; housing conditions; assets; credit; and other sources of household income (Table 2.1). Household location is geo-referenced in order to be able to later link the ESS data to other available geographic data sets (See Appendix 1 for discussion of the geo-data provided with the ESS).

Community questionnaire: The community questionnaire solicits information on infrastructure; community organizations; resource management; changes in the community; key events; community needs, actions and achievements; and local retail price information (Table 2.2).

Agriculture questionnaire: The post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires focus on crop farming activities and solicit information on land ownership and use; farm labor; inputs use; GPS land area measurement and coordinates of household fields; agriculture capital; irrigation; and crop harvest and utilization. The livestock questionnaire collects information on animal holdings and costs; and production, cost and sales of livestock by products (Table 2.3). The livestock module implemented in ESS3 is significantly difference from the module implemented in ESS1 and ESS2.

Cleaning operations

The interviews were carried out using pen-and-paper (PAPI) as well as computer-assisted personal interviewing (CAPI) method. A concurrent data entry arrangement was implemented for PAPI. In this arrangement, the enumerators did not wait until all the interviews were completed. Rather, once the enumerators completed approximately 3-4 questionnaires, supervisors collected these interviews from enumerators and brought them to the branch offices for data entry. This process took place as enumerators continued administering interviews with other households. Then questionnaires were keyed at the branch offices as soon as they were completed using the CSPro data entry application software. The data from the completed questionnaires were then checked for any interview or data entry errors using a STATA program. Data entry errors were flagged for the data entry clerks and the interview errors were then sent to back to the field for correction and feedback to the ongoing interviews. Several rounds of this process were undertaken until the final data files were produced. Additional cleaning was carried out, as needed, by checking the hard copies. In ESS3, CAPI (with a Survey Solutions platform) was used to collect the community data in large town areas.

Response rate

During wave 3, 1255 households were re-interviewed yielding a response rate of 85 percent. Attrition in urban areas is 15% due to consent refusal and inability to trace the whereabouts of sample households.

Abstract

The Ethiopian Rural Socioeconomic Survey (ERSS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency (CSA) of Ethiopia and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study- Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic panel household level data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

The specific objectives of the ERSS are: - Development of an innovative model for collecting agricultural data in conjunction with household data; - Strengthening the capacity to generate a sustainable system for producing accurate and timely information on agricultural households in Ethiopia; - Development of a model of inter-institutional collaboration between the CSA and relevant federal and local government agencies as well as national and international research and development partners; and - Comprehensive analysis of household income, well-being, and socio-economic characteristics of households in rural areas and small towns.

Geographic coverage

Regional Coverage

Analysis unit

Households

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The ERSS sample is designed to be representative of rural and small town areas of Ethiopia. The ERSS rural sample is a sub-sample of the AgSS while the small town sample comes from the universe of small town EAs. The ERSS sample size provides estimates at the national level for rural and small town households. At the regional level, it provides estimates for four regions including Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray.

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units , which are a sample of the CSA enumeration areas (EAs). For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. The AgSS EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For small town EAs, a total of 43 EAs were selected. In order to ensure sufficient sample in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray), quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one "other region" category.

The second stage of sampling was the selection of households to be interviewed in each EA. For rural EAs, a total of 12 households are sampled in each EA. Of these, 10 households were randomly selected from the sample of 30 AgSS households. The AgSS households are households which are involved in farming or livestock activities. Another 2 households were randomly selected from all other households in the rural EA (those not involved in agriculture or livestock). In some EAs, there is only one or no such households, in which case, less than two non-agricultural households were surveyed and more agricultural households were interviewed instead so that the total number of households per EA remains the same.

In the small town EAs, 12 households are selected randomly from the listing of each EA, with no stratification as to whether the household is engaged in agriculture/livestock. Households were not selected using replacement. Thus, the final number of household interviewed was slightly less than the 3,996 as planned in the design.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face paper [f2f]

Cleaning operations

Most of the interviews were carried out using paper and pen interviewing method. The completed paper questionnaires were sent to the CSA headquarters in Addis Ababa. The questionnaires were first checked by editors for completeness and consistency. The editors checked completeness (taking inventory) and cross-checked the questionnaires with the EA codebook. Questionnaires with inconsistent responses or with errors were corrected by contacting the branch offices or, in some cases, by sending the questionnaires back to the field. Checked questionnaires were keyed by data entry clerks at the head office using CSPro data entry application software.

Computer assisted personal interviewing (CAPI) was implemented, as a pilot, in 33 of the 333 EAs using SurveyBe data collection software.

The data cleaning process was done in two stages. The first step was at the CSA head office using the CSA's data cleaning staff. The CSA data cleaning staff used the CSpro data cleaning application to capture out of range values, outliers, and skip inconsistencies from the batch error reports. Once the errors were flagged in the batch error report the hard copy of the original questionnaire was retrieved and checked if the errors were at the data collection, editing, or entry level. Editing and entry level errors were corrected at the head office. Field level errors were communicated with the branch offices in the regions. The second level of data cleaning was done using Stata program to check for inconsistencies.

Response rate

A total of 3,969 households were interviewed with a response rate of 99.3 percent.

Abstract

The Ethiopia Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency (CSA) of Ethiopia and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic, household-level panel data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and generating a clearer understanding of the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

ESS is a long-term project to collect panel data. The project responds to the data needs of the country, given the dependence of a high percentage of households in agriculture activities in the country. The ESS collects information on household agricultural activities along with other information on the households like human capital, other economic activities, access to services and resources. The ability to follow the same households over time makes the ESS a new and powerful tool for studying and understanding the role of agriculture in household welfare over time as it allows analyses of how households add to their human and physical capital, how education affects earnings, and the role of government policies and programs on poverty, inter alia. The ESS is the first panel survey to be carried out by the CSA that links a multi-topic household questionnaire with detailed data on agriculture.

Geographic coverage

National Coverage.

Analysis unit

Households

Universe

ESS uses a nationally representative sample of over 5,000 households living in rural and urban areas. The urban areas include both small and large towns.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units, or CSA enumeration areas (EAs). A total of 433 EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. A total of 43 and 100 EAs were selected for small town and urban areas, respectively. In order to ensure sufficient sample size in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray) and Addis Ababa, quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one “other region” category. A more detailed description of the sample design is provided in Section 3 of the Basic Information Document provided under the Related Materials tab.

Mode of data collection

Mixed data collection mode

Cleaning operations

The interviews were carried out using pen-and-paper (PAPI) as well as computer-assisted personal interviewing (CAPI) method. A concurrent data entry arrangement was implemented for PAPI. In this arrangement, the enumerators did not wait until all the interviews were completed. Rather, once the enumerators completed approximately 3-4 questionnaires, supervisors collected these interviews from enumerators and brought them to the branch offices for data entry. This process took place as enumerators continued administering interviews with other households. Then questionnaires were keyed at the branch offices as soon as they were completed using the CSPro data entry application software. The data from the completed questionnaires were then checked for any interview or data entry errors using a STATA program. Data entry errors were flagged for the data entry clerks and the interview errors were then sent to back to the field for correction and feedback to the ongoing interviews. Several rounds of this process were undertaken until the final data files were produced. Additional cleaning was carried out, as needed, by checking the hard copies. In ESS3, CAPI (with a Survey Solutions platform) was used to collect the community data in large town areas.

Response rate

During wave 3, 1255 households were re-interviewed yielding a response rate of 85 percent. Attrition in urban areas is 15% due to consent refusal and inability to trace the whereabouts of sample households.

Abstract

The Ethiopia Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency of Ethiopia (CSA) and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic, household-level panel data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and generating a clearer understanding of the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

ESS is a long-term project to collect panel data. The project responds to the data needs of the country, given the dependence of a high percentage of households in agriculture activities in the country. The ESS collects information on household agricultural activities along with other information on the households like human capital, other economic activities, access to services and resources. The ability to follow the same households over time makes the ESS a new and powerful tool for studying and understanding the role of agriculture in household welfare over time as it allows analyses of how households add to their human and physical capital, how education affects earnings, and the role of government policies and programs on poverty, inter alia. The ESS is the first panel survey to be carried out by the CSA that links a multi-topic household questionnaire with detailed data on agriculture.

Geographic coverage

National coverage

Analysis unit

Households

Universe

The survey covered all de jure households excluding prisons, hospitals, military barracks, and school dormitories.

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

SAMPLING PROCEDURE The sampling frame for the new ESS4 is based on the updated 2018 pre-census cartographic database of enumeration areas by CSA. The ESS4 sample is a two-stage stratified probability sample. The ESS4 EAs in rural areas are the subsample of the AgSS EA sample. That means, the first stage of sampling in the rural areas entailed selecting enumeration areas (i.e. the primary sampling units) using simple random sampling (SRS) from the sample of the 2018 AgSS enumeration areas (EAs). The first stage of sampling for urban areas is selecting EAs directly from the urban frame of EAs within each region using systematically with PPS. This is designed in way that automatically results in a proportional allocation of the urban sample by zone within each region. Following the selection of sample EAs, they are allocated by urban rural strata using power allocation which is happened to be closer to proportional allocation.

The second stage of sampling for the ESS4 is the selection of households to be surveyed in each sampled EA using systematic random sampling. From the rural EAs, 10 agricultural households are selected as a subsample of the households selected for the AgSS and 2 non-agricultural households are selected from the non-agriculture households list in that specific EA. The non-agriculture household selection follows the same sampling method i.e. systematic random sampling. One important issue to note in ESS4 sampling is that the total number of agriculture households per EA remains 10 even though there are less than 2 or no non-agriculture households are listed and sampled in that EA.

For urban areas, a total of 15 households are selected per EA regardless of the households' economic activity. The households are selected using systematic random sampling from the total households listed in that specific EA. Table 3.2 presents the distribution of sample households for ESS4 by region, urban and rural stratum. A total of 7527 households are sampled for ESS4 based on the above sampling strategy.

Mode of data collection

Computer Assisted Personal Interview [capi]

Research instrument

The survey consisted of five questionnaires, similar with the questionnaires used during the previous rounds with revisions based on the results of the previous rounds as well as on identified areas of need for new data.The household questionnaire was administered to all households in the sample; multiple modules in the household questionnaire were administered per eligible household members in the sample. The community questionnaire was administered to a group of community members to collect information on the socio-economic indicators of the enumeration areas where the sample households reside.

The three agriculture questionnaires consisting of a post-planting agriculture questionnaire, post-harvest agriculture questionnaire and livestock questionnaire were administered to all household members (agriculture holders) who are engaged in agriculture activities. A holder is a person who exercises management control over the operations of the agricultural holdings and makes the major decisions regarding the utilization of the available resources. S/he has technical and economic responsibility for the holding. S/he may operate the holding directly as an owner or as a manager. Hence it is possible to have more than one holder in single sampled households. As a result we have administered more than one agriculture questionnaire in a single sampled household if the household has more than one holder.

(a) Household questionnaire: The household questionnaire provides information on education; health (including anthropometric measurement for children); labor and time use; financial inclusion; assets ownership and user right; food and non-food expenditure; household nonfarm activities and entrepreneurship; food security and shocks; safety nets; housing conditions; physical and financial assets; credit; tax and transfer; and other sources of household income. Household location is geo-referenced in order to be able to later link the ESS data to other available geographic data sets (See Appendix 1 for discussion of the geo-data provided with the ESS).

(b) Community questionnaire: The community questionnaire solicits information on infrastructure; community organizations; resource management; changes in the community; key events; community needs, actions and achievements; and local retail price information.

(c) Agriculture questionnaire: The post-planting and post-harvest agriculture questionnaires focus on crop farming activities and solicit information on land ownership and use; land use and agriculture income tax; farm labor; inputs use; GPS land area measurement and coordinates of household fields; agriculture capital; irrigation; and crop harvest and utilization. The livestock questionnaire collects information on animal holdings and costs; and production, cost and sales of livestock by products.

Cleaning operations

Final data cleaning was carried out on all data files. Only errors that could be clearly and confidently fixed by the team were corrected; errors that had no clear fix were left in the datasets. Cleaning methods for these errors are left up to the data user.

OTHER PROCESSING The electronic datasets are organized by questionnaire with the following labels on file names in parentheses: household (hh), community (com), post-planting agriculture (pp), post-harvest agriculture (ph), and livestock (ls). The data within each questionnaire do not contain any constructed variables. For example, the ESS data provide most all variables needed to construct an estimate of total household consumption, but the data set does not contain an estimated value of total consumption. The only compiled data that are included with the ESS files are the geo-spatial variables.

Response rate

ESS4 planned to interview 7,527 households from 565 enumeration areas (EAs) (Rural 316 EAs and Urban 249 EAs). A total of 6770 households from 535 EAs were interviewed for both the agriculture and household modules. The household module was not implemented in 30 EAs due to security reasons (See the Basic Information Document for additional information on survey implementation).

Abstract

The Ethiopian Socioeconomic Survey (ESS) is a collaborative project between the Central Statistics Agency (CSA) of Ethiopia and the World Bank Living Standards Measurement Study- Integrated Surveys on Agriculture (LSMS-ISA) team. The objective of the LSMS-ISA is to collect multi-topic panel household level data with a special focus on improving agriculture statistics and the link between agriculture and other sectors of the economy. The project also aims to build capacity, share knowledge across countries, and improve survey methodologies and technology.

The specific objectives of the ESS are:

• Development of an innovative model for collecting agricultural data in conjunction with household data;
• Strengthening the capacity to generate a sustainable system for producing accurate and timely information on agricultural households in Ethiopia;
• Development of a model of inter-institutional collaboration between the CSA and relevant federal and local government agencies as well as national and international research and development partners; and
• Comprehensive analysis of household income, well-being, and socio-economic characteristics of households in rural areas and small towns.

The ESS contains several innovative features:

• Integration of household welfare data with agricultural data;
• Creation of a panel data set that can be used to study welfare dynamics, the role of agriculture in development and the changes over time in health, education and labor activities, inter alia;.
• Collection of information on the network of buyers and sellers of goods with which the household interacts;
• Expanding the use of GPS units for measuring agricultural land areas;
• Involvement of multiple actors in government, academia and the donor community in the development of the survey and its contents as well as its implementation and analysis;
• Creation of publicly available micro data sets for researchers and policy makers;

Geographic coverage

National Coverage.

Analysis unit

Households

Kind of data

Sample survey data [ssd]

Sampling procedure

ESS is designed to collect panel data in rural and urban areas on a range of household and community level characteristics linked to agricultural activities. The first wave was implemented in 2011-12 and the second wave is implemented in 2013-14. The first wave, ERSS, covered only rural and small town areas. The second wave, ESS, added samples from large town areas. The second wave is nationally representative. The existing panel data (2011/12-2013/14) is only for rural and small towns. Large towns were added during the second wave and, so far, there is only one round. The planned follow-up ESS surveys will continue to be nationally representative. The ESS sample size provides estimates at the national level for rural and small town households. At the regional level, it provides estimates for five regions including Addis Ababa, Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray.

The sample is a two-stage probability sample. The first stage of sampling entailed selecting primary sampling units, which are a sample of the CSA enumeration areas (EAs). A total of 433 EAs were selected based on probability proportional to size of the total EAs in each region. For the rural sample, 290 EAs were selected from the AgSS EAs. For small town EAs, a total of 43 EAs and for large towns 100 EAs were selected. In order to ensure sufficient sample in the most populous regions (Amhara, Oromiya, SNNP, and Tigray) and Addis Ababa, quotas were set for the number of EAs in each region. The sample is not representative for each of the small regions including Afar, Benshangul Gumuz, Dire Dawa, Gambella, Harari, and Somalie regions. However, estimates can be produced for a combination of all smaller regions as one "other region" category.

During the second wave 100 urban EAs were added. The addition also included one more region to the sample, Addis Ababa. In each EA 15 households were selected. The addition of urban EAs increased the sample size from 333 to 433 EAs or from about 3,969 to 5,469 households.

The second stage of sampling was the selection of households to be interviewed in each EA. For rural EAs, a total of 12 households are sampled in each EA. Of these, 10 households were randomly selected from the sample of 30 AgSS households. The AgSS households are households which are involved in farming or livestock activities. Another 2 households were randomly selected from all other non-agricultural households in the selected rural EA (those not involved in agriculture or livestock). In some EAs, there is only one or no such households, in which case, less than two non-agricultural households were surveyed and more agricultural households were interviewed instead so that the total number of households per EA remains the same.

In the small town EAs, 12 households are selected randomly from the listing of each EA, with no stratification as to whether the household is engaged in agriculture/livestock. The same procedure is followed in the large town EAs. However, 15 households were selected in each large town EA.

Households were not selected using replacement. Thus, the final number of household interviewed was slightly less than the 5,469 as planned in the design. A total of 3,776 panel households and 1,486 new households (total 5,262 households) were interviewed with a response rate of 96.2 percent.

Mode of data collection

Face-to-face paper [f2f]

Cleaning operations

The interviews were carried out using paper and pen interviewing method. However, a concurrent data entry arrangement was introduced in this wave. In this arrangement, the enumerators did not wait until all the interviews were completed. Rather, once the enumerators completed some 3 to 4 questionnaires, the supervisors collected those completed interviews from the enumerators and brought them to the branch offices for data entry, while the enumerators are still conducting interviews with other households. Then questionnaires are keyed at the branch offices as soon as they are completed using CSPro data entry application software. The data from the completed questionnaires are then checked for any interview or data entry errors using a stata program. Data entry errors are checked with the data entry clerks and the interview errors are then sent to back to the field for correction and feedback to the ongoing interviews. Several rounds of this process were undertaken until the final data files are produced. In addition, after the fieldwork was completed the paper questionnaires were sent to the CSA headquarters in Addis Ababa for further checking. Additional cleaning was carried out, as needed, by checking the hard copies.

Response rate

Response rate was 96.2 percent.