Population et pauvreté

This work looks at the dynamics of poverty (through living standards) of peri-urban households in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. Drawing on data collected by the Ouagadougou Population Observatory from a set of 15,925 households in the periphery of Ouagadougou between 2008 and 2012, we will construct a composite indicator of household living standard in order to evaluate the evolution in poverty in these households between two data collection cycles (called Round 1 and Round 3). The proxy measure of living standard, estimated using a quantitative approach to poverty, will be determined on the basis of a certain number of goods that households possess using a scoring system (the sum of 1s, each reflecting a household's possession of a given good). Three levels of household standard of living (poor, medium and rich) will then be derived in a way that permits the constitution of the most homogeneous possible classes. Afterward, using factorial correspondence analyses, we will examine the changes (or lack of changes) in living standards at the level of a number of sociodemographic and economic categories. Our analyses will provide valuable information to public authorities for the targeting of the poorest households, and also aid in the planning of actions to allow households to quickly increase their standard of living.

In order to determine the relative living conditions of people 60 years of age or older, we estimated households' living standard on the basis of variables characterizing households and their level of equipment drawn from the 2001 census of Niger. We determined the living standard indicator by place of residence on the basis of principal component analyses. We took the living standard proxy as the first component of each PCA, discretizing it into five classes (from very poor to very rich) using dynamic clouds. Moreover, we created several categories of household around the presence of an elderly person in the household combined with the age of the head of the household, on one hand, and the sociodemographic characteristics of the latter person or of the household as a whole, on the other. Using a multinomial logistic regression, we estimated the probability for a given category of household of being in a given one of the five living standard categories. The overall result is that, whatever other criteria are used to categorize households, those that include elderly individuals present a higher probability of having a low standard of living than households that do not include an elderly person.

In Moroccan society, gender-related roles and responsibilities are defined and performed through marriage. With reference to the Koran, men must fulfill the economic needs of the household. In exchange, his wife must obey him (the principle of ta'a) and is expected to be housewife, mother, sister, wife and manager of finances. Traditionally, men are responsible for everything outside the household and women for everything inside of it. This strong role differentiation suggests a similarly differentiated perception of the notion of poverty, with men emphasizing obstacles encountered in the quest for income, and women focusing more on their living conditions, which are inevitably domestic. Networks of solidarity described as a potential recourse can also be expected to be marked by gender, with women being confined to relationships with individuals of the same sex. We verified these hypotheses by conducting semi-directed interviews with men and women on their perception of poverty and their own condition, as well as their survival strategies in the face of their severe difficulties. The participants live in Marrakesh and the surrounding region. We distinguish the urban medina, rural plains areas and rural mountain areas.

Due to its importance, the relationship between poverty and demography continues to be the subject of in-depth analyses and studies. It is not a demographic fad, but due to the causal link between poverty and various demographic factors, such as fertility, contraception, maternal and child health, mortality and marriage rates. It is generally recognized that the poor reproduce more quickly, have a higher child mortality rate and a lower life expectancy, and adopt an etiological model that is harmful to their health. It is also recognised that the socio-economic environment and social inequalities influence behaviour and attitude to these demographic factors. The reconstruction and analysis of these analytical trends help to throw light on the general interaction between poverty, social inequalities and demographic behaviour. One of the most useful benefits of this study is that it differentiates the observations made according to the individual’s social standing which would contribute to identifying protective factors that could improve the well-being of the poor.

The “female head of household” variable is a special indicator of gender relations in demographic research in Sub-Saharan Africa, but studies on households run by women in this sub-region remain rare. This fact often leads to these households being assigned* observations made in other social environments, such as the feminisation of poverty due to the multiplication of female households. Based on data from the general population survey in 2006, our study compares the socio-demographic and economic characteristics of households run by women with those run by men in Ouagadougou. The findings show, overall, significant structural discrimination against women in terms of access to academic education and employment, compared with men. However, the differences within the category of households run by women are greater than those between this group and that of households run by men. A comparison using the households’ living standards does not show any systematic link between a household’s poverty and the sex of the person who runs it.

* Translator’s note: non-standard usage in the original text (“plaquer” to mean “étiqueter”).

According to the results of the Integrated Household Living Conditions Survey (EICVM 2009), close to half of the population of Burkina Faso lives below the poverty line. Poverty is more severe in rural areas, but to differing extents. People who live near forests appear to be more advantaged than other rural populations because they derive some of their income from forest products. This paper analyses the link between poverty and the environment through the importance of forest resources in household income in nine villages located near forests in the Waterfalls region of Burkina Faso. Using an ordered polynomial model, we show that the probability that a household belongs to the poorest quintiles increases with the percentage of income derived from forest resources. Furthermore, the existence of another source of income, by reducing the household’s dependence on forest resources, reduces its likelihood of belonging to the poorest quintiles. These results highlight the dilemma between poverty reduction and environmental conservation, in particular for the most vulnerable populations.

Health care is both a medical and economic problem. Increasing health costs and the disorganization of financial protection systems push 100 million people below the poverty threshold each year which could jeopardize the attainment of MDGs. In Cameroon, health costs are nearly always financed by individual households less than 5% of which have health insurance. People from non-poor households spend four times as much as those from poor households on health care. However, the weight of health expenditure in the household budget is higher for the poor. This study analyzes the magnitude and development of social inequalities due to the economic weight of health. Because of the special nature of health expenditure, the disparities have been analyzed using the Lorenz curve and the GINI index and an explicative analysis has been carried out using the general linear model (GLM). The results obtained show that considerable disparities exist in terms of health expenditure which became more apparent between 2001 and 2007. The main factors that explain inequalities in the economic weight of health are place of residence, standard of living, sex, age, level of education and type of health care.

Employment-related problems continue to grow in both industrialized and developing countries, with large numbers of women and men exposed to unemployment or constrained to precarious, temporary or poor-quality jobs. In Cameroon, despite low levels of unemployment at the national level, the unemployment rate among holders of post-secondary qualifications is substantially higher than among those with lower levels of education. Given this observation and in keeping with the recommendations of the Summit of Heads of State and Government of the African Union in Ouagadougou in 2004, several actions have been undertaken in Cameroon to promote the creation and monitoring of employment, including notably the creation of a ministry in charge of employment problems, of an Observatory on Employment (ONEFOP), and of the National Youth Council (Conseil national de la jeunesse). The provision of incentives in favor of self-employment and youth employment through projects and support programs such as the Integrated Support Project for Informal Sector Actors (Projet intégré d'appui aux acteurs du secteur informel – PIAASI), the artisan support project, the Support Program for Rural and Urban Youths (Programme d’Appui à la Jeunesse Rurale et Urbaine -- PAJER-U), etc. Only one of these initiatives, the Graduate Jobs Program (Programme Emplois Diplômés -- PED) specifically targets holders of post-secondary qualifications in general. The objective of this communication is to identify the causes of unemployment among holders of post-secondary qualifications.

It is difficult to observe poverty in France through census data only. Data is available on the type of activity or level of education, but not on income. We therefore crossed census data with those taken from a household budget survey in order to ascertain household income according to various demographic and economic data. A correlation can therefore be observed between fertility and income, and more generally speaking, between household size and income. It could be determined, for example, whether households with low financial resources have more children or fewer children than other households and how the relationship evolves according to region and environment (urban, peri-urban, rural). This question appears to be crucial: if populations with the greatest socio-economic difficulties have the highest level of fertility, future prospects in terms of the reproduction of socio-economic difficulties from one generation to the next do not appear very attractive. Backwardness at school, in particular, is related to the household’s standard of living. The question is also posed of one’s perception of the future in a social environment in which a certain mistrust of society has become entrenched.

This study is the result of the participation of researchers in a homeless census conducted in Santos in the São Paulo state of Brazil, in conjunction with the local authorities. The aim is to understand the different dimensions of the type of work and survival strategies of the homeless in Santos. The economically excluded and socially vulnerable are characterized by their constant displacement from one place to another. Thus the activities developed by the homeless are forms of social interaction specific to the urban environment, such as performing activities in public that are usually defined as private and structured by their street living. In this respect, survival strategies take place in a dimensional sphere somewhere between public and private life, according to the possibilities offered by a given transitory space.