Getting Better Gender Statistics from NSS* Surveys *The Indian National Sample Survey

NSS Surveys: A Brief Introduction  Started in 1950  Yearly but on varying subjects  A subject usually repeated every 5 years or so  For each subject, time series data thus produced  Aim of NSS - To fill data gaps in national income aggregates

A Brief Introduction to NSS Surveys (contd.) Till date, the NSS Organisation (NSSO) is the largest survey organisation in the world employing permanent survey staff who are trained in conduct of surveys in diverse areas Because of its size, NSS is able to survey a sample of over 100,000 households in India for the main subject of enquiry in a particular year

NSS surveys  Household surveys  Enterprise surveys  Other surveys

Household surveys  Employment & unemployment  Consumer expenditure  Health  Education  Land holdings  Debt and investment

Enterprise surveys  Unorganised manufacturing  Unorganised services  Unorganised trade

Other surveys  Particulars of slums  Village facilities  Particulars of constructions

Method of data collection Two-stage sampling 1 st stage Select villages/ urban blocks randomly from complete list of villages/ urban blocks in India 2 nd stage  Visit each selected village/block  Select households/enterprises randomly from list of hhs/enterprises prepared first  Interview the selected hhs/ enterprises to record data on the subject of enquiry

Strengths of NSS surveys Objective, fair and transparent Because of large sample size, can generate State-level estimates and estimates for sub- populations such as cultivators, agricultural labourers, etc. If some information on level of living of the surveyed households can be collected (by asking questions on household consumption), the survey results can be classified by economic level (e.g. health expenditure of bottom 20% population, next 20%, etc.)

Weaknesses of NSS surveys To collect all the information wanted, very long schedules of enquiry have to be used which strain the respondents’ patience and affect data quality The household member capable of giving the information is often busy and the rest, though willing, are ignorant Enterprise owners/managers tend to conceal information on the volume of business, and receipts in particular

Grading of NSS surveys by availability of gender data 1Employment & Unemployment Most info. col- lected person- wise Most info. tab- ulated gender- wise 2Education Health Some info. col- lected person- wise Some tabula- tion done genderwise 3Mfg/Service/Tra- ding enterprises Very little information collected genderwise. 4Consumption Land holdings Assets & Indebt- edness No information on the main subject of enquiry collected personwise. All information collected household-wise.

Gender statistics available from the NSS Employment & Unemployment Survey  Worker population ratio  Labour force participation rate  Employment rate  Break-up of workers by industry All available genderwise

Enterprise Survey Gender-wise data collection is restricted on a few aspects of the survey Ownership of own account enterprise Workers Areas where such type of data not collected/generated Compensation to workers GVA Asset/liability

Consumer Expenditure Survey Except for demographic particulars data not collected gender-wise Survey results are published on per capita basis Data not generated gender-wise on certain important parameters viz.  food consumption of males/females  expenditure on education

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