J.15_Feed_the_Future_Tajikistan_Baseline_Report_(ENG).pdf

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report

July 2014

Prepared for the United States Agency for International Development, USAID Contract Number GS-23F-8144H/AID-OAA-M-12-00006, Feed the Future FEEDBACK.

Recommended Citation:

Feed the Future FEEDBACK. 2014. Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report.

Rockville, MD: Westat.

Westat Contact:

Detra Robinson, Chief of Party 1600 Research Boulevard Rockville, MD 20850 Tel: (301) 738-3653 Email: detrarobinson@westat.com mailto:detrarobinson@westat.com

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report iii

Table of Contents

List of Acronyms ............................................................................................ vii Executive Summary ....................................................................................... viii

1. Background

1.1 Feed the Future and FTF FEEDBACK Overview

1.2 Feed the Future Zone of Influence (ZOI) Profile

1.2.1 Feed the Future Intervention Areas Within the

ZOI

1.2.2 Rationale for ZOI Designation

1.2.3 Strategic Objectives for Feed the Future in the

ZOI

1.2.4 Demographics

1.2.5 Agriculture

1.3 Purpose of This Report

2. Methodologies for Obtaining Baseline Values for the Feed the

Future Indicators

2.1 Data Sources

2.2 Procedures for Estimating Values From Secondary

Sources at ZOI Level

2.3 Organization of Survey Work

2.4 Survey Sample Design

2.4.1 Sample Design

2.4.2 Sample Weighting

2.4.3 Questionnaire Design

2.5 Limitations

3. Descriptive Findings

3.1 Household Characteristics

3.1.1 Demographics

3.1.2 Dwelling Characteristics

3.1.3 Water and Sanitation

3.2 Household Consumption and Expenditures

3.2.1 Prevalence and Depth of Poverty in the ZOI

3.2.2 Per Capita Expenditures

3.3 Household Hunger

3.4 Nutrition

3.4.1 Children’s Nutritional Status

3.4.2 Women’s Nutrition

3.5 Women’s Empowerment

3.5.1 WEAI Overview

3.5.2 5DE

3.5.3 GPI

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report iv

Table of Contents (continued)

4. Analysis of Findings

4.1 Analysis Requested by USAID/Tajikistan

4.1.1 Women’s Empowerment and Feed the Future

Indicators

4.1.2 Women’s Empowerment and Household

Hunger

4.1.3 Women’s Decision-Making and Select

Indicators

4.2 Other Analyses

4.2.1 Feed the Future Indicators by Expenditure

Categories

4.2.2 Drinking Water Sources and Food Security

4.2.3 Livestock Holdings and Food Security

4.2.4 Migrant Labor and WEAI

4.3 Disaggregation by Rural and Urban

4.3.1 Livestock Holdings

4.3.2 Water Sources

4.3.3 Household Energy Supply

4.3.4 Rural and Urban Household Sanitation

4.3.5 Households With Members Working Abroad

4.4 Alternative Expenditure and Poverty Analyses

4.4.1 Expenditure Outliers and Holiday Season

Adjustments

4.4.2 Alternative Poverty Lines

4.4.3 Alternative Poverty and Expenditure Estimates

4.4.4 An Alternative Poverty Line for Baseline

Poverty Measures

5. Summary and Conclusions

List of Appendices

A References B Sample Weighting C Indicator Descriptions and Calulations

List of Annexes

A Survey Protocol – Tajikistan B Survey Instrument C Survey Instrument – Tajik D Survey Instrument – Uzbek

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report v

List of Tables

Table 1. ZOI total population, 2012 Table 2. Agricultural significance of provinces of Tajikistan by various indicators, 2009 Table 3. Feed the Future indicators and data sources Table 4. Survey sample design for the ZOI Table 5. FTF FEEDBACK PBS survey modules and relationship with selected indicators Table 6. FTF FEEDBACK ZOI population-based indicators

(13 indicators) Table 7. Household demographics Table 8. Highest education level within the household Table 9. Dwelling characteristics Table 10. Primary and secondary electricity sources Table 11. Housing construction materials Table 12. Main source of cooking fuel Table 13. Secondary fuel type Table 14. Households using improved water and sanitation facilities Table 15. Drinking water source Table 16. Water for washing and other uses Table 17. Prevalence of poverty, poverty gap, and per capita expenditure in the ZOI Table 18. Prevalence of households with moderate or severe hunger Table 19. Nutritional status of children under 5 Table 20. Prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding of children under 6 months of age Table 21. Prevalence of children 6-23 months receiving a minimum acceptable diet Table 22. Components of MAD among children 6-23 months of age Table 23. Women’s nutritional status Table 24. Prevalence of underweight women Table 25. Prevalence of overweight and obese women Table 26. Prevalence of households with overweight women and stunted children under 5 Table 27. Prevalence of households with underweight women and stunted children under 5 Table 28. Women’s Dietary Diversity Score: Mean number of food groups consumed by WRA Table 29. Women’s Dietary Diversity Score, by quartile Table 30. Percentage of women eating each of the nine food groups Table 31. WEAI indicators Table 32. Women’s 5DE subindex Table 33. Women’s 5DE score and household type

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report vi

List of Tables (continued)

Table 34. Percent of women who are not yet empowered and who have inadequate achievement (censored headcount) in the 5DE indicators

Table 35. GPI Table 36. Percent of men and women who are not yet empowered and have inadequate achievement (censored headcount) in the 10 5DE indicators

Table 37. Values for eight Feed the Future indicators according to WEAI Table 38. Severity of household hunger according to women’s achievement on WEAI indicators Table 39. Feed the Future indicators by levels of WEAI decision-making index Table 40. Selected Feed the Future indicators by category of per capita expenditure Table 41. Household hunger and drinking water sources Table 42. Households reporting moderate or severe hunger by livestock assets Table 43. Women’s decision-making in households with and without members working abroad Table 44. Livestock holdings of urban and rural households Table 45. Primary drinking water sources, by rural and urban household Table 46. Source of water for washing and other uses, by rural and urban households Table 47. Primary and secondary fuel sources by rural and urban Table 48. Electricity in rural and urban households Table 49. Household sanitation by rural and urban Table 50. Rural and urban households with one or more members working abroad Table 51. Historical comparison of Tajikistan (National 2003/2007) and

FTF FEEDBACK (ZOI 2012) poverty prevalence estimates Table 52. Alternative prevalence of poverty, poverty gap, and per capita expenditure in the ZOI

List of Figures

Figure 1. Feed the Future Tajikistan zone of influence and intervention areas

Figure 2. Trends in Tajikistan agricultural production, 1992-2011 Figure 3. Age distribution of women in sample and women respondents to

WEAI module

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report vii

List of Acronyms

5DE Five Domains of Empowerment

BMI Body Mass Index

CPC Carolina Population Center at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

CPI Consumer Price Index

DHS Demographic and Health Survey

FTFMS Feed the Future Monitoring System

GDP Gross Domestic Product

GOTJ Government of Tajikistan

GPI Gender Parity Index

HHS Household Hunger Scale

IFPRI International Food Policy Research Institute

IMF International Monetary Fund

IT Information Technology

LCMS Living Conditions Monitoring Survey

LCU Local Currency Unit

LSMS Living Standards Measurement Survey

MAD Minimum Acceptable Diet

MDG Millennium Development Goal

MSS Micronutrient Status Survey

PBS Population-Based Survey

PPP Purchasing Power Parity

PPS Population Proportional to Size

PSU Primary Sampling Unit

SEA Standard Enumeration Area

TOT Training of Trainers

USAID U.S. Agency for International Development

USG United States Government

USD United States Dollar

WEAI Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index

WHO World Health Organization

WRA Women of Reproductive Age

ZOI Zone of Influence

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report viii

Executive Summary

This document reports the findings of the Tajikistan Feed the Future population-based survey (PBS) and secondary data sources that serve as the baseline values for the U.S. Government’s Feed the

Future initiative led by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). Feed the Future seeks to reduce poverty and undernutrition in 19 developing countries by focusing on accelerating growth of the agricultural sector, addressing root causes of undernutrition, and reducing gender inequality. Feed the Future FEEDBACK (FTF FEEDBACK) seeks to capture data in the geographic areas targeted by Feed the Future interventions, known as the Feed the Future Zones of

Influence (ZOI).

The PBS, including this baseline report, is a product of FTF FEEDBACK, which is responsible for performance monitoring and impact evaluation of the Feed the Future initiative. FTF FEEDBACK is implemented by Westat in partnership with TANGO International, the International Food Policy

Research Institute (IFPRI), and the Carolina Population Center (CPC) at the University of North

Carolina at Chapel Hill. FTF FEEDBACK PBS fieldwork was conducted by the Centre for

Sociological Research “Zerkalo,” a private survey research firm, in collaboration with Westat and

TANGO International, which provided technical and training support. Surveys were conducted from December 23, 2012 through January 23, 2013.

The ZOI in Tajikistan comprises 12 of 24 districts in Khatlon province. A total of 2,000 households in the ZOI were surveyed for the PBS data collection activity. These households are spread across

100 standard enumeration areas in the targeted districts.

The Feed the Future ZOI baseline values for Tajikistan draw on data from both primary and secondary sources. Of the 13 Feed the Future indicators reported, 11 are calculated using data from the PBS: (1) per capita expenditures; (2) prevalence of poverty; (3) prevalence of children 6-23 months receiving a minimum acceptable diet; (4) prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding of children under 6 months of age; (5) Women’s

Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI); (6) prevalence of households with moderate or severe hunger

(Household Hunger Scale); (7) Women’s Dietary Diversity Score;1 (8) prevalence of underweight women; (9) prevalence of underweight children under 5; (10) prevalence of wasted children under 5; and (11) prevalence of stunted children under 5. Indicators (12) prevalence of anemia among children 6-59 months and (13) prevalence of anemia among women of reproductive age are not reported. Anemia is not a priority Feed the Future indicator and anemia data were not collected in the PBS. Appropriate secondary data were not available to calculate baseline anemia values for the ZOI. All Tajikistan Feed the Future ZOI baseline values have been entered into the Feed the Future Monitoring System (FTFMS) database for the global

Feed the Future initiative. In this report, only differences across subgroups that are statistically significant at the 0.05 level are discussed in the narrative.

1 Women’s Dietary Diversity Score and prevalence of underweight women are measured for women of reproductive age (15-49 years).

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report ix

Evidence from the 2012 PBS underscores the presence of poverty and undernutrition in the ZOI, Household data show that nearly everyone in the ZOI lives in houses made out of mud or adobe with corrugated metal roofs. Houses are connected to the national electricity grid, but power is severely limited in the winter. Most households use agricultural products (firewood, crop residue, and animal dung) for fuel. Almost half of all households have one or more household members working abroad. Nutrition data show that almost one third (30.7 percent) of children under 5 in the

ZOI are stunted, 6.9 percent are wasted and 10.1 percent are underweight. Only 7.7 percent of children ages 6 to 23 months are consuming a minimum acceptable diet, and of children under 6 months of age, 38.5 percent are exclusively breastfed. Based on the Household Hunger Scale (HHS),

13.9 percent of all households report moderate to severe hunger. Women of reproductive age consume, on average, 4.4 of nine food groups. Comparable statistical estimates of poverty prevalence follow the downward trend economists observed in the 2003 and 2007 LSMS;

nonetheless, sampled households report mean daily per capita expenditures of $3.32 (2010 USD) and, at the lower end of the distribution of expenditures, 8.8% of households report per person consumption expenditures below the Feed the Future international poverty line of $1.25 (2005

PPP)/day/capita. Increases in agriculture prices since 2005 appear to have increased household incomes in the largely rural ZOI, but increases in food prices have decreased purchasing power disproportionately among poorer households. The households spending less per person per day than the international poverty line do not have the resources required to purchase healthy diets, adequate residential environments, and necessary medical services. The burdens of chronic poverty fall disproportionately on women and children.

The WEAI measures the empowerment, agency, and inclusion of women in the agriculture sector, reported as an overall score and comprised of two subindices. For the Tajikistan ZOI, the WEAI score is 0.69. The Five Domains of Empowerment (5DE) measures women’s empowerment in five key areas, and the Gender Parity Index (GPI) measures the average level of equality in the empowerment of men and women in the household. The average 5DE in Tajikistan’s ZOI is 0.68, and 21.0 percent of women in the ZOI have achieved adequate empowerment (a score of 0.80 or greater). The GPI in Tajikistan’s ZOI is 0.79. In the households with both a male and female adult, more men than women achieved empowerment in nine out of the 10 WEAI empowerment indicators, with the exception of leisure time.

Additional analyses requested by USAID/Central Asia Republics (CAR) in Tajikistan examine the relationship between WEAI indicators and household hunger, and the differences between national poverty estimates based on prior surveys and the 2012 Feed the Future estimates for the ZOI.

Women in households with moderate to severe hunger are significantly less likely to be empowered in making decisions about agricultural production, ownership assets, and purchase, sale, or transfer of assets compared to women in households with no hunger. Analyses comparing households with members working abroad to households with no members working abroad shows insignificantly higher scores on the women’s decision making index for women in households with one or more members working abroad. Urban and rural comparisons show poorer housing and sanitation conditions for rural households. The outcomes for children and for women are more severe in rural

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report x areas of the ZOI for all indicators. Analyses of poverty measures found differences in definitions of the poverty lines used to calculate poverty prevalences and poverty gaps between the national surveys and the international poverty line.

This report will be used to a baseline for gauging changes in the Feed the Future indicators over time in the ZOI. It should be noted that the survey is not designed to allow for conclusions about attribution or causality.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 1

1. Background

1.1 Feed the Future and FTF FEEDBACK Overview

Feed the Future is a U.S. Government initiative that seeks to reduce poverty and food insecurity by focusing on growth of the agricultural sector, addressing root causes of undernutrition and the reduction of gender inequality in 19 developing countries. The U.S. Agency for International

Development (USAID) is responsible for leading the government-wide effort to implement the

Feed the Future initiative. The core investment areas of the initiative are women’s empowerment, dietary quality and diversification, post-harvest infrastructure, high-quality inputs, and financial services. The high-level goal of the initiative is “to reduce by 20 percent the prevalence of poverty and the prevalence of stunted children under five years of age in the areas where we work.”2

Feed the Future FEEDBACK (FTF FEEDBACK) is a USAID-funded project to implement specific elements of the monitoring and evaluation agenda for Feed the Future. FTF FEEDBACK is being implemented by Westat, in partnership with TANGO International, the International Food

Policy Research Institute (IFPRI), and the Carolina Population Center (CPC) at the University of

North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

The main objectives of the FTF FEEDBACK project are to: (1) enable USAID Missions to meet performance monitoring requirements of Feed the Future and maximize the use and benefits of the data collected; (2) provide high-quality empirical evidence to inform program design and investment decisions that will promote sustainable food security; (3) ensure timely availability of high-quality data for use in monitoring performance and evaluating impacts of the Feed the Future initiative; and

(4) facilitate accountability and learning about what Feed the Future interventions work best, under what conditions, and at what cost.

To measure progress in addressing global food security, USAID is collecting data through large household surveys in geographic areas targeted by Feed the Future interventions, known as Zones of Influence (ZOI). These population-based surveys (PBS), combined with secondary data for the

ZOI, capture information related to women in agriculture, food security, consumption, nutrition, and wellbeing of households in the ZOI. The baseline values will be used to measure changes in the

Feed the Future indicators over time in the Tajikistan ZOI. All baseline values collected through

FTF FEEDBACK have been entered into the Feed the Future Monitoring System (FTFMS) database for the global Feed the Future initiative. The midterm and endline surveys will be conducted in 2015 and 2017, respectively.

2 USAID 2013. Feed the Future. Progress Scorecard, June.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 2

1.2 Feed the Future Zone of Influence (ZOI) Profile

1.2.1 Feed the Future Intervention Areas Within the ZOI

The Feed the Future strategy is focused on 12 of 24 districts in the Khatlon province (Qubodiyon, Qumsangir, Vakhsh, Nosiri Khusrav, Jilikul, Bokhtar, Khuroson, Jomi, Yovon, J. Rumi, Sharituz, and Sarband) in the southwest part of the country bordering Afghanistan. Figure 1 shows the identified ZOI areas for Tajikistan.

Figure 1. Feed the Future Tajikistan zone of influence and intervention areas

Source: USAID Tajikistan.

1.2.2 Rationale for ZOI Designation

Khatlon is one of the poorest provinces in Tajikistan. The Tajikistan Demographic and Health

Survey (DHS) placed two-thirds of the population of Khatlon in the lowest two quintiles of its national wealth index.3

Donor assistance in Tajikistan, especially that provided by bilateral donors such as the U.S.

Government (USG), has in the past been widely distributed throughout the relatively small country;

resulting in limited sustainability of investments made. The scattering of resources to provide equal access to aid for all regions of Tajikistan has greatly increased the costs of aid and made it more difficult to learn from and apply that experience to other areas and projects.

3 Statistical Agency under the President of the Republic of Tajikistan (SA), Ministry of Health [Tajikistan] (MOH), and

ICF International. 2013. Tajikistan Demographic and Health Survey 2012. Dushanbe, Tajikistan, and Calverton, Maryland, USA: SA, MOH, and ICF International. Cited in further footnotes as Tajikistan DHS 2012.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 3

The Feed the Future strategy breaks with this tradition of distributing aid widely, and it purposely concentrates efforts to improve food security in the cotton, wheat, and fruit-and-vegetable growing districts of Khatlon. These districts have struggled to regain economic footing during their transition from a major supplier of cotton in the Soviet economy to a smaller slice of a highly competitive world market. While Tajikistan has experienced three consecutive years of robust growth during

2010-2012, lower international prices for its premier export crop of cotton have had a disproportionately negative impact on the Khatlon economy. In Khatlon a 5 percent increase in the food component of the national Consumer Price Index (CPI) during the last 6 months of 2012 has weighed more heavily on poor households.4 With bread as the main staple food, poorer households lack dietary diversity and have high rates of malnutrition.5 This is further corroborated through the anthropometric data of the 2012 DHS, which found percentages of children in the ZOI under age 5 who are stunted (24.6 vs. 26.2 nationally), wasted (11.2 vs. 9.9 nationally), or underweight (13.1 vs.

12.1 nationally) the same or higher than the national values.6

Wheat accounts for almost 60 percent of calories per capita7 in Tajikistan, but smallholder household and dekhan8 farms do not produce enough wheat to meet domestic demand. Tajikistan thus depends heavily on food imports and, in the ZOI, lower cotton prices in the export market and higher food prices combine to depress purchasing power of poorer households. Risks of climate change add to food insecurity. A 2009 World Bank report ranked Tajikistan highest on an index of overall vulnerability to climate change.9

Aging irrigation infrastructure and water intensive agriculture dominated by cotton make Khatlon province a promising place to demonstrate the effects of water and land reforms. Complementary donor programs in Khatlon province create opportunities for synergies in collective impact. Feed the Future is working with the Government of Tajikistan (GOTJ) to implement agricultural reforms to address food security and nutrition. Feed the Future will build on the work of the GOTJ by combining its efforts with other donor agencies working in the province, including the World Bank, and the United Nations-sponsored International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).10

Fostering water conservation and agricultural diversity in the ZOI achieves dual goals. Diverting less efficient cotton and wheat production to fruit, vegetable, meat, and dairy production supplies a variety of nutritional foods to local communities. A shift away from monoculture planting also increases the resilience of local economies and opportunities for laborers, especially women, who work as low-paid field hands on larger farms. The latter goal has special importance in a country that is exporting a substantial proportion of the male population to foreign labor markets, and for which

4 World Bank, 2013a. Tajikistan Partnership Program Snapshot.

5 USAID, 2012b. Tajikistan FY 2011-2015 Multi-year Strategy.

6 Tajikistan DHS 2012. Percentages are of those more than 2 SD below mean.

7 USAID, 2012b.

8 “In Tajikistan, ‘dehkan farms’ are midsized farms that are legally and physically distinct from household plots.”

See http://geocommons.com/overlays/13980.

9 M. Fay, R. Block, and J. Ebinger, eds. 2010. Adapting to Climate Change in Europe and Central Asia. Washington D.C.:

World Bank.

10 USAID, n.d. Tajikistan Fact Sheet.

http://geocommons.com/overlays/13980

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 4 remittances from citizens working abroad accounts for almost 50 percent of the National Income.11

Empowering women within local communities reduces the dependence of the country at large on a potentially volatile economy, in this case, Russia, and increases the supply of a diverse mix of nutritious foods. The United States has interests in the ZOI districts that go beyond humanitarian aid. These districts lie close to the Tajikistan border with Afghanistan. Food insecurity in this region heightens political and social insecurity across Central Asia.

1.2.3 Strategic Objectives for Feed the Future in the ZOI

The overall goals of Tajikistan’s Feed the Future investment are to improve food security and nutrition in the ZOI over 5 years.12 An estimated 201,000 vulnerable smallholder farmers and their families will receive targeted assistance to escape hunger and poverty.13 Additional rural populations will achieve improved income and nutritional status indirectly from strategic policy engagement and institutional investments. To achieve these goals, the Feed the Future Tajikistan strategy investments are built on three pillars:14

Pillar One. To assist household and small commercial farms to increase income and food for home consumption and to provide support to improve nutrition and health outcomes. This includes development of fruit and vegetable value chains and better livestock management, increasing yields of meat and milk, increasing access to protein, improving livestock management, and reducing pressure on the environment. Along with these efforts, public health programs will address nutrition, improve dietary practices, and support health care needs of women and children, focusing on pregnant women and children up to 2 years old. Increasing incomes and educating women will empower them and improve children’s nutrition because women are more likely than men to spend money on nutritious food.

Pillar Two. To build capacity building in local and community-based institutions and organizations. Programs include agricultural extension for production techniques, resource conservation, formation of producer groups to improve access to markets and inputs.

Pillar Three. To complete agrarian reform in selected districts of Khatlon province.

Reforms include change in land and water regulations, rights, institutions, and incentives.

11 A. Danzer and O. Ivaschenko, 2010. “Migration patterns in a remittances dependent economy: Evidence from

Tajikistan during the global financial crisis,” Migration Letters, 7 (2): 190–202.

12 Ibid.

13 USAID, n.d.

14 USAID, 2012b.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 5

1.2.4 Demographics

Table 1 presents population estimates for the ZOI, including by household type15 and the categories that are reported in the FTFMS database. The total population in Tajikistan at the end of 2012 was around 7,987,400 people and the rural population was 5,880,900 or 74 percent of the total population.16 Table 1 shows that the ZOI makes up 19.2 percent of the total population of

Tajikistan and a slightly larger share (23.0 percent) of the total rural population. Around nine of 10 households in the ZOI are in rural areas.

1.2.5 Agriculture

Agriculture in Tajikistan accounts for 23 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and provides formal and informal sector employment for 75 percent of the labor force. Despite this high percentage of the labor force in agriculture, food imports account for over 58 percent of Tajikistan’s domestic cereal requirements and 81 percent of overall food consumption for the 2012/13 marketing year. Imports of wheat and barley mainly come from Kazakhstan and rice from the

Russian Federation.17 Due to lack of arable land, Tajikistan’s dependence on food imports will continue.

Most agricultural work is done through manual labor by women, on household plots and as poorly paid workers on cotton farms. The number of women engaged in cotton sector is larger than the number of men. The proportion of women relative to men involved in the cotton sector is increasing as external labor migration of men continues to rise due to the acute lack of jobs in

Tajikistan.

15 As explained in USAID, 2012a, Feed the Future M&E Guidance Series Volume 6: Measuring the Gender Impact of Feed the

Future: “Feed the Future household (HH) level indicators are disaggregated by “gendered household types” – that is:

(1) HH with male and female adults (18+ years), (2) HH with at least one male adult and no female adult, (3) HH with at least one female adult and no male adults, and (4) HH with children and no adults. This categorization is somewhat different that the standard “male-headed vs. female-headed” households, and the distinction and change is very meaningful. The concept of “head of household” is highly loaded, presumes certain characteristics that may or may not be present in household gender dynamics, and often reflects the bias of the researcher or respondent. In addition, the head of household concept may perpetuate existing social inequalities and prioritization of household responsibilities that may be detrimental to women.”

16 Demographic Yearbook of the Republic of Tajikistan. 2013. Statistical Agency under President of the Republic of Tajikistan., pp. 95-97.

17 FAO, 2013a.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 6

Table 1. ZOI total population, 2012

ZOI population

Total population1 1,537,100

Rural 1,354,755

Urban 182,345

Population in male and female adult(s) HH 1,430,764

Population in female adult(s) only HH 101,802

Population in male adult(s) only HH 4,534

Population in child no adult HH 0

Total households (HH)2 210,915

Male and female adults (HH) 186,772

Female adults only (HH) 22,632

Male adults only (HH) 1,511

Child no adult (HH) 0

Women of Reproductive Age (WRA) (15-49 years) 422,545

WRA rural 372,761

WRA urban 49,784

WRA nonpregnant 387,988

WRA pregnant 34,557

Children 0-59 months 241,041

Males 0-59 months 119,320

Females 0-59 months 121,721

Children 6-59 months 217,252

Males 6-59 months 107,704

Females 6-59 months 109,548

Children 0-5 months 23,789

Males 0-5 months 11,616

Females 0-5 months 12,173

Children 6-23 months 70,453

Males 6-23 months 34,345

Females 6-23 months 36,108

1 Source: Demographic Yearbook of the Republic of Tajikistan. 2013. Statistical Agency under President of the Republic of Tajikistan.

2 This number is the number of households in the ZOI (and disaggregated by GHHT) and not the number of people living in the household.

Around 86 percent of employed rural women work in agriculture, and more than 53 percent of them are occupied with their own personal households. While “… between 2002 and 2008, the proportion of women owning family farms in Tajikistan rose from 2 percent to 14 percent,”18 the number of smallholder farms increased rapidly from 2008 to 2012 as a result of privatization of collective farms, and the proportion of these farms headed by women fell from 14 to 8.5 percent.

Over the same five years, the proportion of women among all workers in agriculture increased from

44 to 50 percent.

18 United Nations CEDAW Success Stories: http://www.unifem.org/cedaw30/success_stories/#kyrgyzstan.

http://www.unifem.org/cedaw30/success_stories/#kyrgyzstan

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 7

Figure 2 shows trends in Tajikistan agricultural production from 1992-2011. Of the products in the figure, fresh fruits and vegetables (especially onions)19 have been identified as the best options for value chain development in the ZOI.20

Figure 2. Trends in Tajikistan agricultural production, 1992-2011

Source: FAO 2013b.

Table 2 shows the importance of Khatlon province for Tajikistan’s agricultural production.

Tajikistan’s largely mountainous terrain has relatively little arable land. Khatlon accounts for one-third of agriculture land area, 45 percent of gross agricultural output and almost half (49 percent) of crop land. Khatlon produces 40 percent of Tajikistan’s cattle and 39 percent of sheep and goats.

Table 2. Agricultural significance of provinces of Tajikistan by various indicators, 2009

Khatlon Sughd DRD GBAO Tajikistan

Gross agriculture output 45 25 26 4 100

Agricultural land area 33 24 26 17 100

Cropped area 49 32 18 1 100

Cattle 40 27 26 7 100

Sheep/goats 39 31 21 8 100

Source: Ministry of Agriculture of the Republic of Tajikistan, et al. 2011. Note that these percentages from the GOTJ are not available to two decimal points.

19 USAID, 2012b.

20 USAID, 2012b.

200,000

400,000

600,000

800,000

1,000,000

1,200,000

P ro d u ct io n m e tr ic t o n s)

Year

Cotton lint

Onions, dry

Potatoes

Wheat

Fruit

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 8

An estimated one million Tajik citizens are migrant workers, primarily men working in Russia.

Remittances are the highest in the world and make up almost half of the GDP (47.4 percent).21

Remittances are reducing the need of Khatlon residents to work as seasonal laborers in cotton fields.

The growth in remittances is driving an increase in domestic market demand for food products, including higher value-added items such as fresh fruits and vegetables. This growth in demand is an opportunity for Tajik producers to sell more and at better prices in the domestic market. According to USAID,22 remittances make Tajikistan vulnerable to cycles in the Russian economy and Russian policy towards foreign workers. However, remittances also represent potential for investment in agriculture.

Background information related to national nutrition status and household food security can be found in Section 3.3, Household Hunger, and Section 3.4, Nutrition.

1.3 Purpose of This Report

This report presents baseline values estimated from the Feed the Future ZOI PBS and from secondary data for 13 Feed the Future indicators. This baseline will be used as a reference point for measuring changes in nutrition, poverty, and women’s empowerment in the ZOI. The baseline is established for monitoring, rather than for estimating program effects. The survey was designed for measurement of changes in the Feed the Future indicators over time in the ZOI. It does not allow for conclusions about attribution or causality. Midterm and endline surveys are scheduled for 2015 and 2017, respectively.

The presentation of data findings in this report begins with general descriptive findings (Section 3.0), followed by specific analyses requested by USAID/Central Asia Republics (CAR) in Tajikistan

(Section 4.0). The specific analyses requested by USAID/CAR/Tajikistan include descriptions of data cleaning methods, alternative poverty prevalence and poverty gap estimates, seasonal adjustments of expenditure data collected during a holiday season, and the potential impact of a food-specific consumer price index (CPI), as opposed to a general CPI, on baseline poverty prevalence.

21 World Bank, 2013a.

22 USAID, 2012b.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 9

2. Methodologies for Obtaining Baseline Values for the Feed the Future Indicators

2.1 Data Sources

FTF FEEDBACK collected primary data through a ZOI PBS. Baseline values for 11 of the 13 Feed the Future indicators are from PBS data, as noted in Table 3. The remaining two indicators, prevalence of anemia among children 6-59 months and prevalence of anemia among women of reproductive age, are not reported. Anemia is not a priority Feed the Future indicator and anemia data were not collected in the PBS. Appropriate secondary data were not available to calculate baseline anemia values for the

ZOI.

Table 3. Feed the Future indicators and data sources

Indicator Source Year collected

Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of households with moderate or severe hunger FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Women’s Dietary Diversity Score FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of underweight women FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of underweight children under 5 FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of stunted children under 5 FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of wasted children under 5 FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of children 6-23 months receiving a minimum acceptable diet FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of exclusive breastfeeding among children under 6 months FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Per capita expenditure of USG targeted beneficiaries (2010 USD) FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

Prevalence of poverty: Percentage of people living on less than $1.25/day FTF FEEDBACK PBS 2012

2.2 Procedures for Estimating Values From Secondary

Sources at ZOI Level

FTF FEEDBACK collected primary data to estimate all indicators except anemia among women of reproductive age and children less than 5 years of age. FTF FEEDBACK uses secondary data for indicators wherever possible to supplement survey data. The DHS was implemented in 2012 with oversampling of ZOI districts so that data could be disaggregated to the ZOI. However, at the time of the FTF FEEDBACK PBS, it was unclear whether the DHS would oversample in the ZOI to collect the necessary anthropometric indicators for Feed the Future.

2.3 Organization of Survey Work

Fieldwork for the FTF FEEDBACK PBS took place in Tajikistan from December 26, 2012 to

January 23, 2013. The Center of Sociological Research (Zerkalo), a survey research firm based in

Dushanbe, Tajikistan, conducted the fieldwork. Detailed discussion of survey methods and survey implementation are included in the protocol found in Annex A.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 10

Training

Training of trainers (TOT) and supervisors took place in Dushanbe from December 14 through

December 16, 2012. The TOT and the supervisors’ training were conducted in English with translation into Tajik. The TOT was attended by 12 trainers/supervisors, several Zerkalo staff members, including an information technology (IT) specialist. Enumerator training took place in

Qurghonteppa, a town in Khatlon province, from December 19 through December 23 to minimize transportation difficulties for participants. Prior to training, Zerkalo hired 110 enumerators who were residents of the Khatlon region. Because this was the first time electronic tablets were used in

Tajikistan, hiring requirements were stricter than usual and included some experience with computers, smart phones, or similar devices. In addition to relying on its own list of candidates, Zerkalo also hired enumerators from NGOs and other organizations in the region. All enumerators were fluent in Uzbek and Tajik. There was some enumerator attrition during training. After the first day of training, 84 of the 110 returned. Field work was conducted using 80 enumerators, all of whom were part of the initial group of hires and attended all training sessions.

Enumerator training on the PBS questionnaires and survey protocol was conducted in Tajik by

Zerkalo senior staff, using Nexus 7 tablets and paper questionnaires, Shorr boards, and Seca scales.

Senior staff were assisted by trainers, and supervised by TANGO staff. USAID provided Shorr boards and Seca scales for measuring heights and weight of women ages 15-49 and children under 5.

Training included instruction and practice on both. A copy of the training manuals can be obtained from the Development Experience Clearinghouse or by contacting the FTF FEEDBACK project.

Fieldwork

During the fieldwork, the survey managers supervised the daily activities of the field teams. For the purpose of the survey, the 12 districts of the ZOI were divided among eight survey teams. Each team was made up of ten enumerators—80 enumerators total. Guided by Zerkalo senior staff, enumerators were asked to obtain verbal consent from respondents in order to generate trust, and as was standard for other surveys in the country. Enumerators provided respondents with a translated copy of Module B (in either Uzbek or Tajik) and signed that informed consent was provided by the respondents. Teams were divided into male and female interviewer pairs as the Women’s

Empowerment in Agriculture Index (WEAI) requires interviews of both the primary male and female members of the household. Males interviewed male primary respondents and females interviewed female primary respondents. One supervisor was assigned to each team. An IT specialist provided technical assistance throughout the field work. The overall survey team totaled 91 members.

Interviews were conducted on Google Nexus 7 tablets running Open Data Kit (ODK) data collection software. Data were backed up in the field and transmitted to secure Westat servers, where data were aggregated and managed. As noted previously, this was the first time tablets were used for a survey in Tajikistan. For quality assurance, in many cases where data entry only required one tablet, such as housing characteristics and Module E expenditure survey, Zerkalo enumerators

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 11 entered the data on two tablets. Data from both tablets were used as checks during data cleaning and were identical in nearly all cases, indicating few data entry errors. The final dataset includes data from one tablet, as appropriate. Early in the field work technology problems with tablets, mostly involving software updates, slowed survey progress. These issues were resolved by Zerkalo and FTF

FEEDBACK staff.

Start- and end-dates and times were recorded on tablets to allow FTF FEEDBACK to reconstruct field work, locating enumerators in clusters on each day. The survey team spent two days in each cluster. Zerkalo initially estimated 24 days for field work. However, due to weather conditions and having fewer enumerators than expected, field work extended to 34 days. The survey team addressed the problem of limited electricity by using generators to recharge tablets.

Data Quality Control

During the fieldwork, data quality was maintained in several ways. The data entry software on the tablet computers had programmed checks for variable ranges, skip patterns and consistency. In the field, the supervisor checked each questionnaire closely for completeness, consistency, range checks and skip patterns. The team leader also checked a subset of questionnaires in the same manner. The fieldwork was planned so that all the field teams were within close proximity during the initial days of the fieldwork, and the teams all stayed at the same location in the evening. In this way, problems identified during the first days of fieldwork were shared and resolved with the entire field team.

Westat data management staff also ran data quality programs that incorporated the data quality checks on the tablet computers, the checks done by field staff and other general checks. These data quality programs included range checks, checks of skip patterns, consistency checks and completeness checks done by the tablet computer software, and the checks by field editors and supervisors. The programs checked for completeness by listing whether all expected questionnaires per standard enumeration area (SEA)23 had been received, by result of the interview (complete, incomplete, etc.), by percent of modules that were completed (by module), and by percent of missing data for select variables, such as age and gender of respondents. All of these data were analyzed by Westat data management staff to identify data quality problems to be addressed in the field. In addition to producing detailed reports by enumerator, the programs produced summary reports that were used for general data quality control.

Handling of Missing Values

The approach used in this report is to take all “don’t know” responses and missing data and recode them to null value– to take the value of “no” (if a yes/no question) or “0” (if a numeric response is required) – and to include the recoded data in the numerator and denominator of indicators.

23 Standard enumeration areas are geographic areas defined by the Statistical Agency under the President of the Republic of Tajikistan and used for the national population census.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 12

This approach was used unless a specific indicator is defined otherwise (e.g., children who were not weighed and measured and children whose values for weight and height were not recorded are excluded from both the denominator and the numerator for anthropometry indicators). Means are computed for questions whose responses are numerical values.

Data Imputation

Missing or “don´t know” values were generally treated as described above and allowed to stay in the data. The exceptions were dates missing or “don’t know” values for critical events, which are needed to correctly compute indicators for these individuals:

Date of birth of women 15 to 49; and

Date of each birthing of women aged 15 to 49 for living children under 5 years of age.

The procedure followed to impute these dates followed international DHS standards, as described in

DHS Data Editing and Imputation.24

Methods for Data Analysis

Most of the quantitative results in this report are presented as percentages and means, all with two decimal points in tables and one decimal point in the narrative. Representativeness is maintained by weighting any statistics that apply to the survey population (such as percentages and means) by the inverse of the probability of selection of any given survey respondent:

Percentages. For values provided in nominal scales (e.g., yes/no responses), percentages are computed using the weighted number of cases that provided a given response as the numerator, and the total weighted number of cases for that column as the denominator. Single response variables add up to a maximum of 100 percent, while multiple response variables may total to more than 100 percent.

Means. For variables collected in a continuous scale format (e.g., number of household members), means are computed using the weighted sum of values as the numerator and the total weighted number of cases as the denominator.

The unweighted sample sizes for the results are presented in each table and labeled “n”. To avoid showing unreliable statistics, results are only shown when the unweighted sample size is equal to or greater than 30 cases.

Computed Variables and Indicators25

International standards are used whenever available to compute analytic variables and indicators:

24 T. Croft, n.d.. DHS Data Editing and Imputation.

25 Detailed descriptions provided in handling missing values, data imputation, methods for data analysis, and computed variables and indicators are based, in part from P. D. Rosell, B. O’Colmain, and H. Howell. May 2013. Haiti Baseline Survey. Draft Report. ICF Macro Inc. Report submitted to USAID/Haiti, p.12-14.

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 13

1. Nutrition and food security indicators are computed using international standards as described in the following:

– 2012 Feed the Future Indicator Handbook;

– 2011 Household Hunger Scale: Indicator Definition and Measurement Guide; and 26

– 2010 World Health Organization (WHO) Indicators for Assessing Infant and Young Child Feeding Practices (Part 2 Measurement).27

2. Anthropometry indicators are calculated using the child growth standards and data processing programs published by the WHO in 2006.28

3. WEAI is calculated with guidance and materials provided via the USAID Feed the Future webinar conducted on November 9, 2012 and the Instructional Guide on the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index.29

The details for calculations of the ZOI indicators are provided in Appendix B.

2.4 Survey Sample Design

The FTF FEEDBACK Tajikistan ZOI baseline survey was designed and implemented through coordinated efforts between Zerkalo, Westat, and TANGO International. Table 4 shows the sample design for the ZOI, which is a two-stage cluster sample designed to represent the ZOI.

26 T. Ballard, et al., 2011.

27 World Health Organization (WHO), USAID, AED, FANTA-2, UC-Davis, IFPRI, and UNICEF, 2010. Indicators for assessing infant and young child feeding practices part 2: measurement.

28 http://www.who.int/childgrowth/en/index.html. See also World Health Organization and UNICEF. 2009. WHO

Child Growth Standards and the Identification of Severe Acute Malnutrition in Infants and Children: A Joint Statement by the World Health Organization and the United Nations Children’s Fund. Geneva and New York: WHO and UNICEF.

29 S. Alkire, et al., 2013.

http://www.who.int/childgrowth/en/index.html

Feed the Future Tajikistan Zone of Influence Baseline Report 14

Table 4. Survey sample design for the ZOI

District Stratum ID Strata N of clusters # of HHs

Vakhsh 18 Urban 1 20

Rural 10 200

Jilikul 21 Rural 6 120

Khuroson 22 Rural 6 120

Qubodiyon 23 Rural 10 200

J. Rumi 24 Urban 1 20

Rural 9 180

Bokhtar 25 Urban 1 20

Rural 14 280

A. Jomi 26 Urban 1 20

Rural 9 180

Qumsangir 28 Urban 1 20

Rural 7 140

Sarband 33 Urban 1 20

Rural 2 40

Shaartuz 36 Urban 1 20

Rural 6 120

Yovon 38 Urban 2 40

Rural 10 200

N. Khusrav 40 Rural 2 40

Urban

9 180

Rural

91 1,820

Total 100 2,000

Sample Size Calculation

Per USAID guidance, the sample was designed to be large enough to measure impact of Feed the

Future investments from baseline to endline and to fit within FTF FEEDBACK time and budget constraints. Based on the Feed the Future recommendation to use stunting and underweight in children under 5 years of age, along with poverty prevalence for calculating the required sample size with five percent level of significance, a power of 80 percent, and finding a 20 percent difference or more from baseline to endline, FTF FEEDBACK calculated a sample size of 2,000 households for stunting, 10,000 households for underweight and 850 households for poverty estimates (accounting for a 15 percent nonresponse rate). Sample sizes were calculated using the excel spreadsheet developed by FANTA for this purpose. Interviewing 10,000 households to detect a change in underweight children is not feasible within this project. It is possible to estimate the remaining indicators using a sample size of 2,000. Baseline values used to calculate sample size (stunting and underweight children under 5, and poverty) were obtained from other recent surveys,30 31 while endline values used in sample size calculations are a 20 percent change from the baseline. The sample for underweight women and for the Women’s Dietary Diversity Score is women aged 15-49.

30 World Bank, 2010. Europe and Central Asia Information Brief: Tajikistan Poverty Update 2007-2009.

31 Republic of Tajikistan State Committee on Statistics and UNICEF. 2009. Tajikistan Living Standards Measurement Survey

2007: Indicators at a Glance. Dushanbe. Retrieved from http://stat.tj/en/publication/e-version/.

http://stat.tj/en/publication/e-version/

Feed the Future Tajikistan…