Poverty and inequality measurement and determinants : the case of Zambia

Includes bibliographical references (leaves 98-103).This thesis investigates the role of education, employment and household structure in explaining poverty and inequality in Zambia between 1991 and 2004. This period was characterized by macroeconomic and structural adjustment reforms that led to declining public sector employment due to liquidations and retrenchments and changed education distribution due to, among many other reasons, the introduction of user fees. Trends in poverty and inequality are profiled. It is found that poverty increased while inequality reduced. The thesis explores some key drivers of these changes. Using a semi-parametric kernel density re-weighting approach, it is found that changes in education endowments and economic returns to education, employment and household attributes explain a substantial part of changes in the distribution of consumption and therefore inequality

Are Savings Working for Zambia’s Growth?

This article analyses the effect of savings on economic growth in Zambia. Using vector auto regression, the article finds that economic growth ‘Granger’ causes domestic savings. This goes contrary to the neoclassical theory on the relationship between economic growth and savings. However, the article argues that a case of increasing domestic savings mobilization holds on the premise that doing so may influence growth indirectly by attracting partnerships with international capital thereby helping to inject new technology in the economy which is undoubtedly vital for growth. The argument is strengthened further by observing that East Asian countries have grown faster than Latin American countries from the 1960s. The key distinguishing factor was that the saving rate in East Asian countries was higher than the rate in Latin American countries

Are Savings Working for Zambia’s Growth?

This article analyses the effect of savings on economic growth in Zambia. Using vector auto regression, the article finds that economic growth ‘Granger’ causes domestic savings. This goes contrary to the neoclassical theory on the relationship between economic growth and savings. However, the article argues that a case of increasing domestic savings mobilization holds on the premise that doing so may influence growth indirectly by attracting partnerships with international capital thereby helping to inject new technology in the economy which is undoubtedly vital for growth. The argument is strengthened further by observing that East Asian countries have grown faster than Latin American countries from the 1960s. The key distinguishing factor was that the saving rate in East Asian countries was higher than the rate in Latin American countries

Returns to Technical and Vocational Education and Training: Evidence from Zambia

The study seeks to investigate the returns to technical and vocational education and training (TVET) in Zambia using the 2014 Labour Force Survey (LFS). We adopt the modified Mincerian model and the fixed effects approach. We find that individuals who possessed TVET skills with certification, regardless of their gender or their place of residence, significantly earned more than their counterparts in wage employment without any TVET skills. We also find that males with vocational skills with certification significantly earned more than their female counterparts with the same TVET skills with certification, a sign of labour market discriminatory bias by employers. Moreover, we observe that individuals residing in rural areas with TVET skills with certification significantly earned more than their counterparts in urban areas with the same TVET skills with certification because employers may want to lure TVET graduates to relocate from urban areas to rural areas. However, individuals with TVET skills without certification did not significantly earn more than their colleagues in wage employment without TVET skills. In some cases, individuals with TVET training but without certification were observed to be worse off than their counterparts without TVET training in wage employment. Given the above evidence, it is imperative that the Zambian government significantly increases spending towards vocational training as well as invest in TVET infrastructure in order to improve TVET enrollment rates. This will enhance the employability of Zambians across the country and generate substantial returns to TVET skills. However, there is need for a deliberate policy that will ensure that females with the same vocational skills as their male counterparts earn the same returns. There is also need for deliberate awareness campaigns on the benefits of TVET training in order to reduce the stigma around TVET

The potential to expand antiretroviral therapy by improving health facility efficiency: evidence from Kenya, Uganda, and Zambia.

BACKGROUND: Since 2000, international funding for HIV has supported scaling up antiretroviral therapy (ART) in sub-Saharan Africa. However, such funding has stagnated for years, threatening the sustainability and reach of ART programs amid efforts to achieve universal treatment. Improving health system efficiencies, particularly at the facility level, is an increasingly critical avenue for extending limited resources for ART; nevertheless, the potential impact of increased facility efficiency on ART capacity remains largely unknown. Through the present study, we sought to quantify facility-level technical efficiency across countries, assess potential determinants of efficiency, and predict the potential for additional ART expansion. METHODS: Using nationally-representative facility datasets from Kenya, Uganda and Zambia, and measures adjusting for structural quality, we estimated facility-level technical efficiency using an ensemble approach that combined restricted versions of Data Envelopment Analysis and Stochastic Distance Function. We then conducted a series of bivariate and multivariate regression analyses to evaluate possible determinants of higher or lower technical efficiency. Finally, we predicted the potential for ART expansion across efficiency improvement scenarios, estimating how many additional ART visits could be accommodated if facilities with low efficiency thresholds reached those levels of efficiency. RESULTS: In each country, national averages of efficiency fell below 50 % and facility-level efficiency markedly varied. Among facilities providing ART, average efficiency scores spanned from 50 % (95 % uncertainty interval (UI), 48-62 %) in Uganda to 59 % (95 % UI, 53-67 %) in Zambia. Of the facility determinants analyzed, few were consistently associated with higher or lower technical efficiency scores, suggesting that other factors may be more strongly related to facility-level efficiency. Based on observed facility resources and an efficiency improvement scenario where all facilities providing ART reached 80 % efficiency, we predicted a 33 % potential increase in ART visits in Kenya, 62 % in Uganda, and 33 % in Zambia. Given observed resources in facilities offering ART, we estimated that 459,000 new ART patients could be seen if facilities in these countries reached 80 % efficiency, equating to a 40 % increase in new patients. CONCLUSIONS: Health facilities in Kenya, Uganda, and Zambia could notably expand ART services if the efficiency with which they operate increased. Improving how facility resources are used, and not simply increasing their quantity, has the potential to substantially elevate the impact of global health investments and reduce treatment gaps for people living with HIV

Returns to Technical and Vocational Education and Training: Evidence from Zambia

The study seeks to investigate the returns to technical and vocational education and training (TVET) in Zambia using the 2014 Labour Force Survey (LFS). We adopt the modified Mincerian model and the fixed effects approach. We find that individuals who possessed TVET skills with certification, regardless of their gender or their place of residence, significantly earned more than their counterparts in wage employment without any TVET skills. We also find that males with vocational skills with certification significantly earned more than their female counterparts with the same TVET skills with certification, a sign of labour market discriminatory bias by employers. Moreover, we observe that individuals residing in rural areas with TVET skills with certification significantly earned more than their counterparts in urban areas with the same TVET skills with certification because employers may want to lure TVET graduates to relocate from urban areas to rural areas. However, individuals with TVET skills without certification did not significantly earn more than their colleagues in wage employment without TVET skills. In some cases, individuals with TVET training but without certification were observed to be worse off than their counterparts without TVET training in wage employment. Given the above evidence, it is imperative that the Zambian government significantly increases spending towards vocational training as well as invest in TVET infrastructure in order to improve TVET enrollment rates. This will enhance the employability of Zambians across the country and generate substantial returns to TVET skills. However, there is need for a deliberate policy that will ensure that females with the same vocational skills as their male counterparts earn the same returns. There is also need for deliberate awareness campaigns on the benefits of TVET training in order to reduce the stigma around TVET

Universal health coverage and the poor: to what extent are health financing policies making a difference? Evidence from a benefit incidence analysis in Zambia

International audienceAbstract Background Zambia has invested in several healthcare financing reforms aimed at achieving universal access to health services. Several evaluations have investigated the effects of these reforms on the utilization of health services. However, only one study has assessed the distributional incidence of health spending across different socioeconomic groups, but without differentiating between public and overall health spending and between curative and maternal health services. Our study aims to fill this gap by undertaking a quasi-longitudinal benefit incidence analysis of public and overall health spending between 2006 and 2014. Methods We conducted a Benefit Incidence Analysis (BIA) to measure the socioeconomic inequality of public and overall health spending on curative services and institutional delivery across different health facility typologies at three time points. We combined data from household surveys and National Health Accounts. Results Results showed that public (concentration index of − 0.003; SE 0.027 in 2006 and − 0.207; SE 0.011 in 2014) and overall (0.050; SE 0.033 in 2006 and − 0.169; SE 0.011 in 2014) health spending on curative services tended to benefit the poorer segments of the population while public (0.241; SE 0.018 in 2007 and 0.120; SE 0.007 in 2014) and overall health spending (0.051; SE 0.022 in 2007 and 0.116; SE 0.007 in 2014) on institutional delivery tended to benefit the least-poor. Higher inequalities were observed at higher care levels for both curative and institutional delivery services. Conclusion Our findings suggest that the implementation of UHC policies in Zambia led to a reduction in socioeconomic inequality in health spending, particularly at health centres and for curative care. Further action is needed to address existing barriers for the poor to benefit from health spending on curative services and at higher levels of care

Assessing the population-wide exposure to lead pollution in Kabwe, Zambia : blood lead level estimation based on survey data

In this study, we aim to quantitatively assess the population-wide exposure to lead pollution in Kabwe, Zambia. While Kabwe is known as one of the most significant cases of environmental pollution in the world, the available information does not provide a representative figure on residents’ lead poisoning conditions. To obtain a representative figure, we estimate blood lead level (BLL) of the representative sample of Kabwe by combining two datasets: BLL data collected based on residents’ voluntary participation to blood sampling and socioeconomic data collected for approximately 900, randomly chosen households that represent Kabwe population. The results show that the representative mean BLL is slightly lower than the one observed in previous studies but a few times higher than the recent standard BLL of 5μg/dL above which health risks become significant