[This material first written in March-July 1994. Some editorial work done in February 2007]
I. INTRODUCTION
I.1. Background
In Welfare States, the cost of maintaining the unemployed is shared by all the taxpayers – in other words, by the society as a whole. In a country like Kenya, however, the burden must be borne by the "host" family – largely the individual's close relatives. Most of what has been written about the dynamics of maintaining the unemployed in Welfare States (see, for example, Wilensky and Lebeaux, 1965; Levitan, 1980) has adopted a macro focus; in other words, a focus on the state and civic levels of assistance – and how the individual responds to these. While such a focus correctly reflects the patterns of maintenance in Welfare States, it is not a very fruitful kind of approach to adopt when dealing with issues related to the welfare of the unemployed in a country such as Kenya.
I.2. Problem Statement
Available literature on unemployment in this country has tended to highlight the consequences of unemployment for two polar extremes – the individual and the society as a whole (see, for example, ILO, 1972; Republic of Kenya, 1983, 1986: 7-9). A very crucial middle, the host household, has been paid much less attention than it deserves – both in theory and in policy prescriptions. Consequently, the impression one gets from the literature is that next to or even more than the unemployed individual, it is the society as a whole that bears most of the direct burden of adult dependence that arises from unemployment. Strictly speaking, however, the direct costs of dependence are borne by the host households, as Kenya is not a welfare state.
The concept of "dependent" is usually associated with minors and other persons who are culturally, physically or by statute inhibited from engaging in independent means of livelihood. Being thus unable to support themselves, their welfare is taken to be the natural responsibility of the parents or "guardians." Their dependence reflects a culturally defined or accepted natural order of things.
However, the school leaver or adult who becomes a dependent by reason of unemployment does not represent – as a preschool child or primary school pupil does, for example – a stage in the human life cycle through which we must all inevitably pass. Those who do maintain unemployed, able-bodied adults or school leavers may not quite see that role as an extension of the norm that minors must be maintained by their parents or guardians. Alternatively, they may see the role as reflecting nothing more than a temporary obligation, the cultural acceptance of which may no longer be as unambiguous as it once might have been. Unless they are severely handicapped, adults of working age are sooner than later expected, and expect, to support themselves. Failure to do so inevitably creates tensions between the dependent and at least some members of the hose household (see for example, Kileff, 1975: 93).
As far as one can determine, no previous study in Kenya has paid any extended attention to the specific problems of unemployed dependents as they relate to their hosts or to their wider milieux.[1] Similarly, no study in Kenya has examined in any depth the economic and microsocial impact of such dependence on host households. Indeed, in the context of the household, little attempt has been made to address the question posed by ILO (1972:69) fifteen years ago: "But what in fact do we know about what actually happens to young people who, when they leave school, do not immediately obtain further education or wage-earning work in the formal sector?"
Granted, the ILO made an attempt to answer its own question, but this was as sketchy as it was theoretical. Hardly a substitute for a detailed, empirically grounded analysis, but a useful pointer to the kinds of factors to look out for in a more in-depth study. For example the ILO (1972: 69-72); see also Paterson, 1980: 13-17; Rempel and Lobdell, 1985: 1920) pointed out that the unemployed or underemployed individual:
is almost certainly bound to rely upon his family and thus to take his place in a family network which will provide him with his livelihood and a base from which to look for a way of satisfying his long-term needs. Thus he will often not be unemployed, but he may be severely frustrated in being unable to obtain the sort of work he wants. The family will also make demands upon his time, initiative and energy - for example, to help with planting and weeding, or to assist a family member who is more profitably employed. Those looking for formal opportunities stay at the homes of those who already have formal employment (usually in the towns) utilizing any contacts they may have but at the same time, often acting as part-time servants.
However, neither the ILO (1972) nor Paterson (1980) nor Rempel and Lobdell (1985) made any attempt to measure the relative magnitudes of the various pressures or demands on the unemployed. Nor were the consequences of the burden of hosting the unemployed examined from the perspective of the host households.
I.3. Objectives
The study had one broad objective: To help fill the still considerable gap in our knowledge concerning the contribution of host households to the maintenance of the unemployed, the social consequences of dependence on the unemployed, and the ways in which the unemployed incorporate their dependence into their overall job-search strategies.
More specifically, the study sought:
1. To show in some detail the socio-economic characteristics of unemployed dependents and the households which host them, in selected urban and rural areas of Kenya; and propose ways in which such knowledge can be harnessed to minimize or overcome dependence on those households. The crude characteristics which may have in the past been suggested by first impressions are no substitute for the kind of systematized presentation proposed here.
2. To give a detailed account of costs which host households incur when they support unemployed dependents. The costs to be assessed are not only monetary in nature - in other words, related to household income - but also socio-psychological. In the latter category of "costs" will be included the objectively measured and/or subjectively perceived consequences of adult dependence in terms of the three broad household objectives discussed by Rempel and Lobdell (1985:5-6). In other words, in terms of household well-being in general.
3. To examine the problems or constraints which unemployed dependents encounter as dependents, and in the course of looking for wage employment or other income-earning opportunities; problems/constraints which arise from or perpetuate their status as unemployed dependents. In this connection, their job-seeking behaviour, and skill-profiles, will be critically examined.
4. On the demand side, to examine pertinent secondary data as a means of identifying the conditions or opportunities which might be exploited to ensure a more rapid expansion of wage and self-employment for specified categories of unemployed dependents in specified areas of Kenya.
I.4. Scope and Limitations
Though unemployed dependents were the focus of this study, they were looked at in the context of their host households. It is not possible to examine the burden of dependence without this approach. As a minimum, the unemployed dependent was treated as a de facto member of the household which maintained him/her until one form or another of employment was secured, if at all.
Unemployed dependents in three urban areas (Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu) and two rural districts (Kakamega and Nyeri) in Kenya were interviewed. Since the three towns and two rural districts were purposively selected, the findings of the study are restricted to the study areas. No attempt is made to generalize the findings beyond the said areas. However, useful findings concerning the study areas are by definition likely to have inferential implications for a significant portion of the dependence landscape in the country as a whole.
II. LITERATURE REVIEW
This brief review serves four main purposes. First, it draws from the literature on household composition, crowding and well-being in general such theoretical and conceptual insights as are salient to the study of unemployed dependents and household welfare in Kenya. It also assesses the adequacy or comprehensiveness of the currently available data in terms of those theoretical and conceptual elements. Second, it highlights the main lines of thinking in the available literature on employment and unemployment in Kenya, particularly in terms of the sources of unemployment and strategies for rapid employment creation.
The dearth of detailed discussion of unemployed dependents in the literature is underscored. This part of the review also sets the stage for a more detailed treatment of objectives 3 and 4 in the final report of the proposed study. Third, it examines the extent to which the data bases already existing in the country can be utilized to further the objectives of this study. Fourth, it generates hypotheses to be tested using the primary data to be collected during field work.
II.1. On Household Composition, Income and Well-Being
The introduction of one or more individuals into the daily life of a household inevitably has, as a minimum, consequences for the pattern of interaction within the built environment the household claims as its preserve. Rempel and Lobdell (1985:5) have correctly argued that:
Household behaviour and objectives are inextricably linked to the size and demographic composition of the household. Both change over time as individuals age and as households experience births, deaths and migration.
Births, deaths and migration are key determinants of household composition. Births add to household membership, deaths subtract from it. So does migration, if it is defined narrowly as out-migration.
As far as the proposed study is concerned, rural-urban migration is of greater interest than births and deaths. If rural-urban migration reduces, albeit "temporarily," the memberships of affected rural households, it has the effect of increasing the memberships of the specific urban households that provide shelter to the new arrivals. As Southall and Gutkind (1957: 132; see also, Paterson, 1980: 17; Rempel and Todaro, 1972: 215; Rempel and Lobdell, 1985:19-20) have observed," relatives use those living in the town as their first contacts in the process of settling down to an urban existence."
There is considerable disagreement on the exact impact of migration on household composition. Southall and Gutkind reported that male siblings were more likely than female ones to be found living with older brothers in town. They noted, moreover, that "Not many women come to town without family contacts" (Southall and Gutkind, 1957:133). Rempel and Lobdell (1985: 19-20), writing nearly thirty years later, supported their observations when they noted that rural-urban migrants are usually young, unmarried and male; and, further, that "out-migration is more likely to be considered an option....if the village already has established a `beachhead' elsewhere" (Rempel and Lobdell, 1985:20). What is not certain, however, is whether Rempel and Lobdell based their comment on updated data or were merely recycling Rempel's findings of roughly fifteen years ago.
In her study of Ghanaian workers, Peil (1972: 163) found that while "very few migrants to towns have their own room from the start," the process of securing accommodation may not be as straightforward as suggested by Southall and Gutkind (1957:132) or Rempel and Lobdell (1985:20). She noted that (Peil, 1972: 163-164):
Nearly two-fifths of the rural migrans had to find accommodation for themselves from the start. A few....were in housing supplied by their employer. Space is not always found with the closest relative. There were cases of men with siblings or a parent in town who stayed with a more distant relative, possibly because the former was already overcrowded. Friends and institutions provided nearly a third of the accommodation....Institutional accommodation include schools and barracks, the help of the local tribal head and masters to whom the young men were apprenticed. Quite a few migrants stayed with strangers met casually on the street or fellow townsmen who were unknown but to whom the migrant had been referred.
Peil's observations seem to reflect some of the patterns which casual observation suggests have been emerging in Kenya in recent years. Similarly, casual observation suggests that rural-urban migration is no longer as male-dominated as it once was. Indeed, a recent study found that youth polytechnic-trained females have the same propensity to reside in urban areas as their male counterparts (Yambo, 1986:147-149). Who the females live with while in urban areas was not looked into, however. In order to determine how closely the empirical situation in Kenya at the present time reflects the observations made by Peil (1972), Southall and Gutkind (1957) and Rempel and Lobdell (1985), the relationship between the unemployed dependent and the host will be examined in some detail in this study. Similarly, other relevant background characteristics of respondents will be recorded. This should enable us to determine the frequency with which particular types of relationships between dependent and host occur within the overall sample.
Hosting unemployed or other adult dependents does not seem to be confined to the lower socio-economic strata. Kileff (1975:93) found that it was common practice even in exclusive black neighbourhoods in pre-independence Harare, in Zimbabwe, to do so. As he put it (Kileff, (1975:93):
All the families have or have had relatives living with them. In some cases it is a grandparent or a sibling. Other times it is nieces or nephews.... One family has educated the husband's nephew through secondary school. He is still living with them and many people think he is their own son. An extreme case is that of a woman who said that the biggest problem in her life occurred when four of her husband's relatives came to live with them.
Whether or not Harare's black elite also accommodated adult dependents not related to them is not clear from Kileff's account. Nor did Kileff give the percentages of households accommodating specified categories of dependents (This is a common weakness of the studies reviewed here).
Boswell (1975:150) went even further. He argued that elite households in Lusaka, Zambia, were more likely to have visitors and non-nuclear relatives than other households. His explanation for this was that the elite he studied "had a total of four or five rooms at their disposal, .... [and so] could more easily house.... visitors than the [nonelities] who had only one room and a small kitchen space" (Boswell, 1975: 150; see also Lillydahl, 1976:109). The inference from this is that the amount of built space occupied by the household is another important determinant of household composition.
However, Boswell's reasoning is not quite corroborated by what Grillo (1973:42) found among railway workers in Kampala, Uganda. He found that 42.6 percent of his sample of non-elite households reported having a friend or relative staying in the house. What is more, "over 20% of the households contained more than seven persons" (Grillo, 1973:40). In other words, some sections of the non-elite community had a significantly higher household density than the average of 5.6 persons reported for Lusaka's elite residential area of New Kamwala (Boswell, 1975: 151). In reality, then, the number of rooms a household has at its disposal may not have an unambiguous impact on household composition. To resolve the debate as far as our sample urban areas are concerned, we will test the hypothesis that the number of rooms a household possesses is positively related to the number of persons within the household.
In testing this and other hypotheses, two points noted by Grillo (1973:42) must be observed, however. First, he noted that there was a tendency among the railway workers to spread out their post-puberty sons around several households at night. This was done in deference to the norm that a son "should not share the same roof as his father" (Grillo, 1973:42). The household densities he reported were therefore lower than they appeared. However, even after we reduce these household densities in proportion to the "sleeping time" spent by the sons in other households, the average density is likely to remain as high as reported by Boswell, if not higher. The second and more important point is that the railway workers studied by Grillo tended to play host to any given guest for a relatively short period - "between three to six months" (Grillo, 1973:42). This "high turnover" means that "in the course of a year a household may have several different guests passing through, and most households have at least one" (Grillo, 1973:42). This high turnover rate must be incorporated into any assessment of household crowding, or of the overall burden of dependents on the household.
It is commonly argued that the more mouths a society or, by implication, a family has to feed, the greater the difficulty it encounters in attempting to provide adequately for its basic and other needs (see, for example, Lillydahl 1976:159; Republic of Kenya, 1983:38, ILO, 1972:124-126). In other words, the larger the size of the household, the lower its quality of life, generally speaking. The implication of his is that a certain unknown percentage of households which host unemployed dependents may be doing so only at the expense of the quality of their family life, or of their core household objectives (for a discussion of three core household objectives see Rempel and Lobdell, 1985:5-6).
However, in her own study of household saving patterns in urban Kenya, Lillydahl (1976:159) found that "saving is not differentially affected by additional children after the second child." This suggests that households are able to maintain their target levels of savings/surplus - other words, to achieve one of the core household objectives suggested by Rempel and Lobdell - regardless of household size. If that is so, is there something else that the household sacrifices? Lillydahl (1976:160) argued that:
Although there is considerable variance in the number of adults per household, household saving is invariant to adult demands on consumption suggesting that adults finance their added consumption either by scale economies or by added income, or at the expense of the quality of the average household consumption.
If it is true, as Lillydahl suggested, that there are three possible ways of "financing" increased consumption, one still has the task of determining the relative significance of the three "strategies" for specified household categories. Lillydahl did not address herself to that question. In the course of the literature review, no study focusing on Kenya that did so was found.
It can be argued, however, that while the additional income "strategy" is plausible for parents faced with the prospect of an additional child - an additional parental responsibility which by its nature is long-term - it is not really a viable option for a household which may not know when or for how long it will next have to play host to a non-nuclear relative or other "temporary" dependent. This is particularly so if it turns out, as Grillo (1973:42) suggested, that most "guests" stay for only three to six months. It would appear equally obvious that even if they wanted to, most households are not able to maintain such "guests" by means of their savings for more than a few weeks (Lillydahl's finding suggest that few households would see that as the most rational way of utilizing their limited savings). Similarly, for most households, scale economies are likely to be exhausted after the second child or so. Consequently, it is hypothesized in this proposal that additional adults can be maintained only at the expense of the quality of material consumption within the household. In testing the hypothesis, one would of course have to determine the extent to which the additional adult actually participates in material consumption within the household. As Gutkind (1968:387) pointed out, not all of the unemployed are entirely dependent on their hosts. Some are able to maintain "remarkable measure of independence" by being involved in occasional jobs (Gutkind, 1968:387).
Household well-being is not measured entirely in terms of the level of consumption of tangible goods, or of the quality of goods consumed. It is also a function, inter alia, of the quality of household interaction and the amount of space - in terms of such measures as persons per room - within which the interaction occurs.
The quality of interaction is in turn a function of the numbers and categories of actors involved. In other words, the level of crowding is an important variable in any consideration of household well-being. As Gove, Hughes and Galle (1979:59; see also Baldassare, 1981:110) have argued:
relationships in the home are enduring and play a very important role in determining the well-being and behaviour of the individual... Disruption of these relationships due to overcrowding is thus apt to have serious repercussions.
However, recent empirical research abroad on the consequences of crowding within the household has left unresolved the question of whether or not household crowding has significant effect on household well-being. Booth and Edwards (1976) arrived at the conclusion that household crowding did not have significant effect on family relations. On the other hand, Gove, Hughes and Galle (1979) found that household crowding was strongly related to poor mental health, poor family relations and poor child care. Furthermore, Gove and Hughes (1980:865-869) dismissed the findings of Booth and Edwards (1976) on grounds of serious methodological errors. In a subsequent study, Edwards, Booth and Edwards (1982:254 - 255) found that while the type of dwelling a family lived in had modest effects on family relationships, these effects were independent of the level of crowding within the dwelling. In other words, the study reaffirmed the finding by Booth and Edwards (1976) that crowding had no significant effect on family relations.
Baldassare took the debate several steps further. First, he argued that "some individuals and households can adjust to high density while others have special problems with this situation "(Baldassare, 1981:110). Second, he suggested that "the social characteristics of households or their inhabitants may create either unique difficulties or opportunities for adjusting to high density" (Baldassare, 1981:110). Third, he argued that "the ability to control household space and its uses "has a direct bearing on one's ability to adjust to high density - and on "the expressed degree of satisfaction by household members" (Baldassare, 1981:110 and 116). That is to say, the level of adjustment and satisfaction varied positively with the level of power wielded within the household. In the context of the proposed study, this suggests that we should expect the adult dependent living in a crowded household to manifest a lower level of adjustment or a higher level of dissatisfaction than the head or co-head (wife) of the household. However, Kileff's (1975:93) study of Harare (then called Salisbury) yielded evidence suggesting that in the African context married women may be prone to even lower levels of adjustment or higher levels of dissatisfaction when non-nuclear relatives from the husband's side contribute to crowding in the household. The hypothesis that household crowding more negatively affects the household co-head than the unemployed dependent will be tested in terms of the level of adjustment or dissatisfaction.
Just as Berger and Luckmann (1967:47-183) argued that we apprehend society in two ways, objectively and subjectively; so have Gove, Hughes and Galle (1979:62 and 64-66) argued that household crowding has an objective as well as a mediating subjective dimension. The notions of "well-being" and "quality of life" are equally value-loaded, much as we strive to attach objective indicators to them. In view of this, it is important to incorporate in the proposed study the subjective aspects and/or repercussions of adult dependence, household crowding and household well-being. This subjective dimension was lacking in the otherwise useful studies by Lillydahl (1976:109) and Boswell (1975:150), for instance. A focus on the subjective dimension generates questions such as: Do perceptions of household crowding tally with objective measures of household density? Are the elite psychologically better conditioned to accommodated unemployed dependents than non-elites? These questions will be addressed.
The foregoing review underscores the fact that while there is a lot in the literature reviewed that pertains to Kenya, very little attempt has been made hitherto to relate the actual empirical situation in Kenya to the richness of the theoretical issues only briefly touched upon above.
II.2 On Unemployment and Employment Creation
There is an ever growing body of literature on the unemployment problem in Kenya (see, for example, Ghai, 1970; ILO, 1972; Kinyanjui, 1974; Republic of Kenya, 1983, 1986). In all this literature, however, there is very little that touches upon or alludes to the problem of unemployed dependents, as we have already seen. The essence of the argument in the literature is as follows (see Yambo, 1986:3): Increasing unemployment among school leavers is seen mainly as a consequence either of the largely theoretical or "academic" education which the youth get in school, or the youth's consequent preference for white-collar jobs (Republic of Kenya, 1983:50; see also Gutkind, 1968:388).
The educational system is singled out as the main factor engendering both tendencies, as it has not paid adequate attention to "practical skills" in its curricula. Alternatively, it is accused of failure to peg its output to the level of identified demand for specified skills. All this has resulted in (a) imbalance at various levels between the types and quantity of skills produced and those actually demanded; and, (b) a paradox of "acute shortage of manpower and massive unemployment" (Republic of Kenya, 1983:48-49).
One solution that has been proposed is an expanded system of technical and vocational training in the country (Republic of Kenya, 1976:91-99; and 1981a:39-48). However, the need to temper such expansion with "a coherent policy on manpower planning, development and utilization" (Republic of Kenya, 1983:49, see also Yambo, 1985) has been underscored. Indeed, a recent study found that the system technical training already in place in the country has a capacity and comprehensiveness which approximate current and likely demand for the respective skills (Yambo, 1986:196-198). More importantly, the study found that 17.8 percent of Youth Polytechnic leavers and 9.4 percent of Harambee Institute of Technology leavers were unemployed at the time of interview (Yambo, 1986:116). In other words, technical training alone cannot solve the unemployment problem. The real challenge now is how to expand the demand for an increasingly sophisticated labour.
Before we turn to strategies for employment creation, let us look at some of the unemployment figures. According to the latest national development plan, the level of unemployment in Kenya stood at 10.5 percent of the total labour force in 1981, compared to 7.1 percent in 1976. In 1984, the level of unemployment was estimated to be 13.1 percent of the labour force (see Republic of Kenya, 1986:8). In other words, unemployment affected an increasing number of Kenyans between 1976 and 1984. During most of that period-that is to say, 1976 to 1981 - employment grew at an average rate of 3 percent per year (Republic of Kenya, 1983b:6), well below the annual population growth rate.
Government planners have noted that the number of unemployed Kenyans is likely to grow in the years ahead. Thus (see Republic of Kenya, 1986:7):
Even if the economy created jobs at 3.4 percent a year from 1984 to 2000 which would be a small improvement over the decade from 1972 to 1982, the unemployment rate would increase substantially.
In order for the employment growth rate to keep just ahead of population growth rate, it would have to grow at about 4.2 percent per annum on average. However, Government planners note that such a growth rate "would be unprecedented in Kenya's history" (Republic of Kenya, 1986:8).
According to the 1968-69 urban household budget survey (see ILO, 1972:56), unemployment among dependent adult male members of surveyed households (in other words, among non-head males) in the urban areas covered in this study was as follows: Nairobi, 15.2 percent; Mombasa, 20.0 percent; and Kisumu, 11.7 percent. Similarly, the percentage of females whose work was confined to household duties was as follows: Nairobi, 77.5 percent among married women and 50.0 percent among unmarried ones; Mombasa, 85.1 percent among married women and 67.2 percent among unmarried ones; and Kisumu, 86.1 percent among married women and 50.4 percent among unmarried women. In gender terms, the data suggest that though dependence among males was significant, adult dependence is primarily female dependence.
The dependence rates cited are compounded by the fact that in each of the three urban areas, a percentage of household heads was also unemployed: 4.2 percent in Nairobi, 9.8 percent in Mombasa and 4.0 percent in Kisumu (ILO, 1972:56). No follow-up studies to update and expand on the findings of the 1968-69 survey were discovered in the course of the library search for literature. However, the impression one gets is of a continuing high level of dependence in the three urban areas. It is not known to what extent urban households with unemployed heads maintained other unemployed adults. Theory suggests that there should be a zero or near-zero incidence of such households, unless the affected households have other or substitute breadwinners. Information on this point will be sought in the proposed study.
Let us now go back to the question of demand for labour. As Ghai (1970:10-16) pointed out, a number of measures have been undertaken to directly or indirectly reduce unemployment in post-colonial Kenya. During the first decade or so after independence, there were five main measures to that effect. First, Tripartite Agreements involving the government, employers and Trade Unions whereby public and private sector employers agreed to recruit 10 percent more workers. Second, unemployment relief through road construction projects. Third, settlement schemes to re-settle the landless. Fourth, Kenyanization of commerce, industry – and, one may add, the civil service. Fifth, technical and vocational training through the National Youth Service, Youth Polytechnics, technical schools and similar institutions.
The Tripartite Agreements and road construction projects turned out to have only a short-term impact on unemployment; and the latter proved too costly as well, and had to be abandoned (Ghai, 1970:10). The settlement schemes were "by far the greatest contribution to the relief of unemployment.... By the middle of 1968, some 45,000 families had been settled under various types of schemes" (Ghai, 1970:10). However, the "settlement scheme" option has since lost virtually all steam, as land has become increasingly scarce. Similarly, the goal of Kenyanization, having been practically fully achieved, is no longer a viable measure. Technical training as a solution to unemployment, to which attention was only beginning to turn at the end of the sixties, was virtually elevated to the level of the panacea in the public mind in the first half of the Eighties. However, the limitations of technical training per se as the solution to unemployment are now increasingly appreciated.
For the first half of the Seventies, Ghai recommended four ways of generating employment. First, "higher rates of output growth" (Ghai, 1970:12). Second, the formulation of an effective income policy to prevent both "rapidly rising wages" and a widening of the gap between rural and urban real incomes. He argued that rapidly rising wages encourage labour saving in general; and a widening rural-urban income gap exacerbates urban unemployment through increased rural-urban migration (Ghai, 1970: 12). Fourth, as a prerequisite for all the rest, a concerted effort "to control population growth" (Ghai, 1970:16).
Clearly, the four measures he suggested have by no means been overtaken by events in the Nineties. The achievement of higher rates of output remains as central to government plans as it was then. Yet the actual results have varied from year to year, due to internal and external factors. His recommendation concerning wage and population growth rates remains controversial. The former has not been pursued with any great vigour. Indeed, Unionists who otherwise champion the cause of labour intensive production would appear more inclined to oppose than support measures to prevent rapid wage increases. Family planning programmes, rather than population control per se, have been considerably intensified in the last few years. The suggestion that we pay particular attention to rural development was at least implicitly been taken up in the Eighties via the District Focus for Rural Development. How effective the District Focus has been as a strategy for generating employment in specified rural areas has not yet been determined, however.
Three additional generators of employment have recently received considerable attention - though the concept they embody are not all that new. They are: the export -led of economic growth (Republic of Kenya, 1986:96-98), the Jua Kali/informal sector (Republic of Kenya, 1986:54-58), massive government expenditure on such programmes as rural electrification and large scale housing construction programmes (Kasina, 1987: B23-B25).
II.3. On Existing Data Bases
A survey of data bases in the country suggests that none contains the full range of data on adult dependants which are required in a study such as this. For instance, there is no database with current information on the distribution of households with unemployed dependants by income group, household size or geographical location.
The most comprehensive database in terms of the objectives of the study is the national population census. For the 1969 census year, information levels of household members, as well as on their house hold heads. The rural or urban areas of residence of all enumerated persons was also recorded. (Republic of Kenya, 1971a:80-82; 1971b:50). For the 1979 census year, the respondents' relationship to their respective household heads were explored in somewhat greater detail (Republic of Kenya, 1981b:19). The sex, age and educational levels of all enumerated persons were once again recorded. It is worth noting, however, that though the 1969 and 1979 censuses treated the household as the unit of analysis, it is not certain that the actual unit of analysis . The tables given in Republic of Kenya (1971b :80-82; and 19781b: 50-52) suggest that the individual was effective unit of analysis.
Another important source of national level data, it would appear, is the urban household survey apparently carried out in the very early seventies. It is upon this data base that Lillydahl (1976:115) relied for her thesis, which we have already made reference to. No further details concerning , for example, the urban areas covered in the survey are available as at time of writing. Indeed no clear reference to the survey has been identified in any of the other sources consulted. The urban food purchasing survey of 1977 (see Republic of Kenya and FAO, 1977) which closely approximates the urban household survey mentioned by Lillydahl, was conducted after Lillydahl's thesis had been written, Mysteriously, Republic of Kenya and FAO make no mention of the urban household survey. It is probably the case though the survey was carried out, it has never been officially released.
One would have expected the most recent Integrated Rural Surveys carried our in 1976-1979 to be major source of data pertaining to our sample. However, a look at the modular questionnaires used (Republic of Kenya, 1981c.33-40) shows that the surveys were not geared to generate data on unemployment dependants.
The foregoing brief survey illustrates the fact that besides the national census data, the full analysis of which is yet to be published, one must go back to the 1963 survey of income, expenditure and consumption of Nairobi's middle income Africans for secondary data with close parallels to the proposed study (see Republic of Kenya, 1964 34-37). The survey relates respondents income and household size to their relationship to the other household members. The focus is on middle income Africans - not unemployed dependents. However, the composition of the respondent' households given in considerable detail. Still, neither the census nor the census nor the survey data a substitute for the data needs of the proposed study. Our research objectives, the hypotheses isolated for testing, demand the collection of more focused more up to data. However, where possible or necessary, and more up to data in secondary source will be made.
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