Gender inequality in multidimensional welfare deprivation in West Africa: The case of Burkina Faso and Togo
Abstract
Purpose
The importance of gender equality is reflected not only in the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), but also in the World Bank’s Gender Action Plan launched in 2007 as well as in other treaties and actions undertaken at regional and international levels. Unlike other gender poverty works, which are mostly based on monetary measurement, the purpose of this paper is to adopt a non-monetary approach.
Design/methodology/approach
The present study makes use of a counting approach to examine gender issues in Burkina Faso and Togo using household surveys, namely Enquête Intégrale surles Conditions de Vie des Ménages (2009/2010) and Core Welfare Indicators Questionnaire (2011), respectively. It focusses on six dimensions (housing, basic utilities, assets, education, employment and access to credit) largely recognized as MDG targets.
Findings
Main findings indicate that overall individuals are the most deprived in education in Burkina Faso, while the reverse situation is true in Togo. Gender inequality is observed in all dimensions since women always seem to be more deprived than men. The situation is also marked by regional disparities. Moreover, the assessment of dimensional contributions shows different patterns for each country. While employment proves to be the main contributor of gender inequality in Burkina Faso, three dimensions (assets, access to credit and employment) account together for most of the total contribution to gender inequality in Togo.
Originality/value
The main contribution of the paper is to use a multidimensional method (counting approach) to assess gender deprivation, with countries comparison. It also proposes an interesting combination of the decomposition by dimension with the subgroup’s decomposition in order to determine the largest contributor to gender inequality.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors are grateful to Sabina Alkire and Jean-Yves Duclos for comments on earlier versions. The authors acknowledgments also go to the participants of the 2nd Development Dialogue of World Bank Ouagadougou Office.
Citation
Agbodji, A.E., Batana, Y.M. and Ouedraogo, D. (2015), "Gender inequality in multidimensional welfare deprivation in West Africa: The case of Burkina Faso and Togo", International Journal of Social Economics, Vol. 42 No. 11, pp. 980-1004. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSE-11-2013-0270
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2015, Emerald Group Publishing Limited